The story of Little Red Riding Hood

[Jacques]

Spent 11 hours yesterday and today making the instruction book leather cover. As can be seen, it retains the original booklet plastic cover for stiffening and originality.

I think it came out really well, and suits Little Red Riding Hood. She definately feels appreciated

As usual, take a peek over at the for sale section, if you have an interest in this, I'll be happy to make a few more.

Kind regards,

Jacques

And a few pics from the making. It fits very nicely into the storage room between the seat backrests or the glove compartment.

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Kim.com]

Well done! Jaques.

Just wondering how a vegetarian, can be so fond of working with leather, even though it is green!  

 

 

[fjmuurling]

Looking good, but how much weight does it put on the scale?

[Jacques]

For exhibition purposes, naturally When I decide to drive a bit spirited on some nice backroads, I empty the car beforehand, only having short driving gloves and a fire extinguisher, and half filled tanks. To be exact: around 350 gram for the leathercover. So I better do some more lightening of Little Red Riding Hood.

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Jacques]

So, did some lightening to Little Red Riding Hood today.

 

I decided that the steel disc front brake bells are too heavy and had the supplier make them as AP did in anodized aluminium. Much better. They now look like the rear ones which already are dark grey anodized aluminium.

The process is easy to take apart and do in 10 easy steps:

- take Wheel and brake caliper off

- take grease cup, split, Lock ring, Lock washer and bearing out.

- take brakedisc off and in a big vice, loosen all the 12 smaller 6mm bolts in a criss-cross patern.

- undo the 4 10mm bolts that hold the brake disc bell to the font hub.

- clean everything up and install the aluminium bell, then the brake disc itself.

- install 4 smaller bolts and nip them only, then install the brakedisc on the car with bearing etc.

- hold a fitting dial up to the circumference of the brakedisc, spin disc and find where it is off center, then lightly tab gently with a small rubber hammer.

- repeat Again and Again, till' there's no more deviation. 1/1000 of a mm is good enough.

- tighten the 4 bolts, then undo complete disc and install in vice and install remaining 8 bolts and tighten it all in criss-cross manner in 3 steps up to to 10 ft/lbs (13,5 Nm). Not very much.

- reinstal brakedisc, double check and reassemble caliper and Wheel + Wheel bolts in criss-cross manner in 3 steps up to to 100Nm.

 

The steel bells weigh in at 1283 gram per piece. The aluminium is 600 gram each, so a total saving of unsprung mass of 1,366 Kilo. Very nice. So far I saved a total of 76,463 kilo on Little red Riding Hood, without being noticable.

Little Red Riding Hood is most pleased to finally have the correct brake setup and cannot wait to prove them well working asap.

MUCH more on the way.

Kind regards,

Jacques

 

[Giniw]

Will it be strong enough? Replacing a solid steel plate by a machined aluminium plate looks like a bold guess to me. I hope it has been calculated right!

(76kg is a huge improvement by the way!)

[Jacques]

I certainly hope so! The steel bells are in fact the non-original parts and were made because they are cheaper, easy to make and simpler to make. The aluminium bells are what AP uses and I want that, as on the rear.

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Giniw]

Oh OK, I had misunderstood that. Now that's much reassuring

[Jacques]

We'll see  I haven't driven Little Red Riding Hood yet this year. Cold, rain or snow is a natural call to go indoor and enjoy Harrys Garage or similar  The video he recently made as an update to his first one with the Jaguar XJ v12 is briliant.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vy5t8ttmC1o

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Jacques]

A small new improvement for Little Red Riding Hood is a new tailgate in carbon fiber. This, together with new vents in carbon as well, saves a fair amount of weight and will later on hopefully be combined with another engine cover to match. The weight saving is rough so far, as I need to work on the part to finish it and paint it red on top surface, install window, locking mech, rubber parts etc. plus paint the underside in mat clear coat. A rough measure today is around 24 kilo saving plus engine cover. More on that as I go forward. I will roughly pass 101,655 kilo in weight savings so far, with more on it's way. I bought an old crushed V8 tailgate long time ago and will strip the needed parts from that. It's a bit rough here and there, but I'll work on that in the coming weeks, to get it as smooth as possible.

I need to find out if the Sport300, the S4/S4s and the V8 tailgate underside were the same. There may have been differences to metal shielding etc. Maybe someone can supply a picture of said S4/S4s and Sport300 tailgate underside, and possibly dimensions of metal works attatched to the underside?

I also need to obtain new decals for my 1990 SE tailgate underside, the explanatory one and the other. If someone either have these or know if there's a place to get them, please give me a hint.

An added functionality of this is a supposed automatic swing up of the tailgate upon releasing the catches. No more heavy lifting, I hope. Likewise I hope to reduce the reflections in the rear because of the present 3 glasses, coming down to two.

A few pics so far.

Kind regards,

Jacques.

 

[Steve V8]

Jacques, my tailgate is standard and lifts on its own when lever is pulled, you may have just needed new struts. 

I think I saw the decals on SJ Sportscars website.

[Jacques]

Cheers Steve, I'll give them a shout tomorrow or Saturday.

I don't think the SE from 1990 was ever really able to lift itself up, as the tailgate and the big wing on the tailgate are rather heavy. But of course the struts may be a bit tired by now. I have the normal one and one locking one.

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Giniw]

The S4, and V8 with the late wing were both able to lift their tailgate. I think the struts are not the same as the S4s/Sport 300/GT3/V8GT (at least SJS sells two different kind of struts)

S4 tailgate opening:

 

[Chillidoggy]

Jacques, the tailgate is off my car right now, if you let me know exactly which dimensions you require, I will measure it for you. But be quick, because it’s going back on the car tomorrow.

[Jacques]

Thanks Guys.

I need dimensions of any flat metal plate that is screwed or riveted on to the underside of the tailgate, plus position. I need to find out, if it's the same as on my smashed V8 tailgate.

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Chillidoggy]

Definitely the drip-shields items 35 & 36, what about the gas-strut spreader-plate, item 20?

[Chillidoggy]

Just note that there are angles at the rear of where the plates drop down.

Spreader measurements included anyway.

[Giniw]

(I will probably spend some time in the boot of my S4s tomorrow and/or Sunday so if you need further infos or confirmations I can have a look, too)

[Jacques]

Sunday I will take the V8 tailgate apart and drill old rivets out and unscrew seperate parts, photograph them and post here for comparison.

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Jacques]

I need a Picture of the underside of the S4 tailgate for comparison, so if anyone's got one, please post here or pm me with the Picture. Thanks.

Kind regards,

jacques

[Giniw]

Here are a few photos of the underneath of a (my) S4s. I hope that helps, if it doesn't I can take other photos more focused on something you may need.

(sorry the white balance is often off, the focus not so very accurate and I won't comment the lighting )

   

   

   

[Giniw]

PS: I am aware the gas struts are reversed but the right one almost touches the tailgate underside when it's open (see the last photo which shows the great plastic corner fitting ... ) so I thought it would be better this way

[Jacques]

Cheers Giniw, those are splendid pics. Thanks a lot. Those parts are quite different from the V8 model. But should be absolutely easy to fabricate.

I ran into a series of serious problems with the carbon tailgate though. I won't talk about it here publically, as I am trying to solve these and will get back to this, if and when hopefully solved.

For now, I need to talk to someone WHO has experience working with making carbon fiber parts, to find out what can be done. If there are anyone on here, please PM me, so we can have a talk about what to do. I would really appreciate that.

 

Kind regards,

Jacques

[Giniw]

I just realized something went wrong with most of the thumbnail links, so I am reposting the photos again.

[MrDangerUS]

 

 

Jaques,

Could you please share the rear calipers AP numbers?

Thanks