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Flash's 1965 Ford Thames


Flash

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This also tidies up the frontal area between the two chassis legs which currently has the main accelerator rod crossing diagonally. 

Thinking ahead to when I fit the air-con system this area between the chassis legs would be a really convenient place to mount the condenser. Although that it still a way down the track it's worth thinking about in advance.

Anyway, getting back to the task at hand I quickly whipped out the rods, marked up the orientation and stored them away.

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Next I measured the throw on the Thames pedal and compared it to the cable movement on the 3Y carby. As luck would have it the cable comes in at 35mm and the Thames pedal at 40mm so looks like I'm good to go.

I then spent a bit of time languishing on my carpet off-cut under the Thames trying to figure out how I'm going to fix the outer cable on the pedal end. Because OCD,  I'm really keen to use existing fixing bolts where possible thus limiting the need to drill extra holes in the cab floor. Eventually I decided to target the two mounting bolts that hold the floor mounted headlight high beam dipper in place. Again old mate at Rhino Lining had coated over the heads of these bolts in the cab, so I spent a bit of time with a die grinder - all the while cursing him - and eventually managed to get the bolts out without harming the floor coating. I've already mocked up the bracket with some cardboard, so tomorrow's exercise will be a bit of metal carving.

Thanks for reading. 

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My plan for today was to fabricate the front accelerator cable bracket out of steel plate, but I decided to take the cautious approach by creating a plywood mock up just to make doubly sure that the cable movement and lever throw were spot on. 

I had to tweak the bend on the original Thames rod to get the cable to line up nicely.

The mock up was strong enough to be able to test the movement and I'm happy to report that it works a charm.

So I'll crack into the final fabrication tomorrow.

 

 

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Another fruitful morning was had here at Rough & Ready Restos.

I managed to get the accelerator cable bracket carved and fitted.

I just need to chuck a weld on the back of the bends next time I fire up the welder.

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And in other news the courier dropped off my state - of - the - art cold air duct pipe. At a whole $20.40 including postage it looks like it was a canny investment.

Means I can fit it first thing tomorrow and I can then fabricate a new side valance mounting bracket that will tuck around the pipework.

 

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Yep, air filter plumbing day today.

For the filter intake side of things I've used the original moulded plastic HiAce mini snorkel which I have positioned in the V of the chassis legs facing rearwards to hopefully limit water ingress in wet weather. I've also retained the HiAce water trap which should hopefully deal with any water that does get sucked in.

For the filter output side of things I've used my el cheapo cold air duct kit. I've binned the rigid metal ends that came with the kit in favour of some rubber off-cuts from the original HiAce carby pipe that I am using as spacers on both the HiAce plenum hat and the filter housing output so that the 3 inch flexi pipe fits snuggly .

Test fit seems to work okay and I just need to fabricate a few holding brackets to complete the job. I don't think it looks too bad.

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And, that's the first bracket done for the air filter pipe work. It holds both hoses and I'll use the bolt closest to the fender to secure the new side valance bracket that I still need to fabricate. Also one more bracket to do for the snorkel and I can then tick this job off the list.

 

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Took a trip into town yesterday and treated myself to a new welding helmet, so I thought I'd do some more fabrication work today.

Carved a replacement side valance support bracket out of some 6 mm flat steel. It needed a good curve on it to clear the air filter pipe work. It was a bit tricky carving the curves with just a grinder, so it's not the prettiest thing you have ever laid eyes on, but it is functional.

I glued it to the other part of the pipework bracket that I made earlier in the week and then bolted it in place. I'm relatively happy with the result.

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I cut and drilled a little mounting tab for the snorkel which I glued onto the engine box re-enforcing plate. I then mounted all of the pipework.

It looks pretty much like my earlier mock up did, but everything is now secured with just a bit of movement in the rubber mounts for the rigid snorkel pipe.

The plan is to fit a mud guard inner to protect the pipes from road debris, but I might just see if I can find something to suit at the local wreckers as a lot of modern cars come with plastic inner guards these days.

Thanks for reading.

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A few weeks back I posted an update regarding my proposed brake setup. The plan at that stage was to use the L300 dual circuit master cylinder with a remote booster. Due to space limitations I had proposed to rotate the L300 master cylinder by 90 degrees, but in the back of my mind I was unsure what the ramifications would be, so I posted a picture of the proposed setup on the tech forum and requested input from others. @sr2 is really knowledgeable when it comes to brakes and raised some concerns about the change in orientation. Simon and I swapped a few yarns and I must acknowledge how generous he has been with his time and knowledge. He provided me with some suggestions on alternative setups and together we have come up with another plan that will retain the factory orientation of the master cylinder, as well as use the original L300 booster. If I can get it to work the factory booster will be way more elegant than the remote booster which would only have boosted the front braking circuit.

In summary the plan is to mount the L300 master cylinder / booster combination where I currently have the remote booster mounted and then use a 3 piece activation push rod that will link the new setup to the original Thames brake pedal.

So the first step was to test mount the L300 booster to make sure that it would clear the front wheel and suspension. In my usual fashion I knocked together a few pieces of plywood that I was able to fix to two existing holes in the top of the chassis leg. I then checked wheel and suspension clearance. This is with the wheel at full lock and it looks pretty good :

 

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I then turned my thoughts to the two pivot points that I will need to create. My first thought was to use the existing brake pedal pivot if I can.

So I pulled the pedal out of the L300 pedal box and took to it with my grinder and then test mounted it on the master cylinder side. I need to make sure that I keep the two legs on either side of the pivot the same length so I don't upset the throw. 

The last pic shows the pedal off cut fixed with the original L300 clevis to the master cylinder. All I need to do is create a box section that will support the pivot. I'm thinking I may be able to repurpose the L300 pedal box somehow.

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On the pedal side I've temporarily attached a piece of threaded rod to the original Thames brake pedal clevis yolk, just for this "proof of concept" phase. The threaded rod sticks through the bracket where the original Thames master cylinder used to reside. I drilled a hole in a piece of ply which I have temporarily clamped in whilst I take some measurements. The two bolts that are sticking out above the threaded rod attach to captive nuts built into the chassis leg. They were originally used to mount the Thames gear selector rods, so are no longer needed. My plan is to fabricate a mounting bracket for the second pivot that will attach to the chassis using these bolts. 

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My apologies if today's updates look a bit "piece meal". Tomorrow I'll put together a sketch showing the proposed setup of the activation rods, which will hopefully make things a bit clearer.

The pic below shows my dodgy looking plywood booster mount at a different angle. 

Thanks for reading. 

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In terms of the revised brake setup, yesterday's posts were kinda all over the place, so I thought I'd add a bit of structure by putting together a quick sketch of what I'm trying to achieve.

With reference to the pic below:

  • The dots marked with a P will be the pivot points on the two pivot arms.
  • The dots marked C will be clevis shackles.
  • The rod marked A is currently attached to the brake pedal using the original Thames clevis shackle. It's purely for mock up purposes so is a bit scrawny.
  • The blue arrows indicate the directional travel of each rod when the brake pedal is depressed.
  • There is a return spring that is attached to the Thames pedal assembly which is out of shot

So with that said the rough plan of attack is as follows:

  • For the two pivot points I plan to use the original pivots for the brake and clutch pedals from the L300 pedal assemblies as the bushes are still in pretty good condition and it should  be easy to source replacements further down the track for maintenance purposes. The through pins may need shortening as they are currently long enough to support two pedals, but that shouldn't be too difficult to achieve.
  • I'll cut up the two L300 pedal boxes that I have to harvest the pivot outers that I can then graft into the new pivot support frames.
  • I'll also strip the pedal assemblies out of the two donor HiAce vans so that I can harvest some more clevis pins, shackles and any other bits and bobs that I might need.

Any additional suggestions, comments or concerns would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for reading. 

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After pulling the HiAce apart I still had some time left on the clock, so decided to crack into some plywood aided design.

I've cut and bolted up a piece of ply to represent the main bracket for the front pivot point. I also started work on the mock up for the front pivot lever.

More of the same tomorrow.

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I was going to complete the mock up of the newly proposed brake setup before calling my certifier, but following some prompting by @cletus I've sent the certifier a copy of my concept drawing and have suspended any further work on the mock up until I hear back from him.

So I skipped on to the next item on the list which is to complete the mounting brackets for the gear selector cables. Thought I'd start with the gate selector cable first.

A while back I mocked up the column shift bracket for this cable, so I already know that the cable needs to attach to the column shift lever from the left. This means that I need to run the cable along the left hand chassis leg and then give it a lazy loop above the gearbox tail piece so that it then pulls the cable towards the rear of the van.

The L300 cable is not long enough so I'll need to get a new one made up, but at least I can test the concept for now.

In my usual fashion I made a quick mock up.

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I then carved a copy in some steel plate, folded it up in my vice, gummed the thing together and poked a few holes in it. Then chucked it in for a try.

Gave it a quick test by pulling and pushing on the other end of the cable. Thought the lazy loop might make it tight, but it slides really easily, so I'll take the win.

Just needs a bit of trimming and a general tidy up which I'll do first thing tomorrow before I crack into the next one.

Thanks for reading.

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Talk about two steps forward and one step back.

Sitting last night and thinking through the plan of action for today, I suddenly had an uneasy feeling that I had got the gearbox gate lever movement incorrect. So first thing this morning I headed over to the HiAce donor and put the original column shift through its paces and sure enough I cocked up yesterday. So the cable needs to push when I had it pulling and vice versa.

So back under the Thames for some more puzzling and all is not lost as I was able to trim the bracket that I fabricated yesterday to suit the correct movement. It's now bolted on to the side of the strut rod mount and the cable heads straight forward instead of having to make the lazy loop across the gearbox tail.

But wait, there is more .......

With the orientation now correct the cable that I scavenged off the newer L300 Express is long enough to do the job !

Total win as the closest place to get a longer cable made up is down in Brisbane which is almost 500 km away. Gotta love the vast open spaces of Straya.

Anyhoo, now that I'm back to where I thought I was yesterday, I can now crack into the front bracket for this cable tomorrow.

Thanks for reading.

 

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Mrs Flash and I got inspired to work on our bathroom ceiling which has been half completed for almost 18 months now, so I took a week off the Thames to get that done.

Woke up this morning looking forward to getting back on to the van.

When I left off I had largely completed the bracket for the gearbox end of the gate selector cable, so today was all about working out the column change end of things.

First order of business was to modify the end of new generation Mitsi Express cable to suit the old generation Starwagon pivot arm.

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