I’m rapidly getting to the point where the car will be startable and drivable. I don’t think I’m far off my plan to have it drivable in April. There are a few big buckets of things that need to be finished to get to that point — wiring, plumbing, and fluids. The wiring is getting close, at least close enough to start and drive the car. The plumbing has been coarse fitted but is coming along. There’s not much in the way of fluids in the car yet, other than the oil that came in the engine and the gear oil in the differential. The plan this weekend is to get as much of the plumbing done as possible, as well as filling and bleeding the hydraulics in the car (brakes and clutch).

Today, however, I wanted to get the emergency brake installed.

I have been futzing around with the emergency brake for over a year. Much like the heater outlet on the engine, there’s lots of obvious ways to solve the problem, but knowing how to solve it and actually fabricating the parts are two very different things, especially without a full machine shop.

I have fabricated a couple different ways of mounting the Lokar handle and attaching it to the cables, none of which I was particularly happy with. I finally just broke down and ordered the transmission mounted e-brake kit from North Racecars. They typically sell the Lokar assembly and a few extra parts for mounting it. Most importantly for me, they also include a clevis to attach the handle to the cables that I assumed was going to be better than what I’d tried to assemble. Thankfully I was able to buy just the parts other than the Lokar handle, since I had that from Fortes.

To start, I mounted the handle using two longer bolts that came with the North Racecars kit. I used the fittings that came with the handle as spacers. This is a bit far forward, but any farther back would potentially have lead to interference between the clevis and the driveshaft, and its actually easier to engage where it is here.

The bolts are just mounted through the floor sheetmetal as well. The handle is very solid, which is important as you have to pull like you’re trying to break it to get the brakes to actually engage. In fact, I’m not sure I could do it from a seated position in the car.

The cables come out of the existing mount on the car and mount to the e-brake handle. I am not posting any other photos as Rich at North Racecars doesn’t want photos of his setup online. I don’t really understand why that is, since his setup is basically identical to what I had built, only of better quality, and pretty much identical to every other setup I’ve seen. In any case, I’ll respect his wishes.

While I was in the transmission tunnel (not literally, but figuratively), I wanted to get the wiring harnesses attached in there. I can clearly picture the clamps I bought to do this, but I’ll be damned if I can find them. I’ll buy some this afternoon and mount the wiring tomorrow. I also want to get the final position of the wiring in the trunk arranged as well, and get those affixed. I need to get things mounted so I can get the trunk floors installed at some point soon.

I pulled the wiring out of the back of the car, and set it aside while I gathered up the slack and ziptied the rear end harness, the alternator feed and the battery feed together. They will be mounted at the top of the transmission tunnel as well.

The end of the wires are tucked across the top of the IRS cage which will end up snug to the upper floor of the trunk.

I also decided to take some time and start hard mounting the fuel lines to the frame of the car. The brakes have been riveted to the frame for a year and a half now, and getting the fuel lines also mounted is part of getting the plumbing finished in the car.

I only have the two sets of clamps at the end of the fuel lines mounted at this point. Tomorrow I’ll get the rest of them in, and hopefully get the brakes and clutch bled. I also want to fill the transmission with transmission fluid, and get the wire harness mounted to the transmission tunnel and the frame in the rear of the car. That’ll get me another big step towards both starting and driving the car.

I’ll post more updates tomorrow.