My GKD Legend Kit Car Build - May 2009 until ...

[Marc_NL]

Good to read that another build is about to commence.

I have had some conversations with richard and trying to follow his build closely and will do so on yours as well 

I am spending this christmas holiday to work on my shed (alias garage) and get it prepared for serious work. Tools also coming in this week. If all goes well my plan is to start building a 7ish car (with focus on the GKD at the moment) fall next year.

Have fun with the preparations and build, I will be watching you 

[Richard]

Good to hear, and glad Marc you've so called "come out of the closet" 
A few other builds I know of underway as well in different places, not all on public forums, which is totally fine.

Just been checking out garage heaters to make it a little more comfortable out in the garage in the coming weeks.

['The Gaffer']

Have fun with the preparations and build, I will be watching you 

Marc, hopefully we will be watching your progress too

Just been checking out garage heaters to make it a little more comfortable out in the garage in the coming weeks.

I was considering one of these http://www.machinemart.co.uk/shop/product/details/little-devil-propane-fired-space-heater/path/space-heaters-workshop-heaters

Log burners are great as well if you can fit one.

[Marc_NL]

When a project gets started and there is progress, it will be shared ofcourse! For now it is a matter of preparation which is already a lot of work. Which kit, what philosophy of building etc. And ofcourse getting the work area ready, which is what this winter is good for.

The rules and regulations are a mess here. Recently the tax-free CO2 range is reduced to only 110g/km. This is impossible to reach with a legend 6. Also a law is being prepared to make it illegal to tune or tweak the engine 

Just a little info, probably already known, but it won't hurt to share it. Quite a few E46s (at least overhere) were fitted with a clutch-delay-valve. This, as it name impies, makes it impossible to release the clutch fast. This is greatly annoying, especially in throttled downshifts. Be sure to remove this bugger.

[Richard]

Easy enough to source an E46 from UK Marc ! 
and not too far to drive it back, then build a LHD model (no need to change parts for a GKD build).

Not sure you'd want to do too much tuning to start with with the power to weight ratio you'd get compared to your road car.

Anyway a very small bit of progress today before deciding a source of heat in the garage is required !

Log burner is quite a good idea.

[Marc_NL]

Sourcing a donor is not an issue, it will not take up much of the total cost. Getting it on the road here is the expensive part, full with ridiculous rules etc. That is no longer easy to circumvent by taking an alternative route of import or whatever...

As an indication; CO2 emission is calculated as:
CO2 = 0.078m + 0.527p + 27.035
Where m is roadready weight, p is power ik kW. Above goes for a manual petrol car. The first 110g of emission is 'free of charge'.
Simply put,  a 1063kg car (about 950kg empty weight) without an engine is subject to charge. Same for a weightless car with 157 kW engine...

Between 110 and 180 g/km the charge is E35 per gram this year, up to E 95 in 2013....
Real Madness if you ask me.

Is the garage heated now? Any progress?

I am still working on the shed, but the tools have arrived...slight progress.

[rodgling]

any progress...? I'm desperately trying to get all the 328 donor parts ready for when my legend chassis arrives in a couple of weeks, though I suspect I won't manage this.

[testingtesting]

As above, any updates?  My chassis arrives in a couple of weeks too.

I've got all the donor car stripped down now too.... that was a bit of a pain in the ass!

[Richard]

Been away yet again, and in cold.

Will get back on this topic typing up.

Good to hear you'll getting those chassis soon(next week ?).

A few little tweaks needed for IVA Peter's let me know, seem very simple and not affecting chassis.

[rodgling]

well, i've given up on pressing out the bloody halfshafts (went out and bought a puller and a sledgehammer, but still no joy) so am taking them to a garage on Monday to get them to do it. anyone else have this problem, or did you manage to press them out OK?

[Richard]

They are a real pain to get out !!!

No wonder they sell those special tools for a couple hundred pounds, if you had a garage you'd need them.
£25-30 each second hand.

[testingtesting]

Any update Richard?

Had my chassis arrive so started work on mine now

[Richard]

Excellent News !

[Richard]

First catch up post.

Pedal Box, pedals.

A bit of a fiddle to get access to the bolts for the cylinders so flexi sprocket needed but not awful.
A very tight fit on bottom of cylinders to box metal, a tiny bit of filing needed.

Haven't got any issues in my notes other than that mentioned above, so went reasonably well.

[Dixie]

How long now.  Will it be ready for the summer??

[Richard]

Mark, hope so, have a bit more time coming up and less travel so should be able to tinker away a bit more. Got a few goals in mind but let's see.

[Dixie]

How are you getting to Stoneleigh?  Are you going with your son?  If you're on your own, I have a seat spare in the Cob??

Mark

[Richard]

How are you getting to Stoneleigh?  Are you going with your son?  If you're on your own, I have a seat spare in the Cob??

Mark

Not sure yet, have yet to think about it really other than reserve the dates in my diary. Would be happy to ride shotgun if no toy to go in.

[Richard]

Yippee - Adjusted rear uprights have arrived / collected on a drive down A303 by Peter on another Legend chassis delivery run.

Interesting to see the few changes from my experiences are incorporated into these latest ones. It is just getting a bit simpler to build with these little adjustments.

Beginning to hear some interesting experiences about IVA testing and the "interpretations" of some of the greyer areas of the text. Mostly it all sounds logical to me but then I've not got there yet.

[Richard]

Among the house decorating I nipped to the garage and noticed I'd put in a couple of bolts the wrong way round some time ago on the front suspension, so spent a bit of time correcting, one darned fiddle, but hey bound to be a few of these self induced things as we go along.

['The Gaffer']

Got any pics to post up rich?

[Richard]

Must upload a few pics.

I did a financial progress check and hours spent doing things out of curiousity.

Then I thought I'd compare with GKD claims on build costs on their website, just as a point of reference.

In summary, you can definitely achieve a build for the costs GKD claim. I've spent a bit extra in places you don't need to in order to get a running car on the road but then I suppose that is the way of kit cars.

I've even managed to buy a few tools within the budgets he's quoting so that has worked out well.

A few teething issues I've had have already been altered for subsequent builders and I've even seen that myself on other deliveries to other customers, good to see customer feedback being acted upon.

Main niggle is the plasma cut panels, which take a fair amount of effort to tidy up, but so far for my purpose that has been ok to do, I suspect that laser cut panels are more expensive so that would become a trade of time to money.

Will do a little more of an update at the weekend, now it is food then off to the garage this evening for a couple of hours of tinkering on the engine 

[Richard]

Been doing a few little checks and double checks.

Little amendment made to the T pieces on brake lines, I did not have them on nyloc or locktited so have amended that.

Double checked the cable run tie spacing and all at 200mm or below so that appears to be in good shape.

Experiments on the panels coming along, totally convinced this will not compare to the others in the club in quality of finish but an interesting learning curve. Certainly the paint finish is very proportional to the preparation put in.

Been keeping a log of the torque used on the various nuts/ bolts, using the ones from the BMW manual for those re-joined parts.

Still need to post a few of those pics.

['The Gaffer']

Still need to post a few of those pics.

Yep, people might start thinking you've made it all up Rich

[Richard]

rear T piece on brake lines, locktited underneath, another hole drilled as an option while prop out of the way, may well be bunged later, avoiding any concern of rub/wear in future., prop still out for a couple more days, diff been mostly cleaned up but long way from perfect.



without disk/caliper but showing cover on steering, not heat shrunk to meet requirements, ties to be tidied still.

boys had various wheels on rear today checking the options.

trial paint attempts coming along but still amateurish.

[rodgling]

Richard, I don't want to alarm you, but your steering rack appears to be held together with cable ties...

[Richard]

Richard, I don't want to alarm you, but your steering rack appears to be held together with cable ties...

Because it is 

I leave the ties long until the end, this way you can open them up with a tiny screwdriver if you need to adjust things. The ties will have to be off for the IVA test as it needs to be accessed to inspect what is under it, this then means the fit has to be tight enough to hold in place, so some form of tape wrapped to give a snug fit will be in order, added to list of items to check at end.

The nut under the shroud would be met by the sphere used in IVA so needs to be covered but from what others have done the heat shrinked covers haven't been accepted.

I'm trying to as I go check things against my reading of IVA regs and the hints tips from Peter(GKD) as well as others.

['The Gaffer']

Looks like some good progress there Rich, keep up the good work

[Richard]

shed is now a temp paint booth.

experiments in painting, not yet a Master 

[rodgling]

You've gone for a white one as well then? Good choice. I reckon I'll probably leave the painting for a while - I want to crack on with the suspension bits first.

[Richard]

having some temporary trouble posting a pic, but tidyimg up exhuast manifold to have nicely lined up holes and smooth edges, before fitting.

[Richard]

there you go, some work to do as you can see.

[Bulldog Bri]

Looks good Rich...

[testingtesting]

Looks good

Do any of the panels need bending before fitting?  Wouldn't want your paint to splinter.

[Richard]

Those that are painted are already bent into the shapes needed, a bit of an trial of paint shades and techniques on relatively harmless panels, not 100% happy but getting better at it.

The exterior panels on the car may well have to be painted in situ given the jiggle to get them back on, not quite decided how I'll tackle those just yet, all holes drilled and trial fitted, will have to see how the interior trial ones get on.

Tidying up the exhaust manifold is more time consuming than I thought it would be to get the curves and smoothness done, still slowly but surely progress is made.

Replacing the O2 sensor with a new one when it is fitted, although in a future iteration of the engine and its management that might turn out to be not so needed, but for now it is to be replaced.

[rodgling]

So you're painting the interior panels as well then? I had planned to leave those unpainted, will have to see how yours turn out.

[Richard]

So you're painting the interior panels as well then? I had planned to leave those unpainted, will have to see how yours turn out.

It was a way of trial painting in a place it didn't matter too much.
I did try polishing them up, very hard work and you need a high degree of dedication and a polisher tool.
Another option was to sand to leave a brushed aluminium finish.
A degree of "fettling" required, had a couple of welds that weren't ground down before powderder coating so had some touching up to do there.

[rodgling]

Yes, I had the same issue with welds sticking out in a few places. I just modified the panels to go around the welds as I didn't fancy potentially weakening the chassis by grinding away any weld. Fortunately this was only necessary in places which won't be very obvious.

[Richard]

A few more items being tidied up before fitting



A little more tidying for these large washers and on they will go.

[Richard]

Stuck waiting for wiring loom 

If gardening chores among others permit will spruce a bit more of a panel up and do a phone pic walk.

Apart from that not much to do without wires.