Engine Installed

Haven't had a huge amount of time to spend on the roadster lately, just the odd bit of tinkering time, but I've slowly managed to finish rebuilding the engine over the last few weeks.

Got a decent session in the garage on Friday night though and managed to get the engine in the chassis :)

I still need to either remake the engine mounts, or rework and finish off the ones I've got (following my 25mm offset - see earlier post), but they'll do for now!

It feels like a massive step forward having the engine in place :)  and it opens up lots of other jobs I can get on with now (exhuast, intake system, engine wiring, cooling system, etc, etc...  Not sure where to start!).

Engine Re-build

Haven't had much time to spend on the Roadster lately, but have been slowly stripping the engine down as I have the odd 5 minute here and there.

I've now stripped the block as far as I'm going to, and I'm now ready to start putting it back together again!
I decided to leave the bottom end alone, as it felt fine when I drove the donor, and I can't detect the slightest bit of roughness or play when I rotate it by hand.
The bores also look perfect, and the piston rings appear to be sealing well.

While I was at it I decided to paint the sides of the block with a can of high temperature paint.  Not the best job in the world, but it'll do!
Did bother doing the front or back, as no one will see those once I put it back together :)
A mate of mine who's rather better with a can of paint than me has offered to paint the cam cover, so that should look pretty good at least!

Throttle Cable Outer Stop

To stop the throttle cable outer wandering about at the pedal box end I  got a bicycle brake cable adjuster...

...and stuck it in the pedal box:

Job done!

ECU Location

After moving the battery out of the passenger footwell I decided to fill the freed up space with the ECU.
I used two of the existing ECU brackets (one of which was chopped down a bit) to bolt the ECU to the bulkhead.
It's not exactly heavy, so two M8 bolts and nylocs should be ample!
I also stuck some self adhesive foam to the back of the ECU before I bolted it on.  It'll do bugger all vibration wise, but it made it 'sit' better.

 
The loom to the ECU is the original MX5 one, albeit heavily stripped and modified.
The bulk of the loom goes to the engine bay via a hole in the side of the tranny tunnel panel using one of the MX5 engine loom grommets to protect it.
The rest of the loom goes up into the scuttle where it will eventually connect to the fusebox, clocks, and pedal box.

Head Re-build

Way back when I bought the donor the previous owner warned me that one of the spark plugs was 'slightly rounded off'...
When I tried to get the plugs out it was clear it wasn't slightly rounded off, but completely and utterly rounded off.
As my attempts to get it out failed I ended up buying a spare head off ebay.
I got it several months ago and it's been sat under my desk at work.  Every now and then I've been getting it out during a spare lunch hour and slowly rebuilding it:

It's now finished with new stem seals and re-ground valves and seats (done the old skool way with grinding paste and a sucker on a stick) and ready to go on the engine.

Wiring - Fusebox and Relays

I can't remember if I've covered this already or not, but here's a pic of my fusebox and relays:

I made this up some time ago and fitted it to the scuttle bulkhead.
It might not be pretty, but at least it will be tucked away under the dash where no-one can see it.  Just hope I never need to change a fuse!

Battery - New Home

Well I was going to put the battery out of sight in the passenger footwell, but after buying a nice shiny ali bracket for it I decided to stick it on the engine bay bulkheadfor all to see.
To be fair it was a bit tight in the footwell and my bracket wouldn't fit.. :)
I've also stuck the main fuse next to it so I don't have un-fused battery going through ali panels.

I've held the bracket in place using rivnuts.  It was positioned so that 3 of them went into the chassis rails, and only one goes into the ali bulkhead alone.