Hood Hinge

Finally got the hood hinges figured out.  Why so difficult you ask?  All because of where I cut the hood.  The odd shape would not allow it to open from the windshield area like a door would.  It could probably use one of those fancy lift up and out hot rod hinges that cost a small fortune.  Or I could use a little of my creativity and get a forward opening hood that looks cool - kinda like some of the old corvettes.

I did have to use my fiberglass skills.  I figured since I didn't have any fancy epoxy that turns to rock, I'd just fiberglass in the L brackets to the bottom of the hood.  It worked!  I did use four layers of mat but had to really clean off the old black paint that was on the bottom of the hood with a wire brush and some acetone.

In addition I used 2.5 inch bolts with lots of washers and nuts.  The battery box just happens to be in the right place to stop the hood.  I'm just glad I got that one off the list.  Now I need to get some hood locks.

Relocated Main Brake Line

The longest brake line is a bear to deal with. It winds through the main cabin, snaking around the pedals then along the tunnel next to the driver's seat, then out the back of the pan to marry up with a junction.  Two questions were raised that seem to make sense to me.  1.  If the cabin gets wet and the main line is under the carpoet then it will stay wet and rust, just like metal pans.  2. If there's a leak, you might not figure that out until it's too late because it hard to see where the leak is.

That's when someone on the Bradley GT site mentioned how much sense it makes to run it on the bottom of the car like most modern day cars.  Easy access, easy to repair, easy to spot any trouble and now you don't have to worry about it taking all those twists and turns - Genius!!

So that's what I did.  I did drill an extra hole so the original drain hole below the master cylinder wouldn't get stopped up.  I then added a grommet to protect the hose from rubbing against the metal and used several rubber coated electrical mounting clips.

Now comes the fun of having to bleed the brakes all over again.

Seat Belts

Who buys a car without seat belts?  OK, I'm not the only one!  The guy that owned the car before me did as well - so there.  Safety First, besides it's the law. I bought these some time ago and they have been sitting around waiting for the right time.  I mounted the metal tab to one of the body/pan bolts.  Then mounted the triangular part to the area by small window where there's a sort of metal roll bar, and the last part went below the speaker.  I ended up having to use different lengths of bolts than what they provided.  The roll bar needed 7/16 3/4 inch and the bottom needed 7/16  X 1 1/2 inch with a fender washer on the inside.  Good thing the speakers were out so I could reach down and tighten those bolts. Too bad part of my speakers will be covered but, oh well, Safety first!  I still need to mount the part with the tab that buckles the belt but the bracket should make it easy to bolt it through the fiberglass pan with some large fender washers for support.

Pedal Upgrade

Unique Products has a replacement shaft that guarantees the clutch cable will NOT fall off or wear out from the rather awkward design of the pedal assembly.  You can find this advertised on the Samba.com or look for their website.  For $25 you get a new shaft that allows the clutch cable to be bolted to the pedal assembly in a way so it spins freely and thus doesn't wear out or fall off.  However, like anything else with this car there are complications.  The design of the new shaft is based upon the original German design, EMPI on the other hand seems to have altered from this.  The EMPI shaft is longer and the pedal assembly uses an extra washer.  The peg hole in their shaft design is slightly larger.  I improvised with a bolt that made a tight fit.  Great idea, worth the money but needed a little "jerry-rigging."

Above you can see the original shaft below the newly installed shaft. I had removed the pedals because my they were grinding into my fiberglass pan.  The EMPI pedals seems to be somewhat larger on the bottom than the originals, plus the pan wasn't lined up right. I used a grinder to ground down the bottom of the pedals and the tabs - about a 1/4 inch. 

Naturally when I installed the pedals, the block of wood was now too loose.  I placed a L bracket on the block which made up the difference and did a better job of holding the block in place and the pedals don't scrape the floor now.  Another one off the list of To Do items.

Maiden Voyage

Yesterday was another milestone in this project/conversion.  Taking the car for a spin - finally.  I backed the car out of the driveway and drove to the end of the block and back at a whopping 10 mph!!!  Woohoo!  Ok, I didn't have any seats or seat belts installed yet.  I was sitting on a large pillow.  But the point is....it works.  My wife captured it on her cell phone.

The victory felt short-lived because it is a conversion/project, there's still a lot of things left on the project To Do list before it will be freeway ready.  Then of course there's the whole business of getting it licensed and registered.

Great victory but short-lived because I need to continue the restoration of a 30 yr old car.

Weatherstripping

The trunk and back window weatherstripping needed to be replaced.  Little did I know how jerry-rigged the old stuff was.  Lots of silicone to cover up alterations to avoid hinges and gas struts.  I imagine that this car leaked quite a bit when the rains came.  The hinges for the trunk were not only rusty but frozen where they wouldn't bend at all.

I found some weatherstripping on JCWhitney.   It goes on pretty good but I learned to prep the channel by running a phillips head screwdriver through it so it would open a bit.  I would then push it on then tap very lightly with a rubber mallet. 
I saw on Bradley GT.com where the Bradley GT I puts the weather stripping on the rear window glass versus the car frame.  I decided to do that on the bottom of my back window because the window isn't lined up right with the back frame.  This made for a nice cushion on the back edge but now there's a small gap on the sides.
I'll fill that in at a later time.

I'll take a flat 2 inch thin stripping to cover the lack of carpet trim which should clean the look up.

New Motor

After getting some advice from an EV Engineer, I decided to buy an Impulse 9 motor from Netgain.  Needless to say, this is better technology than the old 8 inch Advanced DC motor I had been using.  This 8 inch motor was able to easily go to 120 volts but not the 156 volts I have for my battery pack.  The Impulse 9 is able to go to 170 volts without "advancing" the motor, or making the motor take in more volts than what it was intended for.
I just happen to buy the last one they had until September when they expect to finish building more.  I saved an extra $100 in shipping by having it delivered to where I work, which has a dock, versus my residence.  I had some help getting the motor in my trunk but had to cut it out of the cardboard box to take it out of the trunk - tight fit.
I was excited to get the new motor but wanted to wait a day after putting on the adapter again, to make sure all the red lock tight was dried. This was the same procedure as before, (see previous entry), except I had to use a 5/16th bolts to hold the hub on and buy some bigger lugs to attach the cables the the motor bolts.

Overall the motor is about 10 lbs heavier and since it's a 9 inch motor with the mounts for an 8 inch (for folks like me that want to upgrade but not have to buy a new adapter) it's wider.  I managed to wrestle that baby into the transaxle in about 45 minutes.
The test run with the wheels off the ground seemed to go great - no ugly noises!

Yet Another EMPI Brake Mod

I painted the rear calipers and rotors.  Not necessarily because I wanted them to match the car but I remember reading on one person's post how the first time these EMPI calipers got wet - they immediately rusted.  I used Duplicolor and did several light coats per instructions.  Be ready to wait several days for the paint to cure, otherwise it will chip off.

So, as I was putting it all together, the brake pads were giving me some problems.  Come to find out there's this little dimple on the metal side that needed to be grinded off because it hits the master cylinder.  Needless to say, this only needs to be done on the inner pad.

One of these things is NOT like the other!

What you see are two clutch brakes.  They are put in the flywheel housing and covered by the Clutch Pressure plate.  The splines on the tansaxle slide through the middle of this clutch brake.  All this is done to give me a clutch so I can coast downhill.  We have a lot of 5% hills here in this neck of the woods.
The funny thing is that one of these clutch brakes fits and the other doesn't.
LESSON LEARNED: Check to make sure the clutch brake fits over the transaxle splines before you go through all this trouble.
So...the company that I ordered the original clutch brake from sent me the wrong one. ( The correct one is on the left.)

In addition, the 1967 transaxle had two different versions, one was a 6 volt and the other a 12 volt.  The guy that made my adaptor sent me a flywheel.  And probably guessed it by now - he sent the wrong one.  So, I ground down the flywheel teeth with a grinder and now it fits.

You would think that after fixing two problems I'd have everything solved, right?  Oh no, everything comes in a set of three.  Take a look at what happened next.

Once I took the motor out - again, (sigh)  I can see where the clutch pressure plate was chewing away at part of the transaxle bell housing.  Looks like my adaptor assembly was off by 1/4 inch.

But at least the wheels turn!!!! 

The original plan was to take the motor off my Sparrow and use it since it's capable of handling the 156V battery pack I have.  Then at some point in time put the motor you see above in the Sparrow. This motor will only handle 120V.  However, the Sparrow motor is unique in it has a longer shaft, collar around the bottom of the shaft and some tach comm at the bottom.  To try and buy another motor, like the Sparrow, would be expensive.

So the choice was to keep the Bradley at 120V or try to fit the Sparrow motor.  I chose plan C - Rather than let $1600 worth of lithiums sit around, I bought a new Impulse 9 motor for my Bradley GT II.  It will be here soon.  : )