The time finally came to start the car, and it didn`t quite go to plan.

As with any new engine build, its important to test for oil pressure first, before you even think of starting it up. So with distributor cap removed, I cranked it over to see what would happen. Sure enough, the oil pressure eventually came to life, but the engine did not appear to be turning over quite as fast as I thought it would. I figured that because it was virtually a brand new engine, everything was probably still a little tight. It was not long before my freshly charged battery was flat, so I charged it up again and had another go, this time with the electrics connected.

It cranked and cranked and cranked. Nothing. Not a sound. After much head scratching and messing about, the battery had gone flat again and went back on charge overnight. The next day I tried again, it cranked and cranked and cranked, but this time gave a pop and a backfire. Then the battery went flat again. By this time I really was questioning everything I had done and many of you even phoned me with pretty much the same advice of going back to basics. Valve timing was checked. The rocker covers were removed and with one eye on the valve train, the position of the rotor arm checked to make sure that I had number 1 cylinder where I thought it was, and that the plug leads were in the right place. Everything else checked out fine too. It gave a pop and a bang though, so there was at least some fuel going in, and a spark to ignite it. It was tried again. It cranked and cranked and cranked, and apart from a small pop and bang, nothing else. It was starting to feel like Groundhog day.

What I had noticed though, over the last few days of doing this was how little time I had before the battery went flat. now, I am fortunate enough here to have some good battery analysers and whilst I knew my battery was indeed a good one, there was something that I had not factored into the equation, and that was the temperature. Cars tend to break down in the cold weather, and its quite often down to a battery problem. Whilst car batteries will perform admirably in the warm weather, and the voltage may remain at around 12v, their cranking capacity (or basically the amount of grunt they have) is significantly reduced in the cold, and at only 3 degrees inside my garage, my battery was reading at around 56% efficiency. Its quite a small battery I have, and possibly not enough to turn over a very tight engine with all its settings up the spout, and still have enough capacity to give a healthy spark as the starter motor was consuming every little amp that the battery could give.

So I pulled one of the large batteries out of my truck and rigged up a set of leads so that I could use both of them in parallel like a monster battery





And sure enough, after a couple of turns, the engine fired into life. The timing isn`t set, the carbs are not set, but for a few moments, the engine ran. The temperature inside the garage has now dropped below 2 degrees, so time to go back indoors and come back to this another day.

But at least it ran, albeit briefly 

So areyou saying you needed a new battery, not a new engine all along? 

So areyou saying you needed a new battery, not a new engine all along? 

Ask me again in a few days when its running properly

Yes Dave the cold weather certainly highlights a battery that's on its way out. The weedy battery in my buggy finally threw it's hand in this winter, I replaced it with heaviest duty one I could find in an 063 case which is the Varta C6 and is rated at 520 cca. about £58 delivered

Thanks to my little bit of bling from Megabug in the form of a timing scale that can actually be seen, (as opposed to the black numbers on black plastic sat in a dark recess) I have managed to set the timing.





And it now fires up straight away on the small battery once more - despite the cold weather   

Whilst trawling eBay and being outbid on many A-Frames at the last minute, I came across one advertised as "Collection Only" from Lands End. Funnily enough, not many people seemed to be that interested in it. A quick jaunt down the coast saw me returning with a complete system for the bargain price of £150 including the cables and brackets from the vehicle that it was previously fitted to. Most I have seen for sale do not include the vehicle specific brackets, and as a Buggy one was going to have to be bespoke, a fitting kit would give me a great head start to some fabrication design.

Now I am no means an engineer, (as you will have gathered from my various posts on here) but the thought process about tackling this one may either inspire you, show you where I went wrong, or at least give you a good giggle.

So this is the plate and bar from a Citroen C1. Its a heavy duty version made by Car-A-Tow (a name I have heard of) and it seems to be constructed from 6mm thick steel (or good old 1/4 plate). The bar is bolted to the brackets with 4 bolts, and the brackets are bolted to the Chassis. This bar is what I have to attatch to the Buggy somehow.





From others that I have seen, they all seem to be pulling on the beam with the brackets in line with the lower torsion bar. As the beam is held on to the rest of the chassis frame head with only four bolts, its stands to reason that this is where the initial strength is, so that is where I will start. Luckily, my mate Adam up the road had a narrowed beam in his workshop that he let me borrow so that I can mock this up on the bench instead of crawling around on the floor under the car.





What most people would do is to make up a couple of brackets that bolt to the holes, and then make something that sticks out for the front bar to bolt to. Sounds easy, but there are an awful lot of variables there. the uprights have to be exactly vertical, the bar has to be horizontal and it needs to stick out buy the same amount on either side - if any one of these is out, then it will affect the ability to pull the Buggy in a straight line. This is where I have another problem. Not only have my welding skills not progressed any further due to no electricity in the garage yet, but since the demise of my mate Bill and his workshop, I have to clamp this all together and run around getting someone else to tack it together. The margin of error here is enormous, so I thought the best way would be to simplify everything as much as I could by initially making it out of as few pieces as I am able to.

The easiest way to ensure everything lined up with the frame head holes was to make it out of one great big piece. I had a bit of 6mm plate here, so I drilled out the four 14mm holes. I now had to attach something to this at 90 degrees so that I could bolt the front bar to it. I`m aware that welding a plate at a right angle is not as great for strength as it could be, so after another rummage in the scrap pile I found a big bit of 6mm angle. I clamped this where I wanted it to be and then ran down the road to see Steve, who welded up the top edge for me - purely to hold it in place and no more.





Once this had been done, I could then drill a few holes and bolt on the front bar. As I said, its probably not the way most would have tackled this, but at least I can be certain that everything now lines up as it should do in all three planes. It weighs a ton as I found out when offering it up to the front of my Buggy. I had already removed the front bumper as I knew it would get in the way. Everything seemed to sit quite nicely behind the bonnet and the bar was sitting just below my number plate.





So far, the idea of making it in only a few parts seems to have worked well, but this big lump of steel is far from ideal. Now, I may not be able to weld (yet) but I am a dab hand with an angle grinder, so its time to put this on a very drastic diet and remove some of the metal that is not needed. After an hour with the grinder I ended up with this.





Now that I have the bare minimum left, (but with all holes in the right places), its time to start thinking about adding some strength back into these brackets. I chopped the middle section into a few bits and then headed back down the road to see Steve for another session of welding. Poor Steve is really scratching his head over this one, as when you are making something you usually have an idea what is going on, but at the moment I am handing over a few bits of metal and saying weld this bit here and that bit there.





But Steve could see what I was trying to do with adding some strength and deep welded up every single seam that he could. I then brought the brackets back home to cut off the excess metal once more and clean them up a bit. There is no doubt that these will be more than strong enough for the task ahead.





With it assembled onto the beam, you can now see how I am hoping that it should work.





After a quick trip up the road to see the guys at Spectrum Coatings, it now has a nice layer of powder coat to it.





I am really pleased with how this has turned out so far and it has prompted me to do something about my lack of welding skills. A few years ago, RichStorm gave me a crash course into welding over the phone, and it was so good that I had a day experimenting with Stick/Mig/Tig down at Sawmill Jim's place and came away from there knowing that it was something I could definitely master in time. Lisa has just spotted a ten week welding course (MIG for beginners) at the local college, and I have booked myself a place on there starting in April.

Can`t wait. 

Looks good Dave and over engineered with a decent safety margin compared to some flimsy off the self ones.

I hope its as strong as it looks. Been looking at quite a few over the last 12 months, and glad that all of the Buggy ones I have seen also appear to be built very well compared with some if the rubbish that does indeed come off the shelf for the modern cars.

Just hope it fits   

One of the other reasons for splitting that back plate into two bits apart from the weight saving was to allow me to unbolt the beam one side at a time without too many complications. And now came the moment of truth. Had what I fabricated on the bench be the right shape and size to fit under the front of the Buggy?





For those interested in the technicalities, the main frame head 90mm bolts were replaced with M12 x 1.5 x 100mm 10.9 grade, and the smaller bolts holding the front bar on are M10 and rated at 8.8 strength. Apparently the zinc finish is now frowned upon as it weakens the surface of the bolts which is why most of them are now advertised as self colour or black. Some have suggested the use of longer bolts on the frame head with nuts at the rear, which whilst it sounds a great idea, I`m going to stick with the conventional method for now.

I have tried to keep the bar within the confines of the lower bonnet, and I think it looks quite subtle.





The A-Frame is really quick and easy to attach. The protective rubber caps are pulled off the end of the bar and the A-Frame arms are simply unfolded with the holes located over the end of the bar and secured with a split pin.





Lucky for me, I also have a metal loop on the bottom of the torsion tube, and that will do just nicely for the breakaway cable to attach to.

Don't know if this matters but to me the idea of two separate parts has a flaw in that when pulling straight it is spreading the load bit under cornering load will transfer to one side, IE onto one frame head mount and possibly introduce a twisting force.

You could rejoin them with a bolted plate/angle to reduce this and retain the benefits of two parts

I do tend to over engineer

A good point well made, but I think the way that the front bar attaches with the four bolts in line should alleviate that one somewhat.

Had the smaller bolts been one on front of the other, then I would agree with you, but side by side should remove sideways movement.

If you see me at Stoneleigh with half a car in tow, I`ll admit I got it wrong 

Just thought I would point it out, should be plenty strong enough. At least you wont have problems with downforce on the front.

One regret I have with my front bumper is that it needs all 4 bolts removed to take it off. If it come off in the future I intend to cut the brackets and fit bolt plates so I can take it off without unbolting the beam so see why you have done it that way

More than happy for people to point stuff out (and indeed criticise) - its the only way I can learn about stuff 

Front bumper is also an issue for me too, as the bracket is now obstructing my bumper mounts - need to have a think on that one.

Looks good, very unobtrusive.

You'll be making these as kits soon enough! haha!

You'll be making these as kits soon enough! haha!

Funnily enough, I`ve had that comment several times now - just wish I could weld, else I may just consider knocking a few out