G'day all,
Thought I'd start another thread now that it is on the road. To answer Lauren's question from another thread. I have done quite a few miles now, not really development miles as I've not had time to change anything inbetween trips.

After topping up the water on several occasions the level now appears to be constantly full. Also the temp gauge now stays between 90 & 100 at a steady 80mph with both fans on low speed.

I have also put in a few miles of night driving on B roads. Just enough to convince me to ditch the current lights & fit the FIAT coupe lights I've got tucked away in the shed. The rectangle ones are woefull. Poor light & not aimed at all, it was terriable. Also a lot of reflections from the dash lights, the draw back from such a racked screen I suppose.

Also discovered that the rattling noise from the rear end was loose bottom shock mount bolts.

Jumping in a driving now is second nature. I drive it every chance I get. Now that it has the tow bar fitted I even take it on the dump run. Lulu rides shot gun and loves to show eveyone how the roof works.

So until I get some more shed time

catch you later

bushboy

Well, that sounds like development to me

Well done Martin, this is what its all about - actually driving on the road. Sounds like your experience of night driving with the original lights mirrors mine - bloomin' awful. My old projector beam setup was better, but main beam was disappointing, and my current set up is better still, but alas no match for modern lighting systems. I can make reasonably rapid progress at night, but only if there are no cars coming the other way

Reflections in the windscreen are a fact of life unfortunately. With your eyeline so close to the windscreen, and the sharp rake angle, it is virtually impossible to stop visible reflection occurring somewhere on the screen. The trick appears to be to try and ensure that the reflections don't interfere with your direct forward vision, which is the best I have been able to do so far.

I still have a hankering for a head-up display, which would work superbly in the Nova - the irritating reflection in the windscreen would actually be your instrument display!

Keep those miles a-clockin'

Lauren

Same! Would love a HUD. I was looking at flogging some parts from Cadillac or Corvette a couple of years ago (fleabay of course). lol

Great news Martin, shows that the extended build time was worth it! My ex-Metro headlights are at best average (seem to remember they were like that on Metros anyway) even with added high power bulbs - but when the road's empty, the nostril and grill lights come into there own and seeing is not a problem.) (bit like Ben's!) Instrument reflection is a bu**er - all you can really do is sink them in more or shroud them in some way - I sank an Alfasud instrument unit into my first Nova's pod - that worked a treat but I guess like hens teeth to find now...... Absolute worse thing is trying to drive into low sun (Autumn evening type stuff) - screen just isn't right for that!

Awesome job! I love posts like these, more and more getting finished.

Thanks for the comments guys 'n' gal.

I'm still torn between the coupe lights and the rectangular one. Purly on a cosmetic apperance. I really love the look of the car with the rectangular lights, but they are pittiful. What's more important, night safety or looks. I'll have to have a close look at acids pics again of his FIAT lights. If I go that route I'll try to mount them further back to get them as high as possible.

Bushboy

I know exactly what you mean - I wanted to keep the classic looks of the rectangular lamps, but significantly improve the efficiency. My old projector beam system was better than the Capri lights they replaced, but main beam was still poor and the dips were only just acceptable.

After Incident #3 I redesigned the lights again as you know. The mains are definately improved, and the modern projector beam (with H7 bulb instead of an H1) does seem to work better too, although the low height continues to give problems on undulating road surfaces (my lamps are 450mm from the ground, still 50mm short of the lighting regs). I had a couple of lads from Burnley come over to look at the car and one of them commented that Green Machine had Ford GT headlights, which I took as a complement, seeing as I used the same trick as the big Ford - disguising the projector beam in a silver rectangular trim ring.

Thinking "out-of-the-box", as I often do, I was wondering if you could use a secondary reflector (mirror) for the headlights. A large, powerful light source could be mounted in the nosecone, facing backwards and angled up toward a thin mirror which would then reflect the light forwards through a narrow aperture. The advantage of this approach would be that the mirror aperture could be almost on top of the wheelarch, with no gubbins projecting behind to foul the wheel. Since the lighting regs only require a horizontal cut-off in the dipped beam, this could be achieved by depointing the light source relative to the mirror. The main beam source could share the same mirror, but with slightly different pointing so that it throws the beam further...

On second thoughts perhaps its not such a good idea

As well as the FIAT lights, you could always consider semi-recessed beams, which supercars like the Pagani Zonda have helped to popularise. And never overlook the fact that at the angle at which they are mounted, the headlamp covers attenuate and/or diffract a lot of the light before it gets to the road. Having detachable, floppable or removable covers might just make all the difference!

The choice is yours!

Lauren

Would a good set of secondary driving lights help with putting more light on the road? In addition to the 7" lamps I was also going to add a set of 3"-4" driving light in the lower air scoops in the chin, and a set of fog lights too.

YES.........

I did toy with using 90mm round lights (£40 each from Car Builders Solutions) but don't have that spare at the moment. Also had a set of rectangular fog/driving lights but sold them a few years ago. So I'm stuck with leaving it as it is for the moment (easiest option) or fitting the Fiat lights. No great rush as it is on the road.

Had another step forward tonight. Finally got around to constructing the speedo corrector to correct the tacho signal. The motor cycle intended digital dash cant cope with the three pulse per revolution signal from the V6 ECU. So I have built this electronic kit that intercepts the signal & either raises it or decreases it in 1% incruments. I have fitted & calibrated it and now I have a more accurate ondication of engine speed. Now I can see what the engine is doing at legal motor way speeds. Have not taken it for a drive yet as I've not long finished fitting it. I don't have a tacho to calibrate it to so I just reved the engine to the rev limiter, assumed it to be 7500 rpm (redlines at 7000) and I'm happy with that.

Now that I am more use to driving the reek I have noticed just how easy it spins the rear wheels. You don't have to try very hard to do it in first & a quick shift from first to second has the same effect of the rears loosing traction. Must be the old tyres

Catch you all later

bushboy

Mine can do that too, and it's just armed with a 1.8, though admittedly it is a turbo. And also mated to old wheels. And slippery ones at that. Radial T/A's anyone? lol

I fitted some new ( old model ) mini tinted visors so that when pulled down I can see through them, sun glare is cut as well.

Yes Jim that's probably the only solution, (one of the first mods I did when I got the car) but results in recduced glare but even less forwards vision......

The funniest proposal I ever saw for a steeply raked windscreen was on the prototype Ferrari 365BB - a little roller blind was placed on the header rail, one for each occupant, and on the end of the string was a rubber suction cup. Pininfarina (Bless 'em) thought that while driving in low sun you could pull the blind down to where you wanted it and secure it to the windscreen at that point with the suction cup

Needless to say it never reached production

Lauren

funny you say that, Lauren....I was considering doing that very thing....not the most elegant of solutions, and you wind up with little suction marks all over the screen...but ya gotta do what ya gotta do!