My Cobra Build Site

Another good progress weekend and Wednesday night!

Dead Pedal and Throttle Panel Mods:

The mod is now complete, taped up and sealed on the outside, and painted. I’m not sealing the DS box until after all of the wiring is done, so the panels will be set aside. Pretty please overall with how it came out. The outside doesn’t have to be pretty, the body will cover it, and the inside is covered with carpet.

I also finished up pushing out the throttle side of the foot box. The panel is now riveted in place, and I made a patch panel to cover the open area around the 4″ tube and gap left by the bump. I will rivet it in after the floor goes in later.

Pics:

Brake Booster and Reservoirs:

Jeff at Whitby’s sent me a replacement booster, so I got it painted and put in. All the firewall cutting I did made it nice and easy to go in. The one issue I had was the boot around the push rod housing coming off as the rod went in and out. I ended up just taking a big pipe clamp and putting it around the boot at the mounting point, and it stays right where it’s supposed to.

I also used the Whitby-suggested mounting bracket and location for the reservoirs, just to the passenger side of the DS foot box. It looks funky now, but once the body is on, it should be a good spot. I left the lines long for now. Once the motor is in, and I’m buttoning stuff up, I’ll route them and mount them in the best configuration.

Passenger Foot Box Mod

I finally got the new top cut and installed, and managed to get the whole foot box installed as well and sealed and riveted in. It looks 100% better than it did. If I were really anal, I would have cut a new piece for the motor side of the box, but I think it looks pretty good the way that it turned out, and once the motor is in, it’ll be great.

I ended up needing some additional bracing to get rivets in place on the bottom of the foot box on the motor side. Not a big deal though.

Pics:

Before:

After: – You can also see the reservoirs.

Inside:

Firewall Brace:

The firewall is flimsy, and once the heater is in and everything else, it’ll be more so. You can buy a brace, but I had the scraps and it took me less than 10 minutes to make this little piece. It really helps keep things in place, and it just feels better.

Pics:

New Air Cleaner:

After reading all of the bad things about the cool Cobra Oval Air Cleaner, I sold it. I managed to find a used 14″ round one with chrome top and a brand-new 3″ K&N filter on it. It was a great deal, and looks awesome. Plus, it’ll breathe much better. I also no longer have any clearance issues with the E-Curve dizzy. It just clears the plug boot on the front of the cleaner.

Pic:

We’ll see what this weekend accomplishes. I’m waiting for lots of parts, so I’m working around the manual a bit.

After I finished the weekend, it didn’t seem like I made much progress, but I’ll take it.

I was able to get the floor pan riveted in (partial), modified the throttle side of the footbox for a little more go pedal room, and I built the dead pedal insert on the other side of the box, which was a big job. It still needs to be riveted in.

Throttle Pedal Side:

There are a couple of ways to get more room on the throttle side, either build an insert/box so you have more space, or do what I did…push out the bottom part of the panel a bit and add some support to hold it in place.

I ended up just trimming the bottom of the panel slightly, and I pushed the panel bottom out (towards the engine) about an inch. This gets me more than enough room for my size 11 feet (with tennis shoes or driving shoes on) and it was a very low effort fix.

Pic:

Dead Pedal Mod:

On long drives, you’ve got to have a place for your left foot, other than resting it on the clutch or shoving it under the pedal. Lots of guys have done the dead pedal mod, and I just copied one I saw on the forum. It’s 2.5″ on top and top front, 1.25″ on bottom front, and flush on bottom rear.

I basically just cut a whole in the side panel after marking the cross bar, then I measured my additions and the bends from there. The initial bends weren’t bad, but then putting the “ears” on those as the secondary bends were a pain. The first pic I saw I wondered why they looked kind of hokey (like they were bent with pliers…) I know now why they look like that…they WERE bent with pliers. That’s about as good as you can get.

The .040 aluminum is thicker than the kit stuff, and it’s an effort to bend it at all. I actually ended up a little aggressive, and the top of mine cracked a little. I added some angle aluminum I had around as a support.

All that’s left is to silicon and rivet it all together.

Pics:

Steering Shaft:

I learned one of the downsides to buying someone else’s kit is you can never find the parts you’re supposed to have. I was missing my bellville washers (little spring washers), so I had to make my own. A couple of 1/4″ washers, the grinder, a vice, and a screw driver, and they were made. These are what takes the slack out of the steering shaft.

I moved the bearing on the footbox to the inside to keep it clear of the brake booster, which was easy. The rest went in without a hitch as well, so the steering shaft is in, and working and tight…

Pic:

This pic shows some measurements a guy needed on the position of the shaft bearing assembly, and the angle at which it sits.

I hope to get my brake booster replacement soon so I can get that moving again. I also managed to sell about $300 worth of parts, so that’ll help pay for some more new parts.