Zach’s Electric Diablo

After a wonderful weeks vacation in Maui, I get back to discover that the transmission fairies have delivered my rebuilt transmission. Yeah!

The last couple weeks have mostly been ordering parts and figuring out a plan of attack. However, last night I started work on the e-brakes and needed to fabricate a part from scratch. I know it’s a small, but it is the first one.

I opened up my Wilwood spot brakes (p/n WIL-120-2280 and WIL-120-2281) and found that the opening was just not big enough for my discs:

Instead of shimming it, I decided it would be cleaner to just build a new spacer. So…

A few minutes in SolidWorks and I had the new spacer ready to cut on our waterjet:

Just a little trimming on the mill:

Done!

I’m going to start building the roll cage next week and wanted to try the body on the chassis to get some measurements (plus I wanted to see how cool it was going to look).

So, I lifted the body into the air with my lift gantry (worked like a charm):

Then I just rolled the chassis underneath:

Problem #1: The D&R body that I have has this nice fiberglassed trunk (in the front).

However, that trunk interferes with the master cylinder:

My solution was to temporarily remove the master cylinder until I decide how to cut out that nice fiberglassed trunk.

Problem #2: There is a support rail on the chassis that supports the fiberglass cross member that spans the engine compartment.

However, it can’t move into place because the bottom of the very back of the body interferes with another piece on the chassis:

Update: Check out my posting on kitcentral.com for answers to these questions.

Yesterday, I got to spend a few hours on the car. Didn’t get a whole lot done, but figured out a few things. I started by figuring out the wiring coming out of the steering column:

There are still a few mystery wires, but I found all the important features: ignition, wipers, lights, and turn signals.

I also started building my wiring harness. I used this list that Jim Dinner posted on Kitcentral.com as a starting point, but soon realized that without an ICE there are a lot fewer circuits needed (granted, I will have one or two really big circuits for the DC motor).

The last and most important thing I got done was making a list of all the “stuff” I still needed to order (listed in no particular order):

• Vintage air A/C system and DC motor to drive compressor
• Vacuum pump for brakes
• Touch screen for dash
• GPS for nav system
• Power supply for mac mini
• Relays
• Mirror motors (the ones I got from allelectronics.com were just too big)
• Interior switches (door lock, windows, mirrors, air lift, etc)
• Shifter (I need to decide on cables or hard linkage)
• Dash vents (forward facing and defrost)
• Battery charger
• Battery monitoring system
• Seat tracks
• Loom holders
• O-ring grommets
• U-bolts for airlift conversion
• Air fittings for airlift
• Thumb key latches for the outside
• Clutch kit
• Brake lines, bender and flare tool (ordered)
• Bondo for the headliner area
• Metal for roll cage
• E-brake lever (ordered)
• E-brake calipers and cables (ordered)
• Flashers for turn signals
• Rollers for front lip
• Fuse box
• Windshield wiper and motor
• Seat belts
• Oh-s handles
• Sun visors
• Rear view mirror
• Dome light
• Wheels/tires
• Batteries