My project Corsa, AKA Cecil

[andrewt1971]

Its getting to that time of the year where its too cold to make moulds and the resins that I have need using up because there getting close to expiry... so I was moving Cecil and as I parked him up I thought 'how much does the handbrake weigh?'

May as well weigh the floor closure whilst i'm here..

A little grinding later and we had the constituent parts, the base could be lightened but it would require a pattern making to take the teeth and a new spindle which I cant make at the moment because I cant get to the lathe, bloody lockdown.

I can probably do something with the lever halves..

But the way the're formed doesnt make them easy to use so a little modification was required to the 'handle' end

and a coat of primer to stop the mould sticking to the filler

All prepped up for moulding

moulds made

Floor plate first

not a bad saving

Half a lever curing

Again a pretty significant saving.

Final assembly


so total 668G vs 1285G almost half the weight..So not worth the effort!

[andrewt1971]

Cant really get a good picture of the handbrake but its fitted and works..





Untrimmed carbon parts for the oil cooler mount/duct



The weight of the aluminium...



versus carbon



The carbon parts are much stiffer.

Assembled and ready to be fitted back on the car




and fitted..







There's probably not much of a weight saving compared to how the oil coolers were mounted, even with the shorter hose runs, but the weight is lower down and the ducting should make the whole cooling package a little more efficient.

[andrewt1971]

Crappy lock down and winter meen I havent been doing much except for some CAD drawings for parts I need making and cant do myself. More on those when I have physical parts!

What I have been doing this last week is prepping the cam belt cover for carbonising, the standard design of clips and what not doesn't lend itself to replication so I'm using the standard back as the basis of a pattern and the front parts will be made from scratch. The standard set weighs a little over 700g, I should be able to half that...I think









gelcoated



First layer of glass on



Mould finished



Whilst I was waiting for the resin to cure I decided to lighten the damper reservoir brackets, no idea why..

before



after



6 grams total saving, for the pair. Now I think about it I probably have some aluminium screws laying around that could replace the steel ones and save another 6 grams.

[andrewt1971]

Original, if slightly tatty and chopped about cover


roughly trimmed rear, not a bad saving when you consider..


That compared to the original it is 'full depth'...




So when the front parts are made they will be shallower and therefore proportinaly lighter than the originals.

Now all I need is my dummy engine to bolt it to so I can make the front covers.

[andrewt1971]

Retrieved my engine block over the weekend and continued trimming the back cover.



Here I set up a laser cross level that was parallel with the bottom of the block then used the vertical line to trim the front true, you can see the cut edge on the right of the image is green where the laser catches it on the way past.


As I left it, I'm now waiting for a delivery of pulleys and a water pump so I can finish trimming where the idlers fit and then start on the front parts of the cover.

[andrewt1971]

So the cam belt kit arrived and the pump and pulleys were thrown on with the engine mount.

Trimmed to clear..

This looks wrong but its similar to the stock backplate, its so if the back plate moves the teeth of the belt dont touch

Then I roughly cut a piece of wood to make the front cover pattern and grabbed the router with a tracing bit, really I should have ordered a larger bearing but as I didnt have much to do I just taped it up to increase the diamter

so that the outline of the front cover piece..

Would be larger than the back..

and therefore overlap when the finished part is made.

[andrewt1971]

I had a little play in the steering rack so ordered up a recon unit and replaced it, wont bother with any pictures , its just a rack and not even a corsa one so it wouldnt help anybody. Anyway, Once fitted I got out the scales and the strings..

and did a full geometry set/check, 0.5 deg camber on the rear, 1 deg on the front and 2mm toe out at both ends. Unfortunately our scales were right on the limit so I couldnt corner weight the car. Total weight was 932kg with 10kg fuel on board. 615.4 KG on the front axle, 313.6KG on the rear.

I've also done a little more work on the pattern for the lower timing belt cover.

[yodacraig]

U have been super busy lol fair play mate

[andrewt1971]

Finished the mould for the lower timing belt cover.


Made a cover


Original.


Not a bad weight saving


Trimmed and test fitted




Need to get some fasteners and then I can move on to the top cover.

[andrewt1971]

When I fitted the top front idler pulley and then tried to fit the cover I realised I'd made the cover a bit too slimline by literally two millimeters! So, I removed the standard bolt.

and fitted a low line hex

problem sorted.
I also ordered some standoffs to allow me to bolt the front cover on, but I'm going to have to make some replacements as they weigh 17grams each, not exactly light.
And to finish a couple of pictures with the cover and cam sensor bolted in so i can start on the top section.

[andrewt1971]

Got some more done with the timing covers, didnt take pictures of the pattern and mould making, but its the same as everything else!
Top cover roughly trimmed.


When you make the patterns they have to have a draft on them ie, they are wider at the back than the front otherwise they wont come out of the mould, I've slightly overdone it on this part so rather than starting again i've put some 1mm thick foam on the inside edge to seal the gap, it doesnt look as bad in person as it does in the photo.


Just need to add fasteners



Original set weighed



New set, a 400g saving isnt bad

[andrewt1971]

Managed to get on the lathe and whittle up some spacers.

Fitted them

And bolted everything on.

[andrewt1971]

So, I was finally in the mood to swaping the timing belt covers today.
A couple of before picks.





Whilst it was all in pieces I cut the excess material from the engine mount that I presume is used to locate the engine at the factory.






Only another 50 odd grams but every little helps.

All fitted without issue.

[andrewt1971]

Finally an update. Literally the day after my last update I went down with the covid which knocked me out for two weeks, then work crap and christmas means I havent done much, however the last few weekends I got back on it..

The rear undertray I've been using was an off the shelf item that was thick fibreglass and didnt really fit and I have to run a large aluminium tray to reach from the suspension beam to the undertray which made suspension checks and adjustments a pain, so, off with the tray and out with the power tools.

added an extension to the front, the 'skid plates' give it some shape and will have foam embedded in them to increase stifness of the finished tray, also added two ' diffuser tunnels' at the sides which will do nothing but will look trick.




Adding lots of filler to get the radiuses in the corners etc


and the first coat of primer applied.







It will probably need another four coats before I can start flatting it to the final finish.

[andrewt1971]

Now the weather has finally warmed up, a bit, I've made the mould for the undertray





and started on a cover for the fuel tank. First step is to create an offset mould off the boot floor so i covered the area in 1mm thick wax.




then made a splash mould





So I could make a collar that fit the floor perfectly and then started building the rest of the cover.