Ownership Log – ERA#2124

[paulmartin]

hi allen its paul.as you know i just fitted the 48 idas to an identical engine. i had greatb luck and and instant seal with the permatex hylomar on the gasket ports and the right stuff on the water ports.
it is imperative you have jim send your intake maifold out to cobra automotive to get portmatched to your heads. try to contact your head manufacturer for a cad drawing , cobra automotive prints this to scale to use as a porting template.i used a thicker SCE large port gasket ...perfect fit for my 205cc intakes.
You will also need to remove an inch by i inch piece from your bellhousing[if you have an aftermarket] to mount the throttle pivot....a noisy messy job with an angle grinder and cut off wheel.
make sure you use studs in the heads. You will also need to make yourself a cutoff open ended wrench in order to tighten the center nuts under the carbs.
before you lower the intake fully with the glue tacky , put a couple of wood blocks under it to hold it off as you need to start the nuts under the center
carbs , they are impossible to get on once the intake is fully pushed down.
Jim did a great job with all the linkage and carb prep.
Many people dont realize he goes through every carb and blueprints it to your spec.Its very important to fit his low pressure regulator and make sure you have a high volume low pressure pump.Webers worked best at 2.5 to 4ilbs , mine are at 3 ilbs and perfect.
after a bit of synching with the synchrometer i adjusted the timing to 34 degrees full advance.....its spot on .My car fired up first go.
my car dynoed at 504 before the webers and we just pulled 543hp on a 347 stroker with the webers....yikes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.
everycar is different but i hope these tips find you well.
p.s. i also fitted the avon tires ....they have to be the best tire for a cobra but sadly very expensive..!
sending pics to your email.

[Fullchat289]

Originally Posted by ceslaw

Question: regarding that fuel pressure gauge, do you plan to add an interface of some sort so that there won't be a fuel line under the dash above your right knee? If yes, curious as to what you will be using.

Not sure I'm following, Chuck. Not sure if your concern is something interfering with my right knee or more so with the fact I'm bring fuel into the interior of the car...?? Anywho, CobraPack suggested I use a brided brake line with -4 AN swivel ends, which I thought was a brilliant idea. A 14" flexible braided stainless line can be had for ($11). This is connected to a -4 AN to 1/8 NPT female adaptor on the gauge side, and a -4 AN 45 degree bulkhead fitting that will be on the dash side. I'll then run a line from the bulkhead fitting in the engine compartment to the comp fuel log. All this stuff was purchased from Jegs..

Here are some pics of the fuel gauge and location I plan on for the dash.





BTW, Chuck, good to have you in the thread. I'm really interested in the direction you are going with your car. My next one will be an adaptation of ERA's slab come comp car....they should probably put some effort into creating some molds for Jones Flares and front Spats, IMHO. I could see that area growing..

- Allen.

[Fullchat289]

Paul:

Thanks very much for the assembly tips and photos. I had a suspicion that I would need to do something back there with the bell housing and now you've confirmed it. I don't have a cut-off wheel like you, so I'll have to come up with something clever there. Jim said he was starting my system this week and was sending the fuel log and bell crank tower so I could do some fitting...should have those pieces today or tomorrow. I plan to modify the fuel log to incorporate a coolant bypass circuit, so I will detail that here as well.

Great Hp numbers, btw! How is the transition from low to high jet circuits? Any flat spots/stumbling at all?

- Allen.

[ceslaw]

The concern with bringing the fuel line from the fuel log to the pressure gauge is essentially a safety issue. A fitting or line failure could spray fuel under the dash.

I have not yet researched it, but I suspect there is an interface that the fuel line will connect to under the hood, and then a line carrying nonflammable fluid will connect to the gauge so that in the event of a line failure one would not have fuel spraying in the passenger compartment.

[Fullchat289]

Chuck:

For what it's worth, the components/connections used to bring the fuel into the engine compartment are rated for much higher working pressures than typical for the fuel system application. These connection points will only see a max of 3psi. Definitely not a high pressure application. Totally understand the concern, tho. For a point of reference, my mechanical oil pressure gauge runs 60-80psi and no issues.

- Allen.

[ceslaw]

Allan: google 'fuel pressure gauge isolator.'. There are several that popped up. Here is a link to a Mallory unit sold by Summit.

Mallory Ignition 29806 - Mallory Fuel Pressure Isolators - Overview - SummitRacing.com

Looks like a simple device, costs under $75. I will look into it a bit more when I get to that stage of my build.

[LightNFast]

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[Fullchat289]

Kurt:

Jim is documenting some changes to my bellcrank tower so that future customers don't have to modify the flanges on their blow-proof bellhousings. The flange on mine is quite extended and with the backing plate on the engine I'm having to carve my way through nearly 0.5" thick of material. Not my idea of a good time....a more elegant solution will be the order of the day without taking away from any visible authenticity.

(Nice car by the way. )

- Allen.

[Fullchat289]

For those wondering what the discussion was all about regarding the trimming of the bell housing for use with the bellcrank tower, here is a picture of the trim line to the bellcrank tower, as well as a reference template that shows the holes in the head and the profile of the blowproof bellhousing flange. Jim and I talked about modifying the tower to pick up the upper third hole rather than the one covered up by the flange. This will save some messy, tedious work for others retrofitting a bellcrank tower while using a blowproof bellhousing in the future.



Also, here is one of the most artistic pieces of the whole set-up. This is the FIA comp fuel log that I will be modifying to implement a coolant bypass circuit port as done by Rick Parker and others. This is a "belts and braces" approach for those of us running the duel outlet weber manifold combined with a thermostat. I'll detail this a bit more later.



- Allen.

[strictlypersonl]

There's a surprising amount of force on the linkage pivot bracket. Flex is a definite problem if the bracket isn't designed and secured well. I'm afraid that removing that third attachment without further modifications is going to create a "function" problem. We had a car in here with a wimpy bracket that made the linkage near-unusable.

[LightNFast]

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[Fullchat289]

Originally Posted by strictlypersonl

There's a surprising amount of force on the linkage pivot bracket. Flex is a definite problem if the bracket isn't designed and secured well. I'm afraid that removing that third attachment without further modifications is going to create a "function" problem. We had a car in here with a wimpy bracket that made the linkage near-unusable.

Bob:

Yep. I agree that we need to get the proper footprint such that we can counter the moment forces... In light of your comments, I think what we may do is instead of totally trimming that area off, we'll adjust some of the return flange so it fits between the bell housing flange and the head. We'll then weld on another flanged "wing" to take up the third attachment point for securing the bracket with the remaining "ear" at the bottom serving to counter the forces you describe. Good input there - appreciated as always!

- Allen.

[ceslaw]

Allen

Another option is to mount the bell crank on the wheel housing rather than on a pedestal bolted to the back of the enigne. That would be original as well and indeed is the way I plan to do it. You won't be able to use Jim Ingelese' push rods and they would have to be fabricated. But the bell crank itself appears to be exactly the same.

Chuck

[LightNFast]

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[Fullchat289]

Just a quick update to show how the Fuel Pressure Gauge install turned out. I’m pretty happy with it.



In this next picture, you can see the modifications required to the aluminum cross beam that stabilizes the bottom of the ERA dash. I also had to fab up a little bracket to clamp the gauge to the back of the dash as it didn’t come with one when I purchased it. The whole installation went really smoothly.



I also acquired a different set of sidepipes over the past few weeks, and I will be having those modified along with my headers to feature a ball & socket joint in place of the current slip joint. These ball & socket joints are available through JEGS and can be had in aluminized or stainless steel.




- Allen.

[ceslaw]

Hey Allen

Dash looks great. The fuel pressure gauge looks like it belongs there.

So how do you manage to have a half tank of gas with the dash out of the Cobra?

[Fullchat289]

Originally Posted by ceslaw

So how do you manage to have a half tank of gas with the dash out of the Cobra?

Bluetooth.

- Allen.

[Fullchat289]

Should be receiving my 48IDA induction system from Jim today or tomorrow, so pretty excited about that. In the meantime, I’ve been working on revising my fuel delivery from the tank replacing the ill-placed canister filter with a simple in-line and adding a fuel shutoff valve so that I can work on the fuel system in the future w/o having to drain the tank. I will be hard-mounting my fuel pressure regulator directly off the Mechanical Fuel pump, and adding a small Moroso 15psi fuel pressure gauge off the regulator for accuracy sake in addition to the Stewart Warner gauge on the dash that I detailed earlier.

Over the weekend, I sanded my headers which were black, and decided to try white just for a change of pace. I fully expect that these will yellow quite quickly, but no matter. I see the coating of exhaust as a routine maintenance item anyway. I plan on keeping the pipes black for now. I’m not sure the car could carry white sidepipes…

VHT FlameProof White on the Headers:



I also decided to freshen the competition valve covers a bit with a new coat of silver and added the “CS” and “COBRA” stickers to them. (Thanks to Chuck (ceslaw) for detailing the decal application on his set.) I am quite pleased with the result:

Freshened Valve Covers:



So aside from the 48’s I’m expecting any time, I also have a Kirkey Vintage Race seat on it’s way. With a trip to Sweden coming up this coming weekend, I hope to get the IDA’s trial fitted so that I can mock up my water bypass return modification to the FIA water neck/fuel log and get that off to my fab guy before leaving…fingers crossed.

- Allen.

[ceslaw]

Really nice progress.

Valve covers look great.

Curious about fuel shut off valve. Mechanical or remote electric? Where will the valve be located? Another advantage of the shut off valve is you can drain the carbs of fuel easily by letting them run dry; good idea if it won't be driven for a while.

What is the book in the background with the covers?

Chuck

[Fullchat289]

Thanks, Chuck!

This is the book:



...and this is the fuel shut-off valve:

Earl's 230501 Earl's Fuel Shut-Off Valves



On my car, there is a 5/8-18 union that connects the 3/8 hardline coming from the tank to the one that goes forward to the mechanical fuel pump. The union is approx under the driver's seat and along the frame rail. I intend to replace the existing union with this shut-off valve, which is 3/8 NPT, so I plan on using some AN to hardline fitting adapters and AN6 to 3/8 NPT adapters to join everything. It's actually a pretty nice little valve and well suited to my fuel system pressures. I can follow up with some pictures once I get that job finished.

- Allen.