Well its been a month or so since any progress, due to lack of funds mostly and utterly disgraceful weather making garage time very unpleasant. However with the national kit car show looming on the horizon i was keen to stock up on some bits and pieces to save on postage if ordered on line. I had some old early 30s trophy cups in the loft which had belonged to my uncle, and when he died he had left them to me. He had won them many many years ago for hedge laying, sheep sheering and dry stone wall building, all were 925 silver so worth a bit. I had no use for them personal and after digging them out i was shocked to find the price if weighed in at the jewellers was over £1500. I kept hold of one with his name engraved on it for sentimental reasons, but i did sell the rest although feeling very guilty for doing it. The money isn't going to be pissed up the wall... as this car is an investment, i will always get my build cost back if i ever choose to sell, so i hope he would of approved.
So off to Stoneleigh with some cash in hand, and first stop was "SandJ" a superb company that manufacture some quality parts for the AK kit, AK use them themselves for factory build cars. On the shopping list from them was a set of bonnet locks. These are cut through the double skin of the bonnet and secure the bonnet via a cam on the underside, a lock barrel within the handle keeps the IVA man happy. When fitting the locks i needed a centre line off the bonnet, keep in mind that when a pain finish with stripes is done, anything off centre will stick out like a nun in a sex shop. So measure 50 times, mark out, get ready to cut... then bottle it and call Wendi at AK to check i was doing it right. 
After i grew some balls i made the first cut. my centre line was good, however the centre support of the windscreen wasn't dead on my measurement, so some adjustment was made to allow for the cosmetic look. First i drilled a small pilot hole and slowly opened it up to allow the lock to drop in. Because the bonnet is double skin the locks are held in place with some self tappers, and the securing cam is held onto the main shaft with a grub screw.
So with the locks fitted, just some fine tuning was (and still is) needed to allow all the bonnet panel gaps fit nicely. I was also fitting the bonnet rubber seal around the edge.... this involved a serious amount of sanding and grinding away at the bonnet lip throwing tones of fibreglass dust all over my shinny engine. Bugger!!!
In order to please the IVA man, and so i don't hurt anybody if i run them over the bonnet locks and all external brightwork must meet the 3mm radius test. The lock would fail this due to the top flat 90 degree angle where the lock barrel is. SandJ overcome this by fitting a blanking plug with the required radius as so to pass the IVA test. So the bonnet is locked and the blank plug in. pedestrians are now safe. if i run you over in my car, rest assured that you will NOT get hurt due to the 3mm radius
Also picked up at the show was some windscreen demisters. These are from Chris at Brasscraft, we had spoken about these when i ordered my windscreen. but didn't want to bite the bullet until i had seen them in the flesh and was happy with them.
So to fit the vents i also needed some vent plenums and ducting. I got all that from good old Car Builder Solutions and so once delivered i started fitting. Again same as the bonnet lock measure twice cut once. I started of with a nice thin slice cut out and slowly opened it up with the dremmel. The dremmel i got for B&Q nearly 10 years ago for £15... some tools are worth their weight in gold (some are not eg. Cheep Rivnut setter off bloody ebay) The holes pictured look a little rough but they need to be tidied up with some sandpaper and the louvred vent will cover 90% of it.
The demister plenum is bonded under the dash scuttle and these need a little heating and bending to allow for the curvature of the body. Good thing is these are fairly narrow so will take up less room behind the dash and allow less chance of the back of the gauges fowling them. 
A nice good splodge of Sickerflex should hold these in permanently. Sickerflex is magic stuff it sticks anything to anything, remains flexible and seals the joint also. lovely stuff!!!! 
And in it goes, never to be seen again. I left this overnight to cure and its now stuck good and tight. If doing this yourself remember these will be taking hot/warm air and cold air so the bond has to be capable of handling temperature changes
So with the plenum fitted under dash i fitted the louvred top plate from Brasscraft, again this needed a little bending to accept the curved body tub, but this is easy to do.. trial and error little by little. Looks canny from this side just need to duplicate the process for the other side and that can be ticked off the list. 
Cant really show this well in a picture because I'm tyring to take it through the windscreen looking in. but the leading edge looks neat and once the body is painted will look perfect. Many people when fitting the demisters cut the dash scuttle and have a basic stainless escutcheon plate surround. I wanted to avoid this as i wanted the louvred style as they will direct the airflow onto the screen... not just out into the open cockpit. It seems a little daft i know in a car with no roof, but I'm confident these will be allot more affective than just open cut holes. 
Final little bit for the demisters is the air flow from the back of the heater matrix. This white bit of fibreglass will be sealed around the matrix forcing the air through the flanges on the top, to the relevant area. Two for the windscreen and two to some vents that will be mounted under the dash to heat you legs/feet should you ever need to. The flanges were from Screwfix, they are just standard waste pipe blanking plugs and cost 99p, opposed to Car Builder Solutions @ £3 + VAT and postage. I blanked of the spare two with tape and put a temp seal around the edge and wired up the fan to a cordless drill battery.... very very happy with the air flow, as i wanted and predicted the louvred vents throw the air out direct onto the bottom of the screen at a good rate... not just like blowing through a straw.
I have also placed my order for all my gauges. This if you have build a car like this will know that they are very expensive, but cheep gauges make the finished car look terrible IMO. One thing i remember when i first rode shotgun in Simons GD was how lush the gauges looked with the crisp white lettering against the black face. So have faith another update soon!!! i hope
