Progress over the summer was relatively slow: I spent a lot of time out of doors as it seemed too nice outside to spend a lot of time in the shop. But, now that it’s getting colder during the day, I’m back to working on the roadster more diligently.
So far:
I’ve completed the cockpit and trunk aluminum:
The lower and upper trunk sections had roughly 200 holes drilled, each. I’ll not rivet the trunk Al until all of the electrical work is done as well as the installation of the fuel delivery system. The photo album on Al has a number of photos on the Al work. The oval access panels are held in place with rivnuts and screws and provide a means to get to the fuel pump and fuel-level indicator.
Although this is the fourth (major iteratin of the roadsgter, ther are still a few disign ‘flaws’. One is the attachment of the bolts for securing the body to the frame. As configured in the manaul, it’s impossible to install the bolts because of interference with the gas tank. Fortunatly, the F5 community had a work-around and I replaced the body attachment bolt system for the rear with threaded couplers (‘coupler nuts’) and threaded rods. This will make it easier to attach the body without lowering the fuel tank to get to the original attachment bolts. The ‘old’ system:
The newer attachment: The coupler nuts can remain in place while I remove the threaded rod for body fitment.
I also decided to go with Classic Instruments gauges as they are beautiful and classic looking but they will require some modification of the Ron Francis dash wiring harness. I’ve also begun to lay out the wiring harnesses to get an idea of what I’ll need to do for such things as routing, grounding, connectors and additional wiring:
Below is the temporarily-installed fuse box:
Wiring is totally new to me so I’m taking the opportunity to learn some basic electronics.
I also thought it would be a good opportunity to learn the Arduino system so I got a SparkFun inventor’s kit. Now I can switch an LED to different colors using the Arduino programming environment (C/C++) and Arduino board micro-controller : ha ,ha!
One of my goals in building the roadster was to learn some new things and I think the electrical part of the build will certainly help me to do that!
I purchased two items that will be of immense help with the electrical systems: a 5 volt digital power supply and a digital volt meter.
