Here I’ve just made up the panel between the motor and seating and have fitted a B14 Nissan Sunny radiator. From this shot it also shows how my original idea of mounting the muffler has now had to be changed yet again due to the motor sitting further back than what i had envisioned a couple of weeks back. I think rather than making life easy and moving the muffler to one of the rear corners i will leave it in the area that its shown here and then make a S shaped pipe to join it to the front pipe. That way the weight of my 3.5KG muffler is still central and not to one side of the craft.
Just a shot showing how i mounted the beam that runs across the width of my craft, also shows the two rubber mounts that my radiator slips into. The motor has now been mounted securely to the hovercraft using galvanized bolts. If you look close you can see the left front mount with a bolt in it but currently no nut cause it only has to come back out again. I wouldn’t be surprised if i have a few more grey hairs after mounting the motor, cause even after i spent ages making certain everything was dead straight i still tried to convince myself that there must be something or some angle that i haven’t allowed for, but in the end it’s lined up perfectly so i can stop arguing with myself for now:-)
Here’s another view but in this picture there is that tube coming from beam that the bulkhead will mount to, that tube will eventually be mounted up the inside edge of the seat (along the floor) and all my wires and cables will run down the centre of it, clean , tidy, protective and a easy to way to run my wiring. It’s 2005 and minimalistic is apparently the trend heheh
I would be adding heat shields where i can to try and deflect the heat if this is the concept i go with. Seeing as the whole setup is sitting quite close to the duct I’m assuming there will be a fair bit of air circulating around, but my thoughts are , will the muffler cause heat issues with the shaft and surrounding items if i place it here ?. Oh and i should mention also that , i’m yet to fit a tailpipe, was just trying to work out the muffler position first, and the wood under the exhaust is only there to prop the system up till i get it mounted properly.
Here is the concept I’m playing with ATM, My aim was to try and keep the weight of the muffler central and keep things looking tidy, my concern at this stage is … is the muffler going to cause issues with my drive shaft seeing as there is only around 30mm or so clearance between the muffler and the shaft ? will heat cause a problem ?
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