July 2008

Summary

SVA passed, on the road this month!!

9th July 2008

Well, I haven’t made any updates recently but today was the day that the car passed its SVA, on the first attempt!

The reason for the delay is to do with the front brake callipers. I fitted the original set, but they were faulty as they were leaking from the seal where the two halves of a calliper are joined. I got a replacement set from Caterham, but they were also faulty! At this stage, Caterham said they wanted to have a look at the car to make sure it wasn’t a problem with how I was fitting the brakes. Luckily, Caterham have a Service Centre not that far from me (60 miles or so away, in Barnstaple), so I organised a trip up. This meant hiring a trailer and sorting out a tow vehicle (my father-in-laws friend was happy to oblige here, so I was lucky).

Fortunately, the Service Centre confirmed that the second set of callipers were also faulty, so at least it was confirmed that there was nothing wrong with how I had fitted them. Unfortunately though, Caterham were out of stock of the callipers so I had to wait a few weeks before a new set were received and fitted. I left the car at the Service Centre and let them fit the callipers, otherwise I’d have needed to hire another trailer.

Whilst all this was going on I had two SVA tests booked, which I had to subsequently cancel. Finally though the callipers were fitted and I had a test booked for today. I booked into a Bed and Breakfast near to the Service Centre, so that one of the mechanics could drop the car off at the B&B legally. I had to stay at a B&B because the SVA Test Station in Exeter needed the car for 8am, so I drove down to Exeter from the B&B in the morning. The conditions weren’t ideal for a first drive though, which was nervewracking! Below is a satellite picture from the BBC website.

The journey down went well though, until I was about a mile from the test station. I went into a petrol station to fill the tank up as the test has to be conducted with a full tank of petrol. When I left the petrol station, the car was very hard to get in gear but I managed to get it to the test station. It turns out that the clutch cable needed readjusting, which was done prior to the test, which was fortunate!

The test itself wasn’t bad, although I was really nervous. A rough order of the tasks completed is:

Check of the engine bay, including removing the pedal box to ensure that the pedals are independent of each other.

Check inside the car to ensure that there are no sharp ‘extrusions’. For interest, the SVA inspector pointed out that the indicator switch would be a fail if it was further than a certain distance away from the steering wheel, but I had no problems there.

A check around the outside the car to ensure the rubber edges were in place and that there was no fouling of any parts on the car.

Drove the car onto a ramp so that the inspector could check underneath the car.

The car was weighed with figures recorded for the front and rear axles. The car was also measured in length at various points. These figures are used to assess the brakes.

The front and rear brakes, and the hand brakes are tested at certain speeds. This is done using a set of rollers. This was the only stage where I though a ‘fail’ may occur, because my cars front and rear brakes were transferring more or less equal pressure to the road. According to the inspector, the front brakes should exert more pressure than the rear ones. However, with the measurement and weight figures were inputted into a computer, the brakes were deemed a ‘pass’. Phew!

A CAT test was performed.

A noise test was performed. I was little worried about this because the area where the test was performed wasn’t ideal, because there were buildings and vehicles around which wouldn’t give a true reading. If anything, it would give a higher reading. At 4000RPM though, my car came in at 97dB and a fail would have been anything over 101dB...

The inspector than jumped in the drivers seat and asked me to get in the passenger seat. He then said words to the effect of ‘I’m not showing off, but hold on as I have to put the car through its paces a bit’. He then drove the car quite aggressively for a few minutes, testing the steering, braking heavily etc.

The side and rear view mirrors were tested to ensure that calibrated lines on a road could be seen clearly.

As I had had to drive to the centre with the roof on, it had to be put back on and checked for sharp edges etc inside. If I hadn’t had the roof on, this wouldn’t have had to be checked.

The test took about 3 hours, but it was deemed a ‘pass’, which is great!

I actually tried to get the car registered today as well, but have been unable to because a DVLA inspector has to have a look at it too. Hopefully this test will be conducted very soon so that I can get the car on the road finally!

14th July 2008

The DVLA inspector came around to view the car today. He was happy everything is how it should be. He basically checked that the chassis number and engine numbers are correct. He was saying that the reason the DVLA do this check is because occasionally the car that was taken to the SVA isn't the same one that is actually being registered!!

The inspector needs a couple of days to sort out the paperwork, but all being well I should be able to get the license number and get the plates made up at the end of the week....

19th July 2008

Today was the end of a long, but in the main enjoyable, process. I got the paperwork through from the DVLA and was allocated a registration number, and given a tax disc. This meant I was allowed to go and get a set of number plates made up, making the car truly road legal for the first time!

It's a great feeling being on the road after all this time. The project has taken almost 12 months since delivery, but I think it's worth it. I went for a couple of drives today and am very pleased I went though with this project. I've learned alot along the way, and there have been some frustrating parts, but I now have a fully working car on the road!

I have a few things I want to add/change to the car already. Those, and any details of blats will appear in a new section of the website.

I will be changing the steering wheel for a quick release one. Once I have this, it will enable to fit the tonneau cover I have.

I've got the bits, but I need to add a cigarette lighter for sat nav etc.

I've been perusing http://www.softbitsforsevens.co.uk/ with interest....

I'm interesting in getting a bullet cam setup

Most of this will have to wait a while, but I know I'm going to enjoy this car as it is!