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Old 21st September 2019, 07:58
Mick O'Malley Mick O'Malley is offline
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Default Nibbling Away.

Hi Kon, I did consider doing as you suggest, but, as it will never be driven in the rain (in my ownership), and will almost certainly go to France (where it will doubtless be rebuilt) when I pass it on, I didn't bother. Why France? They're mad for Monacos, one of my FB friends even races his



Anyway, back to the build. I turned my attention again to the gearbox cover, the fettling of which is the last job before permanently bolting the body back onto the chassis. Trial fitting it, and bolting it to the front bulkhead by its front flange resulted in a gap where it's supposed to meet the transmission tunnel. I want it to be removable so, after a bit of head scratching, I decided on a bridging piece bolted across the gap using Rivnuts. Being unsure if these would split the GRP I trial fitted one to a scrap body off-cut of similar thickness - success! I cut, drilled and folded the bridging piece using cardboard assisted design, as always.



For those of you unfamiliar with them, Rivnuts are essentially big pop rivets with a splined outside to grip the substrate, and a tapped hole through the middle for a bolt. The gismo I bought for fitting them works on the inclined plane principle (same as a thread, which is an inclined plane wrapped around a rod). Crap photo' alert.



The Rivnut (at the bottom) is passed through the 5.7mm hole and set by tightening the bolt on the right (this is in the finished position) until the end mushrooms. Quite a lot of force is required but the result is a very secure tapping - as long as overtightening of the bolt inserted is avoided!

Gearbox cover and 3mm aluminium bridging piece.



Tunnel with nuts attached.



I'll put two or three more in the top driver's side edge of the cover for attaching its as yet unmade aluminium side, the bottom flange of which will have to be Techscrewed to the wood sandwich floor.

Regards, Mick
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