A month of ownership

Wow! What a month! The car has been run in (now covered 750mi) and I'm thoroughly thrilled with the driving experience.

I took it steady for the first 500mi or so and ramped it up from there. When I started to open it up, I found that the car offers such exhilarating performance it's rather difficult to drive it sensibly! Corners that used to be 'corners' in other cars the Caterham (now named Stiggy due to the plates) takes far faster than ever before without it really feeling like a corner. The acceleration is a whole new experience; my ST is quick, but this is a totally different experience. The immediacy (due to being NA and not turbo charged) is what stands out for me, there is instant throttle response. That response teamed with the wind in your face makes it all the more fun.

I must confess to buying him a few 'presents' in this first month:

1. A half hood - very nice quality from Thundersport. Much, much easier to put on than the full hood and great for passing showers. 
2. A quick release steering wheel - I very quickly found that getting in and out was rather challenging! That, and the fact I didn't really want to leave the car anywhere but the garage fuelled this purchase. Not that installing the QR wheel was easy! Getting the old upper steering column out took some ingenuity (aka more strength than I possessed). Then getting the upper mounting bush back in the dash, I went too far and ended up with a bush wedged a fair way down the outer steering column. After sawing through the bush to remove a piece and crush it, I managed to pull it free. A replacement bush from Caterham worked a treat the second time. I would probably advise that these bushes are a one-use item (only £7.50ish); I think I damaged the locating features on removal and so it didn't locate when I tried to replace it. 
3. Velcro pads on the harnesses - these are dead useful in stopping the pull tabs from the harness whipping you in the face while driving! 
4. New mirrors - a smaller pair of mirrors that fit onto the windscreen stanchion, so they are available doors on or doors off. The size is much more in keeping with the proportions of a Seven and they don't vibrate as much either!

Sorry for the lack of any decent pictures, but here are a few from the Queen's Square Bristol Breakfast Club to make up for it! Who knew there were so many cool cars in Bristol! Including a P1!

Looking tiny next to a Focus RS

FINALLY

The lack of updates for the last few months, is entirely due to the fact that I have spent these months waiting for VOSA and the DVLA before being able to collect my Caterham. 

A word of warning for anyone building a Caterham, the build takes 2-2.5 months, but getting it on the road took me 4 months! 

To show where that time went: 

• 4 weeks after I finished the build before Caterham collected the car
• 2 weeks from car collection until Caterham performed PBC 
• 4 weeks from PBC to IVA
• Extra 2 weeks due to IVA fail before re-test
• 6 weeks with the DVLA - although they did lose my documents...

Whinging aside, the car is amazing! What a driving experience! Upon collection I almost mistook another 270 for my car - it was back to back with a car with almost identical spec; good taste!

Look of amazement!

Getting the plates on was a quick job (3M dual lock pads) and made it all become very real!

Road legal!

The drive back to Bristol used a carefully selected route, avoiding motorways and incorporating some great twisty sections. The car really came alive in the twisty sections and as the exhaust warmed up the pops and burbles on the overrun were very amusing.

The return convoy (in the sunshine thankfully)

Thanks to my dad for trying to keep up in my Fiesta ST (I'm sure he had fun really), which also managed Bristol to Crawley and back on less than 3/4 of a tank. I did relent and let Dad have a go over the last few miles; it was great to see and hear the car while following it. Good 150mi on the clock getting the car run in, roll on some more trips in the sunshine!

IVA

Bad news all 'round this week. The car failed the IVA. The prophecy from the guy collecting the car has come true - estimating about 85% fail first time.

The summary from Caterham was that it passed all the tests, but the examiner (who they have fallen out with on many occasions) failed it on "brake pedal feel". I'm a little irritated that the car is essentially safe for the road, but an examiner's opinion on feel has prevented that. I would expect people working with cars on a daily basis to appreciate that on a new build kit car the brakes will take time to bed in, but apparently not...

Retest 23rd of June, just in case that date needed any more drama!

UPDATE!

The car successfully passed on the 23rd of June. I believe Caterham installed a restriction in the brake line, such that the entire pedal feel was much firmer - to please the IVA examiner.

All the forms are now in the post - roll on collection day!

PBC and Paint Protection

Following the car's collection it was scheduled for the PBC. I can report that Caterham will try to charge you for additional work. They attempted to charge me £1200 for 15 hours work - dominated by tasks such as "tidying up wiring" even in areas I was certain the wiring was fine. Other areas they were keen to charge for, is where work had not been completed due to missing items (that Caterham had not delivered), a bit of a nerve! Some negotiation was required to bring this amount down to something more reasonable. There was part of me that was initially outraged, but in reality this work, done by people who work with these cars every day, should give me a better car at the end of the day.

The big concern going to the PBC was the non-fitting nose cone. I have had a brief chat with Caterham about this and apparently they removed some material where the nose goes over the ARB, to allow more space to bend the nose into shape. From the pictures I've seen it looks pretty good.

I had considered fitting paint protection film myself, but after a bit of research and a few horror stories I was convinced otherwise, especially as I struggle to make the screen protectors for a phone sit flat! The compound curves of the nose cone and the rear arches, filled me with dread, so I left this one to the experts. Premier Paint Guard fitted new Suntek PPF C film to the car, which you can hardly see. This is supposedly a new technology and supersedes the 3M film, all I know is it looks pretty good - I will report back later on the job it does protecting stone chips etc.

Paint protection film being installed - nose cone looks good

In other news, I've gone for a personalised plate for a finishing touch!

Stig-like ambitions!

An update - Collection, PBC, other musings

I have been trying (generally unsuccessfully) to ignore the bright yellow car in my garage...

This is because, I had the build completed in the week following the Easter weekend (roughly 1st April) and then the waiting for Caterham to come and collect the car began. The car was collected on the 29th of April. Having put the roof and doors on it, I was amused by how challenging getting in and out of the car became. With that in mind I decided not to drive it up the ramp into the truck, as I didn't want to embarrass myself trying to get out in a restricted space!

Waiting to load on a surprisingly cold morning for the end of April!

The guy collecting the car was very friendly, with stories of recently delivered Caterhams both to my local area and the Cairngorms (made me rather jealous). His words of warning were less encouraging with an estimate of ~85% of cars failing the IVA first time around. Apparently the main reason is the inconsistencies often found in the braking system. There's not a lot anyone can really do about this, the newly assembled brakes need time to bed in and find their balance; realistically that would take 50miles or so.

Ready to go

This week is the week of the PBC, hopefully all goes well. On Saturday the paint protection film is to be installed - I hope to have a few pictures of that. If the PBC is completed this week then the IVA will follow shortly afterward and the car will return!

In the meantime I've been looking at all things Caterham: insurance, Lotus 7 Club membership, tweaks and upgrades and how to fit the number plates. To summarise some of these findings:

Insurance - this is a tricky area if you are 23... Not many insurers will cover Caterhams for a start and then of those that do, many are restricted to 25+ or even 30+. On this note many companies will offer a discount for club membership and it can be pretty substantial. I think the reduction in premium I found paid for the membership; happy days!

Number plates - I did not fancy drilling through the fibreglass to attach the plates, especially with the thought of the plates getting caught on something and damaging the nose. Inspiration came in the form of some 3M strips my Mum was using to attach pictures etc to the wall with. There were two sticky sided strips one for the wall and one for the item to be hung, each had a velcro like surface - but a stronger velcro, akin to the pads on the Momo steering wheel. A little bit of research revealed many forms of these pads and they seem ideal for having the number plate attached so it won't fall off, but will yield if the number plate hits something. It also has the added bonus of making the plate removable for track days.

Speaking of track days, I'm hoping to get the car out on the track at Castle Combe on 19th June for the Under 17 Car Club charity day. I'm also debating the Classic, Kit and Retro Action Day at Castle Combe the following weekend - it is very tempting!!

Well... it's done

I apologise for the delay, I was waiting until I had some decent pictures of the finished car out of the garage - not always easy with the British weather!

Finishing up jobs included poppers for the door catches - easy enough if you take advantage of the fact the tabs can be removed from the door to fit the poppers.

Wipers - now these are a bit of a pain, as the spring that holds them on the wind screen is surprisingly strong. I would advise covering the area around the wiper mounting with card/bubblewrap to protect the surface if the spring contracts. Getting them lined up just right took a bit of trial and error, but they look alright now.

Wipers (and, somewhat irritatingly, my reflection)

One job I had missed was earthing the fuel tank. I would not advise missing this job! Ensure you fir the earth wire to a nut on the rear wheel arch attachment - and, yes, of course it will only reach the most awkward one to get to!

Nearly forgot; the boot carpet, must give thanks to Mum for this one. Cutting all the little panels to fit and fitting them in place with glue is a little fiddly. One good tip for the pieces that sit in corders is to bend them on the obvious seam and weigh them down over night to get them to form to the required shape - thanks Mum. The boot carpet interaction with the fuel filler cover caused a bit of head scratching; in essence the flanges for the screws should be under the carpet while the front edge should be used to hold the carpet down.

Boot carpet panels

Fuel filler cover

With the last little bits tidied up, it has been driven - basically back and forward up the drive, but reverse, and first work! As do the brakes and the handbrake, so pretty pleased with it. Many pictures below. Big thanks to all those that helped along the way and a special mention for my Grandad without whom, this may not have been possible and certainly would have taken much, much longer! Kept me going through cold, challenging weekends and made the experience all the more enjoyable, thank you!

Hood and doors

The hood posed an interesting challenge. It was a very tight fit and definitely required two people just to get it loosely in place. We managed to get it in place "good enough" to fit the doors. A piece of advice for the doors is to ensure the hinge that you fit to the door is drilled through the metal piece which runs around the edge of the window. This metal is very hard and is a bit of a pain to drill.

Hood and doors in place

I have left the hood to try and stretch it into shape. and the doors still need the retaining poppers fitting.

Door follows the counter of the rear arch nicely

It was while we were waiting for the hood to stretch in place that the car was lowered onto its wheels for the first time. This made it look very small; it's so low!

On the wheels. 

There are still a few issues to tackle; like the remaining tasks on the hood and doors and an issue I have with the engine idling. It seems to be unstable at idle. It had this issue at 900RPM, so I adjusted the throttle and it still has the same problem at 1100RPM. It seems to phase up and down in revs, like their is an inconsistency in fuel flow. To me it seems like and ECU issue - the controller gains not setup properly?

Interior bits and pieces

With the car mechanically running, it was time to make it look good inside! I started with the interior carpets, which turned out not to be my forte. I managed to confuse the two transmission tunnel carpets - not a good idea once you have started cutting. With replacement carpet delivered the job was finished neatly. Unfortunately that's not where my carpet issues ended - I also had an error of judgment when cutting the boot floor carpet to fit around the fuel filler cover - replacement on the way! I had more success with the rubber footwell mats - drilling and fitting poppers to secure. 

Transmission tunnel carpet

Rubber footwell mats - with poppers to hold them in place

Back to the interior of the cabin and the transmission tunnel top was fitted - it is important to get the handbrake vertical for this bit. Following this installation I was able to adjust the handbrake such that three clicks were the extent of travel and locked the rear wheels. 

Transmission tunnel top - looks nice!

Then came fitting the harnesses. The lap belts in the car are easy enough to fit, but they do have a right way up! For the harnesses through the top chassis rail carefully cut holes through the carpet and then the boot cover. When fitting the harness bolts, I greased the interface with the boot cover to prevent twisting on the surface; this worked pretty well. 

Harness bolts sitting nicely through the boot cover

Harnesses looking nice!

Then it was time for seats. I have gone for the leather option and they look pretty sweet nestled in the car. 

Fitting the boot cover is an interesting job. Using masking tape to mark up the locations of the popper bases on the car you can determine where to drill through the boot cover and fit the poppers. The dot fastener type tool is a bit useless really and I tried a few experimental alternatives, with more success. 

Boot cover all poppered in place

It Runs!

I had been tentatively avoiding this challenge, just in the fear that it may not actually work...

Filling the coolant was pretty straightforward, some of the pipes were squeezed to try and get as much air out as possible during this process - and it's a great colour red/pink!

Filling the engine oil was as simple as filling engine oil can be, but attention must be paid to the start up process. In this process first fill the oil to a sensible level then crank the engine for oil pressure (I'll get to how to do this in a minute) and then start it briefly before re-checking the oil level and filling to the appropriate level.

Filling and bleeding the clutch was done quite easily; I thoroughly enjoyed sitting in the car pressing the pedals!

Filling and bleeding the brakes was more of a challenge; a couple of leaks were caught and careful attention must be paid to the process in the AG for best results. In the end we had a good feel to the brake pedal and no more air coming out.

With the fluids filled the battery was connected - which was momentarily quite frightening. It would appear that as soon as the battery is connected the fuel pump primes (takes about 2s) and we had no idea what it was at first! With the battery connected all the electrics were checked, with all the lights working, the heater and wipers working and (somewhat amusingly) the horn.

Picture following the start - having put the nose cone in place

As described above the process for starting consists of the following steps:

• Fill all fluids
• Cranking for oil pressure. The AG tells you to disconnect the inertia switch, but fails to explain what this looks like or where exactly it may be. I could not locate this mystery switch, but I could see a connector to where the pins went in for the spark plugs. I could not remove this connector, so I just removed the four connectors to each spark plug. Then crank the engine until oil pressure registers. 
• Re-connect spark plugs 
• Briefly start it, then check oil levels and top up appropriately. 
• Now you can start it for real - leave until temperature rises and the radiator etc start to get warm such that the cooling fan kicks in. 

Following these steps, remarkably it started straight away! It had a suitable idle speed just under 1000RPM and the ECU seemed to "learn" as it continued to idle and it became more stable - it also sounded great! Following the start the coolant needed to be topped up again.

Unfortunately the nose cone seems about 2" too wide for the car

Fibreglass cntd.

Since I provided no pictures last week of the rear arches I thought I should put some up. As I said before fitting the rubber piping around the edge of the carbon fibre plates was quite fiddly. fitting the piping around the edge of the rear wing once it was partially installed was much easier. I had pre-cut the required notches which helped make things smoother.

LHS looking good

The RHS took ages to go on, not because of any issue with the arches, but resolving the outstanding issues with the rear wheel hub. After the third bearing and second driveshaft, there was a combination of components that would actually go together! Once that was all fitted with the speed sensor the rear arch was put on.

RHS finally on

Lights and all!

I also installed the other carbon fibre bits (the sill protectors). These really helped to set the car off, but riveting all the interior panels by hand was a bit of a pain.

Carbon fibre trim starting to look really neat!

Fibreglass

During some odd hours this week progress was made on the boot carpet and drilling holes of the fuel filler cover (which is not mentioned anywhere in the assembly guide). If you read the last post, Caterham did send a replacement bearing, but it was just as sloppy as the first one. Their response? "There should be some movement". I have responded to this (quite frankly ridiculous) statement with a video showing the magnitude of the motion (that for some unknown reason will not display properly on this blog). 

The main objective of the weekend was to get cracking with the cycle wings and the rear wheel arches.

Cycle wings

Installing these turned out to be a bit of a pain in the neck. Drilling holes in the cycle wings knackered many a drill bit and the Caterham suggested method of installation was not ideal. On the LHS the Caterham method of drilling the fibreglass for the front holes first and then marking the wing-stays before transferring to the wheel for the rear attachment, was followed. An alternative to this was what we did on the RHS, where the wing-stays were marked up with a hole 1.2cm from the end and a spacing of 8.5cm between the centres; this was drilled both front and back. Once drilled these could be transferred to the cycle wing directly by lining it up where you wanted it and then marking though the holes; this was a quicker method overall.

LHS cycle wing on

Feeding the indicator wire through the wing-stays was a fiddly task; I resorted to toothpicks to try and guide the wire out of the narrow opening - which eventually worked. With the cycle wings on and the lights wired up it's starting to look more like the finished article.

Probably should apologise for using the bonnet as a tool storage area!

Rear Arches

The rear arches needed to have the carbon fibre plates installed prior to fitment to the car. Feeding the rubber piping around the edge of the plate was a time consuming, fiddly task. Once stuck in place with tape they were drilled and riveted to the arches themselves. They did start to the look pretty cool with carbon fibre panels on! Material stillness to be removed in the area of the radius arm to allow it to A fit through the arch and B allow for motion as it absorbs the bumpy english roads. When that is done I shall add the arches to the car and put the lights on.

Rear Suspension

With the focus on the rear suspension, I was hoping to get all four wheels on the car. Seeing as the roll bar was already installed, first the damper units went in each side. Great care was taken with the lower bolts of each of these units to ensure that the holes were not cross threaded. Next the radius arms were installed. The bolt into the side of the car were fine, but the flanges on the de-dion required bending to create an opening big enough to receive the bush at the end of the radius arm.

LH damper installed

Radius arm being installed

Bearing slop

Bearing in nominal position

The A-frame was a bit more of a pain; the attachment to the de-dion required some slender sockets to get on the nut and bolt, but that was the easy part! Getting the alignment at the front moutings correct was more challenging. As the AG suggested I did end up with 3 spacers one side and four on the other to achieve perfect spacing, but it was an effort to get the 3 spacers in and the bolt through - two man job for sure.

Putting the ears back on the de-dion (with Loctite) was fine as was installing the hubs. Installing the disc was also no problem, but when adding the caliper great care was taken with the brake line threading. Unfortunately when I got the the RHS of the car the installed bearing had some serious play in it - completely unsuitable, hopefully this will be replaced. Nevertheless, I now have a yellow, three wheeled car - remind you of anyone...?

Yellow with three wheels!

One thing I would mention is the threads on the brake lines have been notoriously ropey, there has been multiple instances where the unions etc. needed to be re-thread.

With the rear suspension stuck a couple of other jobs were completed:

Throttle cable
Installing the throttle cable it appeared as though there should be a clip on the front of the engine to help guide the cable - apparently this is no more... To get the cable to be the right length for the pedal, you really do have to bend the pedal with a screwdriver inserted into its axis - despite the fact that this feels barbaric. Using this technique in combination with the adjustment on the other end of the cable it was possible to get a perfect match of pedal and cable travel, which had me sat in the car pressing the throttle pedal and grinning from ear to ear!

Carpets
Looking briefly at this jigsaw puzzle, I went for the easy option of installing the seat back carpet. It required some trimming around the transmission tunnel, but otherwise went on pretty nicely - I used Everbuild Stick 2 spray which was nice and tacky and so far has done the job well.

Exhaust & Cooling

I had hoped that by the time I was writing this the front end would be all wrapped up, unfortunately it's not quite there.

Exhaust

I had already fitted the steering column when I came to fit the exhaust, which I thought was a sensible play, seeing as access to that region would be hampered once the exhaust was in. If you follow the order for the pipe installation as suggested in the assembly guide then the pipes can be installed pretty easily. This is in contrast to what I read later, that said it was impossible with the steering column fitted!

Four exhaust pipes - getting on the nuts to torque them is a challenge

Fitting the collector to the exhaust pipes once installed is more challenging due to the reverse springs Caterham use to hold it all in place. The springs are pretty hard to compress, with that in mind I came up with what I think is a pretty neat solution. If you attach one end of the spring to one of the retaining hooks and then use a screwdriver (or similar) in the other end of the spring, you can lever off the other retaining hook to compress the spring. When the spring is compressed secure in this fully compressed position using 3 to 4 cable ties. With a fully compressed spring it is much easier to install over each of the hooks without involving large forces. Note that it still required some filing of the retaining hooks as even the fully compressed spring would not fit over the span.

Installed spring

Full assembly with heat shield - I hope the positioning is ok

Cooling System

Fitting the radiator hoses, radiator expansion tank and cooling fan is fairly straightforward - and it starts to make it look like a proper car! What is less clear is the poorly worded description in the assembly guide for what happens next. I resorted to doodling out two views of the engine bay and where I thought the cooling fluid should be going.

Radiator and expansion tank installed

In summary:

• Use the hose marked as a fuel hose to run from the header tank around to the rear of the exhaust side of the engine, where there is an "L" shaped fixture. 
• Fit the plastic "T" piece to the short "L" shaped hose and then fit the long "L" shaped hose to the "T" piece. 
• Trial fit this assembly to the engine (short "L" positioned with the "T" piece at the top) and cut the long "L" shaped hose to fit to the expansion tank. Remove trial fit assembly.
• Now fit the long straight hose to the other end of the "T" piece. 
• Install this entire assembly to the engine as before now clamping everything down. Note that the straight hose runs beneath the air inlets for each cylinder and along the top of the fuel rail.
• Install the heater (if not done already)
• Use excess "J" hose to create two pieces to run from the heater to the control valve
• I would recommend installing the control valve at this point and verifying the control from inside the cabin. 
• Now trial fit the "J" hose to the rear RHS of the engine. and trim to length. 
• Fit the "J" hose and the straight hose from the "T" piece to the heater control valve. 

Air box

There is very little information about the air box in the assembly guide, so I just made it up as I went along... Mounting to the car via rubber mounts is easy enough, then the filter slots in. There were then some metal inserts to fit into the trunking. Once these were installed, the ridged end of the trunking could then be fitted to the upper air box. Then use the large band clamp to attach the shorter section of trunking to the engine. Finally, fit the upper air box to the lower air box and you are done!

Installed Air Box