Papa's MKIV Roadster Build - #9115 (Post Grad) - One million + views!!!

I've decided to do a build thread and hope this provides some return to the community on the help that I've already received and know I'll need as my build progresses. My experience with working on cars is pretty limited. I've done normal maintenance and some basic customization and mechanical repairs, but that's about it. So, this build, much like wareaglescott's build, will be from the perspective of the novice builder willing to learn as I go and humbled by the knowledge that is available from the many gracious gurus that are so willing to share their time and experience with us beginners.

My build will be based on a complete kit, now sitting in my shop along with some Factory Five upgrades and a few modifications to the basic "by the book" build. My car will use a Moser 8.8 3-link rear axle with Wilwood brake upgrade front and back. I plan to use BluePrint Engines for the powertrain, having selected their 347 c.i. with EFI and the Tremec TKO 600 transmission.

I will be using my roadster exclusively on the street, no racing. I live in Colorado, and can't wait to someday drive the roadster into the Rocky Mountains for a day trip to Breckenridge or Estes Park (Rocky Mountain National Park) with my lovely wife of nearly 32 years by my side.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...1&d=1524416247

Build Thread Table of Contents

Topic	Post Number(s)
Delivery	1
Rear Axle	8
Body & Aluminum Removal	12
Assembly Begins	13
Front Suspension & Brakes	23
Rear Suspension	32
Firewall	42
Pedal Box Assembly	42
Fuel Tank	49
Passenger Footbox	62
Passenger Floor	70
Driver’s Floor & Foot Box	81
Rear Cockpit Aluminum	85
Steering	86
Brake Reservoir	98
FFMetal Battery Box	98
Brake Lines	107
Rolling Chassis	137
Trunk Aluminum	139
Wiring Harness Install	140
Dash Install (Initial)	174
Engine Uncrate	179
Foot Operated Headlight Dimmer Mod	196,517
Electrical Switches	203
E-Brake Cable Install	207
E-Brake Handle	216, 226
Fuel Filter Mount	224
Fuel Lines	233
Wiper Motor Install	249
Engine Install	255
Heater Bypass	280
Seat Heaters	297
Power Steering Lines	306
Electrical Buss Bar	335
Boig Cool Tubes	342
Throttle Cable Mounts	352
Fan & Horn Wiring	356
First Start	357
Drilling Roll Bars	387
Mounting Dash (Final)	418
First Go-Kart	430
Coupler Mod (Retrofit)	454
Trans Tunnel Cover Upholstery	457
Breeze Seat Mounts	466, 664
Body Fit (Rough)	480
Hood Fit (Rough)	513
Hood Hinges/Latches	524
Trunk Lid & Door Fit (Rough)	541
Le Mans Gas Filler	544
License Plate Bracket	561
Tail Light Wiring	582
Headlights	585
EFI Swap from FAST XFI Street to Holley Sniper	618
Side Louvers	639, 687, 731-735
Trunk Carpet	640, 662
Trunk Lid Access Cover	649
12v Power Point	664
Trunk Lid Wiring	667
Driveline Safety Hoop	682
Premium Soft Top	688, 776, 1119
Carpet	693
Body Under Coating	702
Splash Guards	715
Door Strap & Seatbelt Pad Leather Dye	743
Breeze Upper Radiator Panel	755
Door Latches	770
Gap Filler Panels	784
Radiator Aluminum	785
Trunk Gas Struts from Relicaparts (Mike Everson)	796
SDC Self-Cancelling Turn Signals	807
Door Sill Aluminum	826
Gas-N Side Pipes	828
O-Ring Mod for Wheel Spinners	834
Getting Ready to Ship To Jeff Kleiner For Paint	846
At Jeff Kleiner’s For Paint	872, 895, 922, 929, 942, 954, 979, 986
Headed Home After Paint	1007, 1014
Final Assembly	1029, 1044, 1056, 1061, 1067, 1075, 1114, 1118
Getting Legal	1129, 1143, 1183
Ride Height Adjustment	1131
Finished!	1170
Russ Thompson Turn Signal Retrofit	1277
Radiator Replacement and Addition of Breeze Upper Mount	1361
EFI Upgrade - Inglese 8-Stack	1371, 1411
Wheel Spinner Hub Retainers	1394
Inglese 8-Stack and Terminator X EFI Upgrade	1407
Fuel System Contamination Cleanup	1423

Woohoo! Lookin forward to following. Congratulations and get to work!

The start of my build is still off in the future, so I envy you guys that made the commitment. Hope it turns out to be everything you wanted and more.

That drive from Denver to Breckenridge is what roadsters are made for. Welcome and congratulations.
-Steve

Papa,

Being an Electrical Engineer gives you a huge advantage over a lot of us.
To give you an example, it took me 40 hours to wire my dash.
That's why you never give a wrench to a banker.
Looks Like A Great Combination To Me!

Steve

Look forward to following along!
Wow I am envious of that potential drive in the rockies. Sounds amazing!
My Grandparents and Aunts/Uncles are from the Westminster and Lakewood areas. Spent a ton of time in Denver growing up. Would be amazing to drive the Cobra up in the mountains.

Good Luck! I'm excited to watch your build progress. You'll have a few months head start on me.

Thank you all for the kind words of encouragement! So, to catch this new thread up, I received my rear axle and Wilwood brakes a couple of weeks ago. I installed the brakes on the axle and replaced the chrome diff cover with the cast cover.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...2&d=1524416413

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...3&d=1524416429

I also had my grandson "help" me. He installed a lug nut for me and was so proud of himself!

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...4&d=1524416437

Last Saturday, the bulk of the kit arrived and my wife and I spent about six hours doing inventory. I found a few missing items and e-mailed Courtnie. She was right on getting the parts ordered for me. I also have several back ordered parts that should hopefully start arriving soon. Today, I got a shipping notification for two boxes coming from FFR.

Papa-

Little man looks pretty pleased with himself! Where did that red hair come from? Handsome fell right there.

Congrats on starting the build. You are really going to love it. It is both enjoyable and rewarding, and I think you will have a terrific time.

I look forward to following along with your build thread.

Regards,

Steve

Quote:

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Originally Posted by WIS89

Papa-

Little man looks pretty pleased with himself! Where did that red hair come from? Handsome fell right there.

Congrats on starting the build. You are really going to love it. It is both enjoyable and rewarding, and I think you will have a terrific time.

I look forward to following along with your build thread.

Regards,

Steve

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My mother, wife, and two daughters are all redheads (Lord help me)! Today I will be removing the hood, doors, and trunk and marking the aluminum in preparation to remove the body.

Very nice! Ah, your garge is too clean. :D

Lots of progress today! I got the body off the chassis and onto the buck and into the eventual parking space for the finished car.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...5&d=1524416674

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...6&d=1524416683

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...7&d=1524416691

After marking and documenting the aluminum panels, I removed everything down to the bare chassis.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...8&d=1524416697

Finally, I drilled the F-Panels and cleco'd them into position. Now I need to decide how I want to finish them before permanently riveting them and starting on the front suspension.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...9&d=1524416704

Congrats! Welcome to the madness

I'm thinking the reason the F-panel riveting shows up very early in the manual has to do with lack of familiarity. It's much more likely a foreign process to most that tackle the assembly. As to permanent or not the picture shows some mounting slots that might not be so easily accessible after the rivets are in, so I say no rush.

May I ask where you purchased the axle from? Thx, BB

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BB767

May I ask where you purchased the axle from? Thx, BB

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I ordered it with my kit from Factory Five. It was shipped direct from Moser Engineering. I swapped out the stock chrome diff cover for the cast one shown in the pictures.

Thanks.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Papa

I ordered it with my kit from Factory Five. It was shipped direct from Moser Engineering. I swapped out the stock chrome diff cover for the cast one shown in the pictures.

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Hey Papa,

Great idea ditching the chrome differential cover and going with the cast piece.
While things like that may look nice at a car show, oil pans included, we all know that they store heat much like a nice shiny silver teapot.
None of us need any extra heat if we intend to really drive our cars so Bravo on ditching that particular piece of chrome.

Steve

PS: I have a Moser Rear as well (TSD-500) because neither F-5 nor Moser were offering the 8.8 units at the time of my order.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GoDadGo

Hey Papa,

Great idea ditching the chrome differential cover and going with the cast piece.
While things like that may look nice at a car show, oil pans included, we all know that they store heat much like a nice shiny silver teapot.
None of us need any extra heat if we intend to really drive our cars so Bravo on ditching that particular piece of chrome.

Steve

PS: I have a Moser Rear as well (TSD-500) because neither F-5 nor Moser were offering the 8.8 units at the time of my order.

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The chrome cover just looked ... cheap. The cast cover also has the added advantages of both fill and drain ports. Without a fill port on the cover, you would be forced to fill via the vent tube.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Papa

The chrome cover just looked ... cheap. The cast cover also has the added advantages of both fill and drain ports. Without a fill port on the cover, you would be forced to fill via the vent tube.

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Uggggg!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GoDadGo

Uggggg!

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Okay -- give the rookie a break. I found the fill port on the axle. :o

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Papa

Okay -- give the rookie a break. I found the fill port on the axle. :o

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I'm A Rookie Too!

More progress today as I began assembling the front suspension. I decided on black bedliner spray for the exposed aluminum panels and scuffed and cleaned the F-panels then sprayed them. They came out really nice and after several hours of drying time, I mounted them.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...0&d=1524416932

While they were drying, I addressed some areas on the chassis that were missed when they powder coated it. I used a rust converter and will touch up the uncoated areas with POR15 after the converter is completely set.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...1&d=1524416940

Finally, I got the lower control arms, upper control arms, and front coil overs installed. Please check my work on the uppers as I had to flip the mounting bar to get the proper (I hope) configuration on the pre-assembled arms.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...2&d=1524416948

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...3&d=1524416955

I had to use a large flat screwdriver to wedge the rear upper control arm bolt in order to get it torqued. It was too close to the chassis to get a wrench or socket on it.

Back to work (that pays the bills) tomorrow, so the build will wait for another day off to get back into it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by GoDadGo

Papa,

Being an Electrical Engineer gives you a huge advantage over a lot of us.
To give you an example, it took me 40 hours to wire my dash.
That's why you never give a wrench to a banker.
Looks Like A Great Combination To Me!

Steve

---

Wiring doesn't bother me as long as I have a readable schematic to work from. When I tackled the dash replacement on my 1970 El Camino, I didn't have much to go on, but got it done.

Looking good. You're off to a great start. One suggestion: For the upper control arms, I'd recommend flipping those attachment bolts. Wherever possible, it's good build practice to always put the head of the bolt on top and the nut on the bottom. In the unlikely event that a nut were to work loose and fall off, the bolt is more likely to stay in the hole and help limit potential damage.

Hopefully also you used Loctite in those upper ball joints. They look pretty clean so thought I would ask. Some have had trouble with them backing out once driving. In addition to Loctite, good practice to put some paint marks on the ball joint side and upper control arm so you can visually monitor if they've moved or not as part of ongoing maintenance.

http://i867.photobucket.com/albums/a...psdsqswcae.jpg

Quote:

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Originally Posted by edwardb

Looking good. You're off to a great start. One suggestion: For the upper control arms, I'd recommend flipping those attachment bolts. Wherever possible, it's good build practice to always put the head of the bolt on top and the nut on the bottom. In the unlikely event that a nut were to work loose and fall off, the bolt is more likely to stay in the hole and help limit potential damage.

Hopefully also you used Loctite in those upper ball joints. They look pretty clean so thought I would ask. Some have had trouble with them backing out once driving. In addition to Loctite, good practice to put some paint marks on the ball joint side and upper control arm so you can visually monitor if they've moved or not as part of ongoing maintenance.

http://i867.photobucket.com/albums/a...psdsqswcae.jpg

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Thank you for the tips. I did use blue thread locker on the upper ball joints. I ran three or four beads on each before threading them in. I will definitely flip the pivot bolts over as you suggest. I hadn't thought about it, but it makes a lot of sense. They are all still just finger tight right now until I get the spindles mounted. I'll also make sure to put some paint marks in the ball joints to keep track of any movement down the road.

Today I received a good number of backordered and missing parts. So far, I'm very impressed with the responsiveness from FFR. Courtnie has been great to work with through the entire process.

Completed the front suspension and brakes today!

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...4&d=1524417127

Used the two 35mm bolts supplied by FFR to mount the caliper brackets to the spindles. The Wilwood supplied bolts are 40mm.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...5&d=1524417136

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...6&d=1524417144

Next I'll begin working on the rear suspension.

Looking Good!
Here are some of the assembly videos in case you haven't seen them.

https://youtu.be/oBJ5dKLrhoU
https://youtu.be/B5zGnHExZuA
https://youtu.be/H_n5ZJJHrjE
https://youtu.be/BHA_zGXUtok

It's all pretty straight forward stuff so Wrench On Papa, Wrench On!

Steve

Hey Papa. Good luck with the build. My 2012 build was similar to yours except I used a Coyote power plant. I used to live in the Canadian Rockies and my experience with the Coyote at elevations from sea level to above the tree line has bee fantastic. 87 octane pump gas and ran like a top.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dave Howard

Hey Papa. Good luck with the build. My 2012 build was similar to yours except I used a Coyote power plant. I used to live in the Canadian Rockies and my experience with the Coyote at elevations from sea level to above the tree line has bee fantastic. 87 octane pump gas and ran like a top.

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Yep -- EFI is a must-have at altitude! My home is at 6,100 feet and we get up over 11,000 feet going to Breckenridge.

More progress today on the rear suspension. With a few extra hands, I got the rear end in place and then completed the shock install and track bar install.

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...7&d=1524417283

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...8&d=1524417289

After adjusting the top link to get the rear shocks connected on the lower end, it seems that the clearance for the coil-over springs is going to be very close when it comes time to get the pinion angle adjusted. Has anyone had issues with this?

https://thefactoryfiveforum.com/atta...9&d=1524417296

I don't know if they changed anything since my kit was shipped (2015) but I think you've got your rear shocks upside down.

Also, I've got the Moser TSD-500 rear and I had to clearance the brackets a bit, but that is because my pinion angle is different because of how my engine sits.

Hope this helps.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GoDadGo

I don't know if they changed anything since my kit was shipped (2015) but I think you've got your rear shocks upside down.

Also, I've got the Moser TSD-500 rear and I had to clearance the brackets a bit, but that is because my pinion angle is different because of how my engine sits.

Hope this helps.

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Steve,

The manual specifically states that the shock body goes up unless using the double-adjustable shocks. I will wait and see what it does when it's on the ground with some weight on the rear.

Dave

I'm not saying this is relevant but we had this conversation on the 33 forum, discussing red vs silver shocks.

Jim @FFR cleared it up:

"Monotube shocks like the red ones that come with roadsters and came with older 33 kits can be mounted either direction. Twin tube shocks, like the current 33 nickel plated ones or the optional aluminum body double adjustables, must be mounted body down. "

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/showt...nt-konis-on-33

As I said, this was a slightly different context, so take that into account. I only mention it because noticing you have red shocks.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RoadRacer

I'm not saying this is relevant but we had this conversation on the 33 forum, discussing red vs silver shocks.

Jim @FFR cleared it up:

"Monotube shocks like the red ones that come with roadsters and came with older 33 kits can be mounted either direction. Twin tube shocks, like the current 33 nickel plated ones or the optional aluminum body double adjustables, must be mounted body down. "

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/showt...nt-konis-on-33

As I said, this was a slightly different context, so take that into account. I only mention it because noticing you have red shocks.

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I suppose if it doesn't matter, then I could flip the shocks over. My reference to the manual was about the red vs. silver shocks, and there are different pictures in the manual that show them in either orientation.

Papa,

I called Dan at Factory Five since my shocks are oriented in the same position as in the 2013 assembly video.
Dan stated that the Red Shocks can go either way and that you've got them in the correct position as outlined in the later manuals.
I've got them inverted like in his video, but you've done it by the book so yet again I've gone against the norm.
Hope I didn't cause you too much grief.

Steve

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GoDadGo

Papa,

I called Dan at Factory Five since my shocks are oriented in the same position as in the 2013 assembly video.
Dan stated that the Red Shocks can go either way and that you've got them in the correct position as outlined in the later manuals.
I've got them inverted like in his video, but you've done it by the book so yet again I've gone against the norm.
Hope I didn't cause you too much grief.

Steve

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Not at all, Steve. I just wanted to know if anyone has had clearance issues. If flipping the shocks over is a good solution, I'll be happy to do what works best in spite of what is written in the manual. That's why this forum is so awesome!

Dave

One of the cool things about monotubes (like the reds) is that they can be mounted either way and work fine. If you need the clearance on one end or the other, mount them that way. Otherwise, mount the heavier end at the top to minimize unsprung weight in the suspension. Looks like things are going well!

Papa,
Flip 'em.

http://thefactoryfiveforum.com/attac...5&d=1499424568

Cheers,
Jeff