Stu & Mikey's Sonic7 1.6 Build Thread

[daydreamer]

Hi Alison,

I know the question was to "Buildityourself" but if you are asking about the rear wheel bearings ( the only ones I can think of with a driveshaft on a standard Sonic.) then I can offer some experience as described below. This may or may not have been what Buildityourself was thinking of.

A consideration when fitting the rear wheel bearings is that they are a close/tight fit on pressing into the upright and a similar close and tight fit when pressing the wheel hub into the bearing.  The drive shaft  splined CV knuckle end will pass through the wheel hub.  This is also a tight fit but not so much of an issue , as the shaft pulls into the bub easily when doing up the hub nut. 

It has been my experience that the drive shaft can be fitted and removed from the wheel hub many times without issue but removing the wheel hub from the wheel bearing while in the upright always results in a destroyed bearing.  So before fitting the wheel hub to the upright with bearing, it should be "finished" , painted , power coated whatever your finish is and the rear upright , esp the area obscured by the wheel hub when fitted should also be finished.  Painting these parts after assembly is difficult.

From memory the assembly sequence is.

Clean and grease rear upright bearing holding surfaces, remove any paint powercoat from these surfaces.
Press bearing into rear upright.
Fit bearing retaining circlip into rear upright.
Press wheel hub into bearing  

The wheel bearings ( esp aftermarket bearings)  are fragile and will separate into their component parts during the pressing and pulling ( When removing ) operations if they are not supported appropriately. 

I hope that helps and does not add to any confusion. And as mentioned earlier this may or may not have been what Buildityourself was thinking of.


Daydreamer

[alison]

Many thanks that sounds great. Now I've got the wheels I'm really keen to get them on the car.

[buildityourself]

Hi Alison, sorry for the delay, busy weekend!. Fit the bearing to the upright and to the lower wishbone, then fit the drive shaft passing the spline through the bearing, keeping the hub hidden somewhere ;-). Attach the top wishbone. Then you can check with the drive shaft sitting against the edge of the bearing how much play you have in the inner drive shaft joint with supension extended/collaped. You don't want it locked out in full extension, if it is then you can add washers over the splined shaft to help the drive shaft back into the joint. Don't go more than a couple otherwise there isn't enough thread for the driveshaft nut.

I believe the chassis design or tolerances on the chassis/wishbones mean that the fitting of the driveshaft is variable. It seems a couple of large washers are required. I have a few of these if you are going to Stoneleigh on Sunday and want some.

[alison]

Many thanks for this, much appreciated. I'm still working my way through bits that can be done without taking the Focus apart so no driveshaft yet!

[buildityourself]

Centre Tunnel

Bought some alloy sheet for the side and had a piece for the top folded on the edges. Cut the sheet out to a profile and then cut and bent the top to match.



Marked out the gearstick and handbrake holes. 



Was so focused on getting them in the correct position overlooked that the gear lever gaiter was the wrong way round. Why do I always realise things the moment after cutting! Anyway it wasn't a complete disaster as also realised that the top would need to be in 2 sections to get it over the hand brake so the join was made mid gear stick hole and the other half recut correctly.



Test fitted.



Side panels were fitted with rivnuts to secure the top to and then wrapped.





Centre Console

Rather than extend the wiring to the handbrake switch and the accessory socket in the tunnel we needed a console to route the wires. Also decided to move the hazard and lights switch and clock from the dash to the console as they could n't be reached when harnessed up (bit of an oversight when previously fitted).

A sheet of alloy was folded back on itself to form a 3 sided box. Then cut at an angle to join the dash and the tunnel together.



Fitted in place.



Made a couple of brackets to secure it to the tunnel and under the dash.



Marked out the various holes and started cutting them out.  



All cut out. 



Also wrapped and electrics fitted and connected. 



Next up dealing with the holes left in the dash!

[skyquake]

Sweet. There's some really nice sheet metal work been done here, you must be happy with how it came out. Gotta love the gratuitous use of the carbon wrap too!

I like the way you've recycled most of the donor controls, but not made it look obvious. It's been nicely laid out so it looks like it belongs.

What's the control underneath the hazards? You got heated seats for it?

[buildityourself]

May 28, 2022 22:23:01 GMT skyquake said:

Sweet. There's some really nice sheet metal work been done here, you must be happy with how it came out. Gotta love the gratuitous use of the carbon wrap too!

I like the way you've recycled most of the donor controls, but not made it look obvious. It's been nicely laid out so it looks like it belongs.

What's the control underneath the hazards? You got heated seats for it?

Yeah, few frustrations with some of the hole still. Despite marking through the outer holes and centre punching the drill wandered enough to make lining up *****. 

I had to change the headlight switch to a VW polo due to the fog light issues with the focus switch and headlight level controls. Might be taking a bit of a risk with this for IVA as its edges are not radiused. I tried starting filing it down but its just paint as the symbols light up. Now half the switch edge lights up red....

Yes I have heated seats planned instead of a heater post IVA when more time. Not done yet or even sure how/if its gone to work yet. Fitted the switch as motivation/reminder.

[buildityourself]

Dash repairs

Due to moving the light switch to the console (and previously moving the mirror switch the holes in the dash needed to be addressed.

Started by adding layers of fibreglass to the back of the dash panel.



Then added circle layers into the holes and a skim of filler over the top.



Didn't think paint would blend with the rest of the panel without painting the whole dash so decided to cover with carbon effect wrap as a solution for now.



It looks better than expected considering its just on the front face.

Harness bracket

The engine harness was not really secured and just standing in place due to the wires holding it in place, so to protect from eventual fatigue made a clamp bracket from scrap aluminium to support it from the chassis.



Powder coated as per usual.



Fitted in place and works a treat without looking too out of place.

[buildityourself]

Clutch Issue Update

As previously mentioned we lost drive in all gears when attempting to move back from the drive to the garage. I contacted the master cylinder supplier to ask if it could be faulty in some way. Started here as the cheaper/easier place to start rather than the slave etc. They agreed to bench test it if I returned it.

3 weeks after sending still no news but then a parcel arrived with a new master cylinder and no note of explanation. So either they found an issue or hadn't got round to testing it so just sent another one. Refitted it and promptly found that no gears would engage with the pedal pushed to the stop as the clutch was not disengaging indicating the opposite behaviour to the problem before. I removed the stop and retried, the clutch felt completely different with the engagement much lower down than before. Its almost like the previous cylinder was not the bore size that it indicated or the seals were fitted backwards?

More importantly we had drive again so fingers crossed its now resolved and wasn't our work causing it.

Needed to cut down the stop rubber to get full disengagement and a bit of tolerance for heat expansion etc. 

[buildityourself]

Exhaust Mounting

After discussing engine vibrations at Stoneleigh, I took daydreamer 's advice and removed the exhaust mounting to the chassis. This meant a new bracket was need to support onto the engine. 

This was a really challenging problem as it was a 3 dimensional problem with mulitple angles and no easy reference point. Rather than using card I decided to make mock up brackets in aluminum so it could be bolted together to support the weight. 
 


Then found some radiator brackets in the scrap metal box to make up the brackets in steel. They are not particularly pretty but at least fine in the short term.



Fitted onto the engine block. Had to use one of the manifold bolts, which I didn't want to, but there wasn't another suitable option that I could see.



I managed to get the exhaust tailpipe fitting slightly better too as a bonus. I enlarged the tailpipe hole as the exhaust will move around more now, but didn't want to go too big, but its going to need some more removed I feel. 



While the vibrations are better, we are still getting some through the chassis into the seats etc, but can't work out whats causing it other than the gearbox mountings. 

[buildityourself]

Engine Cover Intake

Marked out the holes in the back lip of the engine cover. These are n't really visible when finished as covered by the intake panel




Went for 3 holes in the cover just to be different and potentially increase airflow. Seem to have lost a few photos covering this area. Here is the back masked off for painting. Unfortunately I was a bit careless chain drilling the holes and chipped the gel coat around the edge so they need addressing.



Cut out some mesh for the external holes and bonded this in place.



Here is the finished cover again the wrong side.



Masked off the covers ready for bonding into place.



Completed intake.



As the hole edges needed repairing also tackled a few flaws in the body panels.





After filling with gel coat.



Then sanded/polished once hardened. Seem to have missed/exposed a bit of clear resin so might need another go.

[wishful4444]

Good day buildityourself

Were the body panels delivered with the flaws/damage?

[buildityourself]

Jul 1, 2022 12:04:06 GMT wishful4444 said:

Good day buildityourself

Were the body panels delivered with the flaws/damage?

Yes sadly so, some are more like air bubbles as the surface was soft, so the second pic is after i've removed the thin top layer to expose the hole underneath. I understand different GRP fabricators are used now for the body panels.

[wishful4444]

I think it's poor that the panels were sent to you like that. Why didn't you reject them?

Building the car is difficult enough without having to rectify poor parts.

[wishful4444]

Jul 3, 2022 12:45:39 GMT wishful4444 said:

I think it's poor that the panels were sent to you like that. Why didn't you reject them?

Building the car is difficult enough without having to rectify poor parts!!