Progress is being made on the Sabre front… and I’m pleased to report that I have completed another system… the gearshift.
You’ll recall that I had fabricated a mounting bracket for the gear shift lever, Well the plan was to connect the lever to the engine using a push pull cable as far as the firewall, and then transitioning to an actuation rod in the hot engine bay. Well the plan worked a treat, it is just that I had to have three goes at it. I originally attempted to make the entire lever,pivot and actuating arm in aluminium and frankly spent the whole morning monumentally cocking it up…. twice. So in the end I reverted to making it out of steel, woth just the large handle made in aluminium.
The central steel pivot in this unit is reinforced with some sintered bronze oilite bushes and it works a treat.
You can see it is connected via an m5 rod end, which in turn connected to a push pull cable. part number 300-M3223-975. which is metric, 2 inch throw, 975mm long heft cable from cable-tec.co.uk.
The cable runs across the floor of the passenger compartment, to this little bracket I welded into the base of the bulkhead. you can see it it then transitions to a fabricated push rod… which connects at the other end directly to the gear shift lever that featured in the last post.
Once it was all together, I gave it a test yank it and it changed up and down between neutral and 1st beautifully, infact it has almost no lost motion so is very direct with lots of tactile feedback. Now, being used to Honda boxes, where you can go smoothly up and down the box even with the gearbox static. I naturally assumed I had an issue as I could only N and 1. So I spent a few minutes trying to change into second by twiddly the output sprocket, removing the plugs and spinning the engine and so on. Finally I read the Kwaka manual and discovered it has a positive.neutral action that prevents a change into second unless the engine is spinning. ho hum that seems to be working then.
So the engine is nailed in, gearbox operational, and the diff is in place, although not connected…. I’m now starting to think about oil, water and electrical systems. So progress is moving on, and I’m going to be starting on the electrics now, while I wait for the exhaust bends. The electrical system is going to be based around the CarTek Isolator I bought at Autosport, the McGill motorsports master switch, and a new fuseway system from Polevolt, which I haven’t used before. Duncan and I are starting to become convinced that it is time to pour the custome foam seat. This is because I need to finalise, pedals, shift arse and switchgear positions…. and we need a proper seat to do all that.
On another matter, you can see the slightly rusty chassis rail in this picture. The fact that the chassis is unpainted and rusting is really beginning to bug me. I know It is going to be powder coated, and so I need to complete all the welding, and if possible do a full build before I get it coated….. but I want to work on something smooth, colourful and clean! Every time I go in the garage its almost more than I can stand to not attack it with a paintbrush and big pot of POR15.