Today was the first drive of GT40P1149. After warming it up in Ron's driveway, I drove it a few miles up the road, and back. Although not totally complete externally (the mirrors have to be attached yet, which we can't do until the interior is in and I know where they need to be located) the car lacks only the large plastic rear window- and Ron left that off to make it easier to adjust the Weber carburetors, which will need plenty of adjusting.
What went well: the car tracks straight, the brakes are fine, the clutch will be fine once adjusted, the cooling system seems to work well (at least the thermostat opens and it did not boil over, neither did the fans come on, bearing in mind it was no warmer than forty degrees outside today), the car seems tight and solid. The ZF transaxle seems perfect (it is, after all, brand new with no miles on it to speak of)
What it needs: the tires rub the body, especially on the front. Smaller ones need to be fitted, which I will order tonight. The clutch does not quite disengage, which will not be too difficult to fix- there are adjustments on either end, according to Ron. Very few of the gauges work- the oil pressure is pegged all the time, the temp does not come up, neither the tach or speedo work (and this is an electronic tach which is supposed to be able to understand an MSD box signal) Most of all, the Webers need a lot of adjustment. The engine pops a lot, and does not seem to want to run under load. So clearly some Weber tuning is in order.
But it is worth remembering that this car was not a kit car. It was created de novo from nothing- from scratch, a chassis from NZ and UK, body from Ohio, engine from here built on a vintage block. None of these parts have had to work together before- they have had to fit together, which they pretty much do, but now they have to work and get along with each other. So that will take some time, but we ARE on the way to that. And after more than a decade, if a car is something that starts up and goes down the road, I have a car.
