Thanks! I suspect the MIG weld was unnecessary, but it's definitely worth the peace of mind for all the 2-3 minutes it took to accomplish. I mounted my wheelboxes (made little 20-gauge shelves, welded to the front hoop of the scuttle, as I was worried that the torque of the wiper system might tax the structural integrity of the thin aluminum skin), and tried operating the wipers. It's a bit awkward, as there's no glass in the windshield frame yet, but it did illuminate that, despite all my exhaustive calculations beforehand, I'd mounted the driver's side support box 2" too far to the left. Of course, I'd welded it in securely...
Turns out, I have a 110*-sweep gear in the wiper motor, and I only have 80* available on the driver's side (as the windshield frame leans inward at the sides), so it was necessary to move the box over far enough for the wiper to sweep without the blade hitting the frame
It also turns out that I'd shortened my wiper arms about 1" too much to suit the revised locations of the wheelboxes. Thankfully, I had a spare pair (from England) to modify. Not as nice as the ones I'd over-shortened, but acceptable for the time being. Of course, with the reduced lean-back angle of the windshield (compared to the MGB the wiper system came from), the little chrome angled ferrules were waaaay off the correct angle, so the wipers were almost on their sides at the park position. Ideally, the wiper arm shafts should present at 90* to the windshield...and with the chrome ferrules, it was only 50*-60*. The ferrules needed to lay much flatter (and so, had to be much longer, with a finer angle). I had to turn new ones (well, one long one, cut in half diagonally to make two) on the lathe out of 1" aluminum, then diagonal cut the piece on my little wood-cutting bandsaw, and then file/sand the angled surfaces. I got it up to 80* for the arm-to-glass angle, but that's as far as it's possible to go, due to the size of the mechanism on the back of each wheelbox. I'm using the longest-shaft wheelboxes you can find, so as to get as much lay-down angle as possible without the back plates of the wheelboxes hitting the skin from underneath.
It's amazing how complex & time consuming some of these little details can turn out to be.
Now, to mount the motor on the horizontal scuttle shelf, calculate where on the vertical panel the cable guide tube will go through, and make a hole for it. I want the guide tube to be reasonably secure, yet not touch the aluminum panel itself, as I figure it would rattle and buzz. Thankfully, I'm an inveterate scrounger/packrat, and amongst my collection of junk I've found on the side of the road, I have a thick body plug with a hole in it that will do the job nicely.
The fact that I have to remove all this stuff for frame paint & inspection, then re-install it all, is daunting...
My long-term goal is to (hopefully) have the car to a complete bolt-together collection after paint, with not a single fabrication left undone, so all I have to do is assemble it, skin it, get it inspected, and drive it.
Wish me luck...
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Scratch building, at continental-drift speed, a custom McSoreley-design framed, dual-Weber 45DCOE carburated, Zetec-engined, ridiculously fast money pit.
http://zetec7.webs.com/