A productive visit down to Adem at Ergen Motorsport today. He has done an excellent job with the engine wiring (it was brilliant to hear the engine running!!) but was rightly concerned about the rest of the loom, which wasn't a great job by myself to start with, and subsequent tinkering and hacking has rendered it impossible to decipher and in a potentially dangerous state.

Given further that my original dash and gauges have deteriorated significantly whilst in 'storage' for the last 5 years, Adem has agreed to source an E36 loom and clocks which he should be able to install, just leaving me with the lights etc to wire up and an original E36 instrument cluster to fit into a new dash.

Although this will mean much extra work and expense, it must be justified in order to ensure a safe and tidy final job.

Tim

Well I collected the Sportster from Adem at the beginning of October. He had done a superb job, exactly as expected.

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...pszgmsbq2e.jpg

He left me a bit of wiring to do...
http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...psszxi0ayb.jpg

And rebuilding the dash:
http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...psxr6nucqx.jpg

(apologies for poor quality pics)

This week I connected up the fuel pumps and (after realising the battery needed charging and the earth connection was loose) it started!! Very satisfying!!

The front wiring is more or less complete (just a rad fan controller to put in) although there is more to do on the rear, as I will have to strip out my previous rear loom and wire up the E30 loom. Then a bit of tidying up and I can start putting the bodywork back on (panels now a nicely painted BMW chilli red colour!).

Tim

Full marks for perseverance!!
It must be great feeling to know that you will finally be on the road after all this time. Well done for not giving up.
cheers,
Peter

Tim,

That's great news. Well done. You must be 'bustin' to get it moving and keep it moving again and again and again and under it's own steam....................

You were part of the inspiration that made me start mine 5 years ago so it's been a long road for you. I hope 2016 sees it on the road for real :smile:

Nigel

Well the 'tidying up' took longer than expected, but I now have the dash and scuttle back on.

All working (except I got the side repeaters the wrong way round, oops! Fortunately a simple fix).

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...psfufg1rtu.jpg

All the aluminium panels have been powder coated and look really good. Hoping for some fine weather next week to get the car out of the garage and fit the remaining panels!!

Tim

Hi Tim,
Great to see your progress. I am dwelling behind but hope to have my car back with an exhaust fitted in the next couple of weeks. I am glad to see I am not the only one going for aero screens - they look great. Also, nice work on the wiring for the battery - you have given me an idea!
Cheers
Cammy

Thanks Cammy.

Trying to do several more jobs, including preparing the boot:

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...psnkyfzxak.jpg

Yes, it's warmer to do it in the lounge :) I intend to mount all the lights and fix the wiring inside, leaving one multi-connector on each side to plug together once the boot is back on.

Unfortunately discovered that I should have put the small side panels in before tightening those ridiculously difficult to get to bolts which hold the scuttle down. Oops.

Also found some excessive play in the steering column so have decided to replace that as well. Just when I thought the jobs list was getting shorter!

Tim

Today I drove the almost-reassembled Sportster for the first time in over 6 years! Admittedly it was only from inside the garage to just outside the garage but I'm counting it!

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...pswn76ddjn.jpg

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...ps9afdhadd.jpg

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...psdobiliv8.jpg

The only problem I encountered was that when I put the side lights on, the RH indicators came on (without flashing, just continuous). Without the side lights on, all the indicators and hazards worked correctly. Is this an earthing problem??

Hopefully the rear tub and RH exhaust tomorrow!

Cheers
Tim

PS Tip for anyone else rebuilding their Sportster. Doors, then A-panels, then scuttle. Unless you enjoy taking very fiddly nuts off lots of times.

Got there :)

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...ps5fyfyuoq.jpg

http://i1066.photobucket.com/albums/...psa4xauypz.jpg

Had a little worrying moment on a short test drive when the speedo wasn't working, but fortunately turned out to be just a loose connection.

MOT booked for next week.....

Tim

Looks very smart, well done!

Good luck with the MOT.....

Brilliant. Hope its a little warmer for your drive to the MOT.

Robin

Which cooler have you used?
 

Hi there, I have a question about which cooler did you use? I saw at the picture above but I cannot decide which model you picked it from...?

Hi
It's the Marlin-supplied radiator but to be honest it under-performs in stationary or slow-moving traffic. I think a lot of builders have used bigger and better radiators and fans and I would go down this route if I was starting again.
Hope this helps.
Tim

I thought Rikard was asking about colour?

Oops, mis-communication error!?!
The red is BMW Chilli Red, as used on their Mini's I believe. The silver powder coating was described as titanium by my powder coater.
Tim

Tim

My comment was slightly tongue in cheek! You were probably right first time- perhaps Rikard will be along soon to put me straight!😯

No Timbo - you understood my bad english right - for a short moment I forgot Radiator - and wrote cooler.... My mistake - but now we found out another interesting thing about your building - thanks for information about both things... :thumb:

I used a radiator from an early E30 6cyl. Don't remember what year - but I know the design changed in later years of production. Brand new from ebay. It has the advantage of all the pipes in the right place and is a standard of the shelf item. Fitted fine after a bit of fettling and cooling performance is good.

Robin

Thanks for that info Robin, I may well change it over at some point soon, especially given yesterday's events at the MOT...

... which was mixed news. Failed on headlight adjustment (easy fix), brake light staying on (needs a spring) and emissions (has always been very close to the line because of the length and number of joins in the pipework, but hopefully we can sort this).

During the test the Sportster did manage to empty the cooling system over the floor of the test station (was never happy standing still!), and then suffered from power loss. Idles fine but struggles big time when you put your foot on the accelerator.

Sounds like a MAF sensor problem to me, which I think it has suffered from before in the dim distant past. Since the air intake is in the passenger footwell (!) I suspect it is susceptible to 'unclean' air over a period of time??

So may be a few more days yet...
Timbo

Timbo
Looks great. Unrecognisable from when Adem fired up your engine for me to show he could do the ECU work.
Nice job.
Chris