MadaboutKitcars

Still tempted by the Maser unit Mr Towed mentioned

MrTowed - I have pm'd you

I have a new plan. i will be starting a build thread soon.







=



Images are only ilustrative at this point. Need a new donor car to put it all in as well

When I was with Chris on Wednesday I noticed he had a fancy conical air filter fitted and said it sounded great. I immediately wondered if it made more power too so started to google.

Unfortunately this suggested not : http://www.zroadster.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=8918

But it did suggest modifying the route of the air to the air filter would improve things. Unfortunately I couldn't see any pictures on the thread and other threads I looked at didn't look the same as my engine.

Not to be put of by a lack of knowledge, guidenance or ability I made a start.

I found the bottom of the air box and pulled the connecting bit of plastic off


This was a funny shape with a sort of rectangle at the end that connected to the bottom of the air box and a flat slot at 90 degrees at the other end.



Which ever way you looked at it there seemed to be sub-optimal air flow.



What was needed here was a genius plan to use part of the existing plastic, a jubileee clip, some extra piping and my finely honed fabrication skills to get a flow of cold fresh air directly from the front of my car with no funny squidged bits.

I used a high tech computer aided design tool to generate the theoretical prototype


The yellow line shows where I should cut. The picture below shows where I actually cut.



A quick stroll over to A&E for a wash and three stiches and it looked a lot neater.


Back to the car again and I am pleased with the end result. I didn't bother refitting the bit of plastic and the end result looks like optomised air flow to me.

Now with big bore pipe getting air from the vent in the nose. Shame I couldn't get smooth pipe but the surface area is still loads bigger than before and there is still the big BMW airbox to smooth the air flow.

Hard when you have two fingers taped together and can't bend them

No, it with distort the aluminium tubing :-(

After an enthusiastic drive I popped the bonnet to discover a sub-optimal piece of tubing.

At the back of the radiator and before the airbox there is some very hot air which caused the problem.

If you look at the radiator and the silver bit of bodywork you can see the black plastic fixing mount. I am now thinking that if I put a sheet of something very heat proof to act as a wall between the hot air and the air intake vertically and roughly in line with that mount I might solve the problem

I haven't posted for a while as I have been enjoying the car in the sunshine. Anyway, I finally bit the bullet and have got someone else to do the interior for me. I delivered the var and look forward to seeing what happens next.

Here are some before photos showing the car as it was handed over




Hopefully I will get some in progress shots while the work is being done.

I will be sending Ken a link to this thread so he can add stuff if he wants.

Dropped off the new clock (joke) and took some pictures of progress. The door leather is not fixed yet but the framework holding the switches looks good. It will all be behind a secret pannel when it is finished.

Lower door panels and centre console will be saddle brown.

The top of the door car will be black leather as in the first photo with the bottom part being the brown leather in this picture. Again this is work in progress so the wrinkles will disappear

The leather does have a surface texture so isn't actually shiney, just not a great photo.

The colour is a shade darker in the picture that reality because it is lit from behind. It is a little darker than I thought it would be. I wanted something closer to the wood on the steering wheel. Having said that, it does look good against the black door tops.

Wife has warned me off buying any more cars :-(

Leather hasn't been shrunk to fit yet on the doors and there will be a panel added to cover the modern swithces but you get the idea hopefully.






I like the new door panels as they remove all the modern molded plastic and the way the retrimmed carpet edged have piping that matches the trim etc

I might look at getting the seat re-trimmed but really one some better bucket seats as the standard BMW one are for arses even wider than mine

not sure it is as good as my clock...

;-)

Yes, very happy so far

Just picked it up from the trimmer.







Nice details like a zip to be able to adjust the handbrake without taking the console out


And bi-fold doors on the secret panel

I am chuff to nuts with it.

Little things like they offset the gear stick gaitor so when it is parked it looks like a manual left in 1st gear, or the zip on the hand brake or the way the floor carpets are also edged in leather and they line up with the leather coming down from behind the seats or the leather collars around the roll hoop or the...

You get the picture

Shame about the secret panel not being secret any more......:-

Maybe I should stick a big clock over the front of it?

BTW my quarter lights are on the door and work fine :-) :-)

She does like it much more now but she doesn't drive. That is the problem when I try to explain the need for a fourth car

The Maserati symbol in the wheel needs filling in with paint to make stand out

I quite like it subtle. It is funny when people are trying to work out what the car is. I was sat outside a coffee shop with the car parked near by listening to three blokes discussing what it was.

Lots of pointing, teeth sucking and guesses like Jag, TVR, Ginetta. The were peering inside and you could see the moment when one of them spotted the emblem. He stood up, stepped back from the car and said with great authority - If you look at the front and those side grilles you can tell is it an old Maserati. His mates said it wasn't and they started looking again and he made a big show of staring inside and suddenly spotting the emblem. He then said loudly - I was right, it is a Maserati, there is the logo!

Made me smile

Big engine option has gone out the window unfortunately. Apparently it is now complete. Wife is happy with it which is good. It feels a bit strange driving it without half the interior missing but does look really good I think.

I wonder why you don't put on the lens covers. Do you have condensation problems?

I knelt on one lens cover and broke it. Can't be arsed to get new ones and I like the look without them

Thanks!

To be honest I am not too fussed by other peoples views and comments but it definitely looks better in the pic you posted than the early ones I did.