The 90 degree AN3 fittings will be used on the front brake calipers. I decided to not use the straight banjo ends and ordered up some alternatives, one for the rear brake caliper with a 20 degree side bend, and one with a 45 degree bend for connecting to the hydraulic clutch on the engine.

I also needed needed to cap the fuel return fitting on the tank and run a tank vent, so I got an AN8 to NPT fitting so that I can run a simple hose for the vent.

Today I talked with a person from FEDHILL High Performance Alloy Brake Lines (who seemed to have everything but them) and they said that nobody sells such a thing! It was some sort of weird decision that was made back after WWII that the number of threads for brake lines were standardized (to 24 threads per inch) even though the 7/16" size was not the 'normal' fine thread.

So I called my local ArrowHead machine shop and I asked them if they heard of them and they said they didn't either. However in looking through their taps they saw that they DID have a 7/16"-24 tap!! I told them to make me up three of the nuts using some 3/4" hex stock that they had, this way I will have an extra nut - problem solved!

Consider this a lesson learned and leave extra length on wires, they can always be cut again...

I originally bought a complete Triumph Spitfire front suspension including brakes, wheels and tires from him at the start of my project. Now I will have a spare set of front wheels/tires in case they will be needed.

Greg also checked out my project while he was here this weekend and appeared to have liked the progress. Tthe last time he saw it (1/11/05) was just prior to glassing the chassis at PS Composites, so he saw the chassis in it's 'raw' form and it has come a *long* way since then.

I also spent some time with him, he has a TIG welder and was not having a lot of luck in working with it. So we went into my shop and I spent about an hour with him showing him how I TIG weld, some techniques that I had learned etc. By the end of the session he was doing pretty well, his initial method of welding is typical of beginners in that they have 1) a hard time starting the arc 2) do not put enough heat into the weld.

To overcome the hard starting I put the tungsten and filler rod down onto the piece where I want to start the weld, and then lift the torch up a hair and then start the arc using high frequency. You can typically set the high frequence for start only or continous, unless I am welding aluminum I use start only. Your tungsten should be about 1/4" or less from the work piece.

Think of the heat coming off the tungsten as a cone of heat, the farther away the tungsten is from the work the larger diameter the cone and the larger diameter the heat affects the weld and the less heat that you will be putting into the core of the weld. Of course you have to keep the tungsten far enough away from the weld that you don't contaminate the tungsten. If you put too much heat into the work the puddle will not be able to support itself and it will fall, leaving a hole. You can fill the hole by working around the outside of it with less heat until it is filled in, definately practice this as it is a fine line between putting just the right amount of heat and too much into the work piece.

If you get some steel on the tip there is no need to stop you can still continue welding. At some point you will need to resharpen the tungsten, just remove it and bring it over to the grinder for repointing, nothing special here just taper the tip.

When using filler rod 'dip' it into the leading edge of the molten pool, do it at consistent intervals and your torch hand should be rock steady and move at a consistent speed.

Another hint is to not use your hands for lowering your welding helmet, use a head nod. If you use your hand you loose your starting position on the work piece.

A final piece of advice is to butt two pieces of steel together and weld them, when done you can flip the piece over to see how well you penetrated the piece, you should have near full penetration. Weld short 1" long sections so that you can vary your technique and inspect it. Do this until you can consistantly produce a quality weld.

Personally, I feel that a better option for the average consumer is to use a small MIG welding machine. When the sound of the weld is like hearing the crackling of frying bacon then (assuming that you have enough amperage) the weld should be good. It doesn't hurt to have a little 'coffee shake' in your torch hand, unlike TIG (which requires rock steady hands) a slight zig-zag is good for MIG welding... I use CO2 gas, it's cheap and gives you better penetration. The down side of CO2 is that it causes a bit more spatter. You can also use cored wire with the shielding flux on the inside of the wire as well, just be sure to chip off the flux when done.

I started with making the hydraulic clutch slave line using some 3/16" braided stainless line with a straight banjo connection on one end and a 3/16" brake line fitting at the other end. I had previously ran a 1/4" line from the hydraulic brake master cylinder so I had to use a 1/4" to 3/16" adapter. Left some slack in the line to handle engine vibration.

Next I moved onto the fuel line, again I had a 1/4" hard line from the front fuel pump to the engine. The fuel filter I had was 5/16" and I was able to heat up a 1/4" rubber line so that it would expand enough to fit the filter, and used simple hose clamps to hold in place. Here is a picture of the two completed lines, the arrow points to the hydraulic clutch line:

Moving up into the front trunk I used a 1/4" nipple with a 1/8" NPT to fit into the fuel pump, again using a 1/4" rubber hose with simple hose clamps, the right side has a 1/8" NPT to AN 6 fitting to go to the fuel cell:

Then I finished up connecting the oil lines to the oil cooler, had to cut the rubber lines shorter than I wanted to but did it so that the bends would not put a lot of pressure on the fittings. The fittings used were AN 8 to barbed nipple and hose clamps to complete them, a little tight space to work in but got it all connected. Again some slack in the lines to help deal with vibration:

I have to say that I am very happy that I went with a slightly smaller engine than both Shep and Alex, even with the smaller engine some areas are difficult (but not impossible) to get to. I fear that with the larger 1000cc engines that maintenance and access would be FAR more difficult to perform!

Moving onto the front brake lines. I noticed that the master brake cylinder has two different fittings with a 10mm x 1.0 on the front and some other metric fitting on the rear. Not sure exactly why but I will need to get an adapter to connect it to the hard line.

I jacked up the front of the vehicle and put some cement blocks underneath for support, I figured that there is more work to be done such as front sway bar so it should make it easier to work on in the long run. I mounted both front brake calipers and played with some stainless braided lines to see how I was going to route them. In the end I did it similar to what Shep did, by routing them around the top of the front suspension, back down and into the front trunk.

You have to put a 1/2" hole in through the chassis as the line nuts have that as an outside diameter, later on I will be using some putty to seal up all of the holes.

I used the original mounting brackets from the Spitfire suspension and bolted it onto the lower front mounting bolt, routed the stainless line around the top of the suspension and onto the hard line. Here are some pictures of the finished line routing:

I ended up using 24" long stainless braided lines and they made easy work of routing the lines to the calipers. Later on I will use some stainless clips to also secure the braided stainless lines as well as the hard lines.

Drivers side	Passenger side

1. To cut the lines you use a sharp wood chisel with a large 20oz hammer on top of a steel plate. Do NOT try to use a hack saw to cut the lines, the braiding will fray too much, even if you use tape.
2. Once cut the teflon liner 'eggs' out a bit, use some pliers to round it back out again.
3. Slip the AN nuts onto the braided line.
4. Working with the larger AN 6/8 hoses and fittings are a bit easier than the AN 3 brake fittings as they are typically lower working pressures than the brake lines, and as such simply looking at them it is easy to figure out how to put on the ends.
5. For the brake lines (AN 3) they are steel fittings that contain a brass compression fitting that the teflon liner go into. Once the nuts are on, you have to 'fan' out the stainless braid a bit and slip on the hose end along with the compression fitting. You have to press the braided line towards the fitting a bit when starting to thread the nut on, as the nut gets tight the compression fitting crimps down through the teflon liner and forms a positive seal with the nipple. Just be careful not to get any braids on the flat portion of the compression fitting.
6. Once you tighten down the AN 3 brake line ends, the fittings are NOT reusable, you will have to cut the line to put on another fitting so be sure that the lines are the right length!!!
7. Most of the AN 3 brake fitting hose ends do not swivel, meaning to tighten down one end (say into the brake caliper) the whole line must be rotated along with the fitting. So the other end must connect to a fitting on the hard line that can rotate, as once one end of the braided line is connected the fitting on the other end can not rotate (unless your fittings have swivel ends)!