Front Brakes, Washer Bottle and Some Trimming

First job of the day was to sort out the front steering geometry.  The camber of the wheel (the angle at which it sits on the road), is set by the ball joint on the upper wishbone.  To set it correctly, there needs to be a distance of as near to 48mm as possible from the end of the wishbone to the middle of the ball joint.  The picture below shows the distance although the angle of the camera does make it look about 1mm out on each end, which it isn't.  Note also the rubber cover which is required for the IVA.  Best to fit this now so you don't have to take it all apart again later.

As mentioned in an earlier post, I had bought a set of fully reconditioned callipers from GBS but they had both been for the same side.  On a recent trip to get more parts, I swapped them over for a correct set.  Today I decided to fit them.  It is a simple process of putting some copper grease on the edges of the brake pads and fitting them and then bolting the calliper to the front upright, remembering to use some thread lock on the bolts.  Then I fitted the flexible brake pipe and put a large penny washer either side of the body panel where the brake pipe goes through it.  This will help to spread any load if the brake pipe moves around too much and will hopefully stop the body work from deforming.  Below you can see the calipers all fitted and you can just make out the flexible brake pipes now both exiting the calipers upwards.

The engine and gearbox should be next on the list, but I am not quite ready to start on this yet so I decided to find some other little jobs to keep me going for the day.  I decided I would try my hand at a bit of trimming.  The first thing I tried was the edge of the scuttle, where the dashboard sits.  This is to hide any aluminium and finish it off neatly.  I cut a piece of material (is it leatherette?  I don't know) and set about lining it all up to fit.   

It was all getting a bit cumbersome to do in one piece, so I decided to do the two sides first and then add the one piece across the top.  I used Bostik spray adheasive to glue it all.  Be warned, this stuff goes everywhere so you will need to cover up things you don't want glueing! Here you can see one of the side pieces glued in place before final trimming.

I repeated this on the other end and then used same process with the middle section.  It all looks a bit lumpy because of the rivetts that are used in the forming of the scuttle, but these get hidden with the final trim.  The bubble wrap was used to stop the scuttle and wiper assembly getting covered in glue.

Here is the finished job, all trimmed with the surplus material removed.  Not bad for a first effort. Most of it will be covered up with the dashboard and other trim.

Finally, I fitted the washer bottle.  This has a bracket with 2 bolts to hold it to the passenger footwell panel.  I replaced the normal nuts with locknuts.