Diary of My Locost Build 
As I started my build in January 1998, withd periods of inactivity
throughout, and only started this diary in January 1999, it may
seem disjointed, especially due to 'false starts' and 're-thinks' that
accompany building a Locost.
January 1998
Over the Christmas holidays I read Ron Champions book (borrowed from
the City of Perth
Library), and suprisingly my wife Tania thought the car on the cover looked
pretty good - especially as it could be built for only 250 pounds ($700)....
February 1998
Decided (incorrectly) to buy a Ford Cortina to use as a donor car,
found a licenesed, 'running' 1977 TE Model Cortina with a 2 litre OHC Pinto
enginefor sale for $450. When I got there it was very sad looking car,
and only started if you switched on the park lights(??!). The owner was
a desperate chain- smoking single mother who said she had bills to pay,
weather was extremely hot, her kids screaming in her tiny flat - so obviously
I exploited the situation and offered her $350 cash, if I could collect
the car the following week, which she agreed.
When I came to collect the car, it started only just, and I slowly
headed out the driveway, to start the long drive (for this heap)
to Kelmscott, grinning and waving to everyone in the flats, sort of like
an early aviator about to fly the English Channel. Well, the car got to
the end of the driveway and stopped, I tried to roll start it down a hill
but nothing. Petrol? I got 5 litres from a nearby station, no good. It
was midday, and the temperature was now about 40 Degress Celcius, and nobody
was coming outside to offer help,and it wasn't possible to start "get out
and get under repairs" - so I resigned myself to having to hire a trailer.
That evening I made the 100km round trip collecting the car, my wife and
kids came along to see "daddies nice new green car".
That weekend I discovered the wiring anomolies, it appeared the ignition
switch was buggered, and some innovative back-yard butcher had wired the
"ON" connection to the park light wire near the coil. Oh... he had also
replaced the coil, dizzy cap, ignition leads, etc. I didn't want to buy
a new ignition switch yet, so I fitited a toggle switch to do the job.
I also changed the oil, sparkplugs, set the valve clearances, ignition
timing, sprayed carby cleaner down the intake and eventually (with all
the new ignition parts) by the end of the weekend the car ran very smoothly...just
as well...
On Monday I rang the Department of Transport Vehicle Safety Branch,
I was basically told the Cortina was no good as a donor vehicle, because
the engine was not designed to use Unleaded Fuel (See my FAQs
) and that I couldn't just use the chassis number....
I decided well now I have a running car, I may as well sell it at a
profit, but it needed to be cleaned up, the paint was terrible, and the
door hanbdles didn't all work. The following Saturday the Scottish guy
at Marlows Gosnells (if you've been there you know him) spent ages trying
to sort out the metalic green colours for 1977 Cortinas, then he saw the
car, and wondered why he bothered, as no two panels seemed to be the same
shade. I aslo did a budget replacement of a tierod on ONE SIDE ONLY (I
know....). I spent ages fiddling with the doorhandles, and fixed most of
them. I eventually decided i would have a 'stategy' when it was selling
time to leave the doors unlocked, and I would enter through the non-opening
passenger door for the "test-drive". I would also 'sell' the " toggle-switch
ignition" as an immobiliser security device ("the givernment will make
them compulsory soon, you know...". I also fitted a second hand Ferris
(remember them) stereo cassette (that I got from a vehicle dumped in the
Council pound). With the touch up paint, a bit of tyre black, polish, pumpin'
Ferris stereo, cleaned upholstery, purrin' Pinto engine I sold the Cortina
for $650... this profit sort of justified some future expenditure in the
eyes of my wife...
March 1998
April 1998
Bought the steel from de Candillo Bros. in Ashfield, was able to carry the lot on the Rola roof rack on the Commodore, they cut each length once free of charge. Hired a drop saw from Bunnings and started cutting to the lengths in 'the Book' (later I was to find out this is a big mistake).
May 1998
June 1998
Move the frame out of the carport to the decking in front of shed, and
put it on block, so I can cover it with Tarpaulin to keep rain off. Decided
to have trial run seeing how things fit :
Here
you can see the Toyota KE30 Steering Column, and A seat (too big) in place,
also wheels mounted on Cortina Mk2 axle. The clearance between the Cortina
Axle and 185 tyre combination is shown here:
about
40mm between tyre and frame.
15-19 June Annual Leave - much time spent in the shed fabricating suspension
parts, wish I had all that machinery to make "fishmouths" on tubes etc
but doing it by hand filing is actually satisfying. Also made up a "jig"
as described in the Book, upper and lower wishbone jigs mounted on one
piece of chipboard.
July 1998
2 July Ring John Slater in the UK to find out about using Mini shock
absorbers in place of Coil-overs. He says UK Mini shocks are available
with a threaded top mount, so they are easy to convert to a coil-over.
Gives me specs for the springs he used (11 coils, 13 mm wire, 200lb/inch
rate, 9 inch free height, 2.25 inch Internal diameter). Later in the week
I ring around trying to find a sprring maker in Perth to make them, seems
ID is an issue, eventually Boynes (not boing !) Springs in Osborne Park
say they are able to make them $30 each.
Suspension parts are taken to Louie at Guru welding, he will TIG weld
parts
9 July pick up 2 donor vehicles tendered for from City of Bayswater
Pound.
The Mk1 Ford Escort costs $22:
and the 1974 Cortina costs $12, hire
a trailer(costing more than the cars combined $35) and dad (free of charge
- he found the whole thing quite amusing) to cart them home. The Escort
provides a Diff (3.9 ratio), steering rack and lower column, large bag
of second hand clothes for the Good Samaritans, some gardening tools and
satisfaction that I did something actually in accordance with 'the Book'.
Cortina provided a near-new brake master cylinder (not likely to be used
by me), wheels studs to replace those broken on my previous donor Cortina,
spare wheel, new looking battery. I decided to sell the Cortina almost
straight away as it didn't have many parts I needed unfortiunately I couldn't
work my previous Cortina-resurrection magic over this one and make the
engine start and run, so I just cleaned up the Pinto engine - the light
blue looks so nice and shiny when it's clean! I got $30 for it (which covered
trailer hire!) and the entertainment of watching about 10 teenagers try
and pull the car out of my front yard (down hill) with a toyota landcruiser,
and load the Cortina onto a trailer!
As the Mk1 Escort was very rough, and with few parts left on it It
didn't seem like anyone was going to collect it, even though I was offering
it in the Free Column each week in the "Quokka" classified paper, and the
wife got annoyed about the car. Eventually a guy called Peter said he would
collect it and offered some beers if I held it for him, but he didn't turn
up, so i kept ringing him up to find out what the story was,eventually
he turn up with a trailer one raining friday night and we had fun pulling
the car (with no steering rack) thriugh the wet sand, then towing
it up(hill) my driveway, and then slowly down the hill onto his trailer
- Peter turned out to be good friends with the proprietor of "Escort Road
Race" in the Kelmnscott Industrial Area, gave me ERRs business card, and
said they have "QuickRacks" usually for $190. He was going to use the Escort
body as a replacement for a Twin Cam Escort (very rare in Australia) he
was restoring - and he didn't forget the beers!
22 July Louie shows me problem with Cortina ball joint. Seems Aussie
Cortina ball joint has a 'tongue' which will foul the shock absorber bracket
on the wishbone, he recomends cutting the tongue off the ball joint, as
it already has three bolts to hold it on.
23 July suspension parts are finished.
Suspension parts, brake backing plates, rear axle and coil springs
are taken to R & T powder coaters in Frobisher Street, Osborne Park.
Cost $300, results are impressive:
24 July - a busy month - took delivery of this wonderful AE-71 1983 Corolla Station Wagon, cost $250,delivered, but no rear axle, 4A-C engine actually runs!
August 1998
September 1998
October 1998
20 October A day of work, and managed to get chassis to stage where
it's probably nearly ready to weld, Sarah can't wait!
26 October
Picked up Body Kit (Nosecone, Flared Wings and rear fenders) from Royce
at Northshore Boats - pieces were bought "straight out of the moulds" so
a few defects in the gel coat etc were present. Royce recommends two coats
of high build primer, then two wet (ie thick) coats of 2-pack paint. He
showed me a boat that he has done this on, and he says it is possible to
get a very good shine with plenty of wet sanding. Put nosecone on chassis,
as it is a Lotus size nose cone it is too narrow for the Locost front end.
When I got home I put some body filler into the gel coat holes, to
keep moisture out. Put the peices out of the way in the shed, flared fenders
are hanging from rafters.
November 1998
Finished 'trial-fitting'and tapeing bits to the chassis, decided to deliver the chassis to Guru Welding:
December 1998
Took Long Service Leave - with the intention of completing chassis
before baby due in February next year. Chassis delivere d to Guru Welding.
23 December - visit from Chris Harris who is building Locost in Melbourne.
Went to Guru welding - no further progress on chassis as they have moved
to new premises, and are working on John Bowes new Falcon touring car.
27 Decmber telephone call from 'Darren" the English guy who put me
on to Northshore Boats for fibreglass parts, he is making a Lotus Seven
replica following the original plans 
He told me that he had bought some Triumph Herald Coil-over shocks, as
used in the original Seven, and that they were able to be reconditioned.He
paid $75 for a pair, which is cheaper than Sapx coil-overs! Migt be worth
looking into..
29 January paid a visit to Tri-Parts in Maylands, no Triumph Herald
Shocks, they are too rare in Australia, "John" said he could import them
at $$$$, he sugetsed Dolomite shocks, which are coilovers, and brought
out a front and rear example, the fronts were about 20 inches (too long),
but the rear coilovers were 16 inches, which is still a bit too long, but
may be possible too accomodate them with modifications. He wanted $160
for four, I ordered some but he said it would take a week or so to remove
them from the wrecks.
1999
January 1999
Solved the steering universal joint problem. KE70 Steering Column actually
has 2 Uni-joints, one is fixed to column, the other is a 'clamp on'. Both
are physically the same size, so I dismantled both, by 'unstaking' the
end caps, removed the bearings etc and re-assembled the joint fixed to
the shaft so that it now has a clamp-on end. I will keep the short shaft
that used to be on the endo f the KE70 column, and get the Escort steering
shaft cut with splines to match.
As everyone seems to say the 4A-GE is a tough engine and shouldn't
need rebuilding, and a simple rings& bearings rebuild looked like costing
$500-$1000, I thought I would determine if it was really neccesary, by
checking compression and the engine bearings. First of all I decided to
check compression, turned into a comedy of errors, as first of all the
battery I was using (and intending to use in the car) when complete went
dead flat, almost straight away, then I decided to 'jump start' the 4A-GE
using the battery in my Commodore. The 4A-GE engine turned very slowly
and gave v.low compression figures, what's wrong?, Tried again with the
Commodore engine running, 4A-GE starts turning a bit faster, but not really
enough (frustration level rising ...it's 30+Degrees C, and the Commodore
engines heat is filling the garage), maybe the 4A-GE has to 'loosen up'
a bit after sitting idle for so long... I keep it turning but notice smoke
coming from the jumper leads, and melting insulation. Time to stop, calm
down and make the connections on the jumper leads a bit better. Back after
resoldering and some lunch and the 4A-GE spins freely, giving good compression
figures, BUT the comedy continues as oil spurts out the hole in the block
where the oil pressure guage sender WAS (were did it go? someone looking
at my engine a few months back, did point to the sender and say to me that
4A-GE oil pressure senders are rare, costing $80, and that he was looking
for one....hmmm maybe I should relocate the engine and gearbox to a more
securelocation). So off to Coventries in Kelmscott to buy and oil pressure
"idiot light" switch (my KE70 instrument panel doesn't have an oil pressure
guage anyway - well thats what I'm telling myself).
Compression was all above the stated minimum of 129 Pounds, but varied
from 180 to 225 pounds, it also rose by about 30 pounds when I added oil
to the cylinders, indicating the rings are worn.
Next day I (.... cleaned up the oil and) checked the bearings. Removing
the sump i noted that there is no sump gasket, you just use a bead of silicone
along the sump adn the crankshaft oil scraper/baffle. I opened my packets
of Plasttiguage, and found that these bits of thin green plastic human
hair had slipped out of the packets. Bought some more from Autopro in Kelmscott,
the shop guy knew about this stuff and checked the packets before handing
them over. First time I had used Plastiguage and noted that as well as
the solid green crush line sometimes there was a "halo" - hmmm... which
to use. I checked and re-checked each measurement and all were within spec,
also tried to check crankshaft endfloat, but couldn't get enough to slip
in a feeler guage (did I do it right?), check conn rod end float (which
was quite visible!)and was in spec.
With compression and bearings both in spec, but with wear evident I
decided not to overhaul the engine, and to keep it for registration and
maybe after rego look towards a 20 Valve or GZE.
4 January contacted Tri-Parts to find out about Dolomite Coil-overs
still
5 January
For simplicity of wiring I had intended to use a KE70 Instrument Panel,
but mine doesn't have a tachometer, I have been unsuccessfuly searching
for a 'Corolla CS-X' (with a Tacho) being wrecked but can't find any. Checking
the Wiring Diagrams at the 2nd Floor Alexander
Library, Cultural Centre, Northbridge it seems that most Corrollas
from 1974 onwards have similar coloured wiring, and that Toyota T-18s (TE70
model) a sports liftback, and very likely to have a Tacho, have almost
identical wiring to the KE70 (and there are a few T-18s being wrecked locally).
10 January
Cut the FWD 4A-GE exhaust manifold (a curve under the engine design),
removed a section shortening it so that it won't foul the engine
mounts, but keeps the exhaust oxygen sensor.
19 January
Rang Guru welding to ask how job is going waiting Discover the demise
of the Coolist (no! tell me it's not true) but I can't log into the Net
to subscribe to the OneList, as Connections are down at work.
26 January - Australia Day Public Holiday, completed a 'Wally-Trolley'
made out of 4x2 and some castors to move the engine and gearbox around,
it's now parked under a plastic outdoor table on the rear verandah, away
from theiving fingers (see oil pressure sender, above).
27 January - made some amendments to these pages - acknowledgements
of image sources etc
29 January - corrected above amendments - some things I am thinking about:
The flange on a Cortina Mk2 is different to that of an Escort Mk1 (100mm wide - too big too fit the Cortina Driveshaft I have, so big that it may not fit in the tunnel!), therefore I will have too swap flanges, which means checking "preload". Trying to find a spring balance to measure preload - not available at K-mart, hardwares, kitchen shops or even commercial catering supplier - next stop "Tackle-Bait-Ammo" shop!
Use of Mini shock, think I will make my own spring mounts, cutting perfect circles with angle grinder + hand file will be interesting - found a $24 Heavy Duty hole saw (is it worth it?. Lower spring mount can be made out of a disk (actually a "donut" the size of the shock diameter, and tube, possibly an "exhaust adaptor" 1 1/2in-to-1 3/4 in., the wide section to fit around the shock body, the lower part with a hole drilled to fit a 10mm bolt in the lower shock mounting bracket (maybe I need a diagram to explain this?).
Next, I have found two abandoned Hillman Hunters in the Council pound, one has "Rostyle Wheels", sort of similar to the wheels on John O'Mahoney car here (well maybe... the Hunter wheels are similar to an earlyt Lotus Seven wheel):
"
As no-one has tendered for the cars, I may be able to grab the wheels (does anyone know if Hillamn PCD matches Escort/Cortina PCD???), and the sports steering steering wheel, and maybe even a set of guauges (I think GTs and Hustlers had Smiths guauges) - the Zenith Stromberg 150 carbs could be worth something second hand...
Now read Part 2 of My Diary
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