I've been a bit tardy about updating this site for the last couple of weeks, so here goes for a 14 day update

Wednesday February 4th 2004

I spent a long time on the phone today with Pace products about their ZX12R dry sump system.  it really is a very neat bit of kit.   Apparently you remove the existing water pump and oil pump assembly from the side of the engine and simply slide the new 3 stage (2 scavenge and 1 pressure stage) dry sump pump into the existing housing.  The pump is even driven by the engine's existing oil pump drive shaft so no external drive belts are required.  All that remains is to remove and blank off the existing pressure relief\control valve and dial in the required pressure using the adjuster on the pump.  Of course you lose the mechanical water pump, but I had been pre warned that this was the case and ordered and EWC electric one via a BEC list bulk buy back in November.  The dry sump pump is quoted as outputting 80+ PSI at full chat and 25+ at idle.  Needless to say I ordered one and hopefully it will be with me by the end of February.

Pace also advised that a secondary benefit of having the oil reservoir in a remote tank rather than in the sump is that oil overheating is not a problem so I've decided not to fit an air\oil cooler and see how it goes temperature wise.

Only one thing left to do and that's find a suitable location, size and mounting point for the dry sump tank and then order an appropriate one from Pace.  I must remember to ask them to put in a 1\8th NPT boss for the Digidash's oil temp sensor.     Talking of which.......

Sunday February 8th 2004

Having received my Digidash in the post this week I set too and started to build a new dashboard panel for the racer,  the old dash had the distinctive triangular hole for a Stack data logging system in it, which as they cost nearly 2K was not surprisingly being replaced by the much cheaper DigiDash unit.  I briefly contemplated making the new dash from a carbon fibre sheet,  this would certainly look vary nice and might even save some weight, but it would probably cost 30-40 quid for the carbon, and as I had a sheet of NS4 Ali lying around the garage from previous projects I had effectively got the raw aluminium for free. Carbon fibre pimpy goodness may come next year.

So using the old dash as a template I marked out and cut an ALi blank from the NS4 sheet using an electric jigsaw and a fine metal cutting  blade.  Using a panel beating hammer I beat a "reverse" onto the top edge of the dash to give it some rigidity.  Now it was time to cut the mounting holes for the Digidash.  In the manual that accompanies the unit is a nice 100% life size mounting template which identifies the unit's mounting holes and their position.  So I sat in the car and after making some silly engine noises I stuck the template onto the new dash in the most appropriate mounting position.  In this position I can see the complete instrument cluster  through the spokes of my steering wheel.  The two strips of tape to he left of the template mark the limit of the area visible inside the wheel rim, I intend place the Oil pressure and ECU warning lights in this region. 

So after marking the position of the mounting holes and the central clearance area that needed cutting out to clear the connectors, I once again set too with Jigsaw, File and Drill.  (isn't that a 70s glam rock band?). 

Anyway after about 40 mins of making noise I could actually mount the Digidash unit onto the  ali plate.  Now it was time to lay out the rest of the lights and switch gear,  so using the time honoured method of sticking down some masking tape I began to lay out the rest of the instrumentation.

I will be racing the EVO in the 750 Motorclub's RGB series.  RGB stands for "Road Going Bike Engined" and the regs state that cars "must be able to pass an MOT" although they don't actually need a valid certificate.  This adds all sorts of requirements to the car that are unnecessary on a race car (but does create a level playing field that allows people to bring along their road cars to race). Extra equipment includes such nastiness as a mechanical handbrake mechanism and a need for all the normal lights that you have on your road car.... plus things like a horn!

So I need switchgear for, indicators, hazards, main\dip beam, side & head lights, fog lights, headlamp flash and horn in order to meet the MOT requirements.  In addition to this I also need switch gear to arm my electrical extinguisher, to turn on the electrical reverse mechanism and racing rain light, and lastly for the main ignition and fuel pumps.  All of which are mandated by various club or national regulations.  If your wondering where my FIA cut off switch is in the layout ...well the simple answer is that it's not on the dash board but located low down on my right and side in the cockpit.

So after much drilling, filing and cursing the dash looks like this.

I've elected to use toggle switches for the majority of the switch gear as they are available in high current versions (25amps to drive the headlamps), offer a visual indication of their current state, are relatively cheap and available with waterproof covers.  Each switch also has an LED tell tale to indicate when the circuit is on.  The dash also gained the battery compartment for the extinguisher and the main fuse box.  To the far right are the main ignition and fuel pump switches which are protected by missile style flip up red covers.

Friday 13th February

A whole bunch of aluminium tube has just been delivered.  It is 16 gauge 32mm diameter and will be used to run engine coolant from the engine bay at the rear of the car to the radiator at the front.  I just need to find a supplier of suitable hose to make the connections and I can start work on the cooling system.

Saturday 14th February 2004

Today and in fact earlier in the week I have sprayed the new dash satin black and permanently fitted the switchgear and DigiDash unit.

I've even labelled the switches so that the unit now looks like this, it's now ready for the wiring to be installed, and then to be fitted to the car.

Much of this morning was spent stripping the bodywork off the car again, and then going over it with a big bucket of Tetraclean in an attempt to get rid of the greasy oily film that covers it from front head to toe.  This has been 80% completed (I just need to do the rear suspension and diff carrier as I ran out of Tetraclean at this stage.

This afternoon, however was spent on a much more fruitful activity. 

You may remember this! Which is the remains of the old fuel tank after I had cut it in half and removed it from the car.  It was much, much too big and had a hole it which connected directly to the engine bay, and through which ran the gear change linkage .

Well it now looks like this.  After leaving the fully rinsed out tank outside in the garden for a couple of weeks to vent any remaining petrol vapour it was time to convert to a more appropriate size.  As can be seen from the pictures I basically cut the tank in half and removed the section with the gearshift hole. 

I then cut,shaped and fitted a new plate for the left hand end, by this time I was getting a little tired so I decided to call it a day and complete the tank's transformation on Sunday.

Sunday February 15th 2004

This morning I completed fabrication of the endplate for the new fuel tank.   This included cutting a 30mm hole for the fuel sender that is  mounted in the inboard side of the tank.

The end plate was then TIG welded in place, and although (as can be seen from the pic) my TIG welding is not always pretty, it is functional as later successful tests with pressurised water were to prove.  The welded seams on the radically reshaped tank are leak proof :-).

The fuel sender is  a 6 hole Lucas type and was supplied in the kit of parts that came with the DigiDash.  The float arm is located in the shorter left hand side of the tank as you look at the picture above, and doesn't access the "Sump" at the lower right of the tank, this means that there will be a "reserve" of fuel left even when the gauge reads empty.... but how much?

So in a rather nice closure to the two current projects I powered up the Digidash with a 12v battery, connected the fuel sender to the appropriate input and started filling the tank with water.   After about 6.2 litres the gauge moved off empty and it read 100% full when I had poured in 18 of the tanks maximum capacity of 19.5 litres.  Fab! now I know that I have just over a gallon in reserve when then gauge hits zero, and 19.5 litres of fuel in the tank when it's brim full plus about another 1-2 litres in a swirl pot should give me a fuel capacity of 21L.  That should be more than enough for a 15 lap sprint race or a 25 minute testing\trackday session.