Here's the gaping hole left after removing the Alfa motor. It was
enlarged further still on the left (right in the photo) to about where
that spanner is sitting, when fitting the Pinto motor. (unneccessarily
as it turned out.).
Viewed from the inside, the new bulkhead started with the centre
section, the top of an old locker. The ready formed flanges came in handy.
Cardboard templates were formed to fit the area around the steering column,
and then copied in steel. The Rover Metro pedal box can be seen mocked
in place, a much more workable solution than the peugeot 205 'box I initially
tried. The clutch pedal was bent to clear the steering column. The brake
pedal will require movint to the left, by getting rid of the kink.
Here's a handy tip for ya. Get a bunch of clothes pegs, they make
perfect clamps for holding the cardboard templates in place.
Here's both sides of the new bulkhead in place. The inner piece
of the Metro pedal box can be seen below the remnants of the horizontal
part of the bulkhead on the driver's (right hand) side.
A length of 19mm square tubing was cut and notched to the correct
shape and welded in place to add further strength to the area. Dipstick
was bent so the stick is accessable through the triangular shaped gap formed
by the tubing brace on the left side.
The top plate of the Metro pedal box was cut so the main base part
of it could be bent flat. The tubular part is for the clutch release cable,
and was left in it's original position. Gaps were filled in with steel
plate.
Holes were drilled to mount the plate in position, and the rusted
original panel below was trimmed away to leave a series of flanges.
The brake pedal was heated and bent until more or less straight,
this put it in the right position. The clutch pedal could be bent cold,
until I was happy with it. The straightening of the brake pedal effectively
stretched it, so it was shortened by about 20mm back to it's original length.
So there is the finished job, not the prettiest, but possibly one
of the best candidates for a Ford Pop, when you take into account
availability, price and ease of adaption. Most of the original mounting
holes were used, plus a few new ones for luck.
It's even easier if you havn't cut half the bulkhead away like
I had!
The rusted out top of the other side was cut away and replaced
with a fresh piece of steel. The greeny blue top of the dipstick can be
seen below the triangulated brace.
Here's the pedalbox with the Metro cable in place. Had to pack
the abutment out to raise the pedal a bit to ensure the clutch releases
ok. The shape of the bulkhead gets in the way a bit. I could reshape the
pedal, but packing the abutment was easier.
Not the best photo, but the metro clutch release cable was just
about long enough to reach the Sierra box. I smashed off the plastic abutment
parts with a hammer and turned up a simple retainer (from a brake fitting,
actually) to seat the outer cable in the bellhousing, and kept cutting
and filing the cable end fitting until it attached to the release lever
ok. Only a test drive will tell me if the metro preload is too high for
the Sierra clutch.
Nothing to do with the bulkhead, but related to the pedals and
clutch is the gearstick. wanting to avoid a complicated remote linkage,
I made up this funky gearstick from the Sierra lever base, a small piece
of tubing and the original Pop gearstick, heavily reworked. It was
originally about 4" longer/higher than this, but was fouling the mocked
in place steering wheel when trying for 5th. The lower part was bent to
keep down low to avoid fouling the seats in the tight Pop body.
I carried out a bit of quick-shift trickery on the lever pivot
points to cut down on travel, important when using an overlong stick.
Back
to Pop Intro page.
Forward
to Page 10 (Steering.)
---oooOOOooo---
|