Stage 1 V8

Look after yourself. Start again in the spring.

After a long and patient wait, this finally arrived today:-



Guess I'll have to crack on and fit it

Wow - looks good - Autosparks ? How long did you wait for it ?

Yep Autosparks. They really took a knock from covid restrictions so accepted the 16 week lead time. I ordered mine on the 8th October last year, so 16 weeks with Christmas/New Year break. I was relaxed about it as I was stopped for winter anyway.

Christ, that's a long time - although I've been waiting for a special hood for my hcpu from AWT since June...

Rewiring

I bit the bullet and got stuck in to my re-wire today. What a pig of a job trying to neatly route the loom through the exhaust heat shield and connecting up to the starter motor with such restricted access, and having already suffered putting the old harness back in only to be taking it back out; maddening. Good job the body is off or I'd probably have lost my cool.


Nice new engine harness first. This has to go in behind and under the exhaust manifold...



...and the old worn and oily one has to come out.



I'm feeling the pain in my knuckles as I type this after squeezing in, around, and under, trying to get at the starter connections. It really shouldn't be so awkward but it is.



Old one out.




Moving on to the main harness next. I thought it prudent to first label up everything I was taking off of the instruments so that I have a better chance of identifying each of the wires in the new harness. Autosparks have done a splendid job of matching the colours so all being well, with this spaghetti nightmare...



...and these reference photos...







...I should have a better chance of success.

And the main harness bites the dust.




I'll have to do a bit of refurbishing work on the bezel and gauges, but it's in pretty good nick.



Time to unwrap the next bag and start routing the new main harness. Not sure I'm best pleased with the blue wrapping; good job I'm not rivet counting!



Now who knew it was possible to waste hours trying to get wires and grommets to cooperate; my back is killing me now and my hands are aching, but got it where I want it after a bit of persuading.






Attached to backside of the bulkhead. I fitted a pair of rivnuts when I refitted to old harness so it was simple screw job; no drilling out rivets! Plugged straight into the wiper motor no bother.



And left it there for today.



Next job will be to reconnect all the instruments and switches after I check out the speedometer, etc., and do any cleaning needed.

I shudder to think what mine would be like, with all the defence force bumph in it

Looks a proper job.

Rewiring

Not much progress today. I only got about 3 hours on it. I started refurbishing the speedometer but gave it up as a bad job before I did something silly like break the glass. It has either glued itself down on the old and perished gasket, or 'that person' has been there before me and used sealant. Anyway, it wasn't coming apart without breaking. I managed to remove some crud from the face bezel but that was about all. Bit of a wast of time, although my most beloved SWMBO said it wasn't a waste as I'd made positive progress!



You can see the problem here...



...I used some dichloromethane stripper to soften and remove the crud.





I gave it up as a bad job after struggling to remove the glass. I don't really need to be worrying about broken gauges at this juncture, and all in all the speedometer isn't so bad that it needs to be messed with like this. I re-painted the bezel and put it back together.

A quick clean up and I resumed connecting things. This is proving to be less straight forward than I planned. Funny how even with everything labelled and reference photos, it still proves challenging matching everything up. Fortunately the colour coding of the new harness has been reproduced faithfully. With the correct colours, grouping, and my circuit diagram print outs, I'm just about succeeding in getting things right (fingers crossed, touch wood)





Not that much done but at least it's progress. Fun will be finding the correct wiring for the optional stuff, hazards, heater, etc.

Hi,
On the speedo under the ring there is rubber or something (what you removed with dichloromethane). Did you replace it with spare or just placed metal ring on top of the glass?
Just asking as hit the same issue with mine

tomo_ wrote: ↑Wed Feb 09, 2022 7:06 am Hi,
On the speedo under the ring there is rubber or something (what you removed with dichloromethane). Did you replace it with spare or just placed metal ring on top of the glass?
Just asking as hit the same issue with mine

I've just put it back together without the rubber gaskets for now. I've since found out that there are spares available for these Smiths gauges inc. glass, bezel, and gasket. I'll likely order spares and revisit this later on. I'm going to focus on the wiring and getting the V8 fired up.

This is the best most comprehensive information i have ever had the pleasure of finding on any website.
thank you kindly for sharing this. it really assists in the best way possible towards my 109 V8 build.

kindest regards

Vido

Blimey, you're welcome. I'm fighting to get my Discovery 2 repaired and back on the road at the moment, so work on the 109 has been temporarily halted. I hope to be able to resume soon.

While the Stage One has been patiently waiting for me to sort out my Discovery 2, there has been a bit of weather. Hot sun and UV now followed by a bit of thunder, lightning, and wind!





Guess what I've been doing today

A cheapish PVC tarp would cover it for the winter.

I managed to lash something together with a large DPM sheet I had tucked away. Bit of a struggle on my own but hopefully it will suffice (it won't stand up to a gale) until I can replace the cover. I have replacement on order but no delivery date. The Stage One is also covered with a tarp so fingers crossed.