Punch List

I'm down to the point where I have a few things to finish off to call the car "complete".  I have driven it several times but there are things that I need to take care of to make it really road-worthy and not be afraid of being noticed by the cops!

I went through all of the electrical systems and found the following don't work:

1. Use of blinker blows a fuse that powers most of the dashboard.  This is going to involve some remove-wires-and-test and a lot of blown fuses until I figure it out.
2. High beam lights don't work, but I think this is a problem with a known workaround of a dead high/low beam silver rectangular relay.  This didn't work when I bought the car.  The  high beam indicator light doesn't work and I assume this is related.
3. Hazard lights don't work, likely related to #2, but doesn't blow a fuse.
4. Compartment light doesn't come on when switch in door-buzzer position, but does come on in the other position.
5. Reverse light does not come on when shifter in reverse.
6. License plate light does not come on with headlights.
7. Wiper only works in "middle" position.  Low and high do not cause movement, but when left in high position causes the wiper motor to get extremely hot.

Other items that need attention:

1. Driver's side A-pillar is bent down by about 1/4" and the chrome upright in the door's window assembly doesn't fit nicely into the rubber gasket.
2. Driver's door window mechanism gets stuck when in the full-down position.
3. Passenger's door window mechanism stops about 1/4" below the targa gasket.
4. Need to figure out how to drive the 120V charger with the J1772 charger.  Extreme disappointment that there's no way to derive 120V from the 240V feed due to lack of Neutral.  Luckily I work with electricians and power electrical engineers, so I'll pick their brain for some kind of 240V-120V transformer solution.
5. Buy rear trunk hinges.  Rainbow body shop "lost" them somewhere in their shop.  Pelican doesn't have any stock, but they can get one of them from Porsche in Germany for a mindboggling price plus shipping.  The 914EV list suggests that I watch eBay as they come up for sale all the time.  Unfortunately now there are only front hinges for sale!
6. Get rear trunk hinges stripped/primed/painted by Rainbow.
7. Install rear trunk hinges, rear trunk lid and rear trunk lid latch.
8. Install rear trunk gas struts from Camp914.
9. Mount rear-view mirror on new windshield.
10. Figure out how to keep sun visors up when I want them up and down when I want them down.  I've tried butyl and wraps of electrical tape, but both end up sagging down.  There seems to be a bolt hole, but I won't clamp down on the pivot pin.
11. Finish debugging PakTrakr Android app and publish it into the Android Market.  More on this in a separate post.
12. Buy 3rd party floor mats.
13. Get a padded bag(s) to hold charging cable, Kill-A-Watt, fire extinguisher and tire jack.
14. Get agreed-value insurance to cover the full $40K of money in the car in case of a total wreck / fire.
15. Install pads in rear suspension to raise rear of car about 2".
16. Change California vehicle registration type to Electric by going to smog referee at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo.
17. Long-term: Buy & cut sheets of clear plastic / lexan for battery box covers

Carpet wrapup

The carpets dried in the sun by the next day, so it was time to pop them back in.  I used spray adhesive to attach two pieces of vinyl on the bars just in front of each seat, and the pieces on the side members.  I put the pieces behind the speakers and mounted them in place.  Then I laid the rest of the pieces in place.  The center piece is bumping up a bit due to the unused connectors for the instruments in the non-existent center console, so I'm going to remove those and wrap the wire ends.  Same for the seat sensors.  It's starting to look like a car!

Start of Interior - Carpets

Alert readers will remember that I felt I needed a bit more clutch pedal travel to gently shift gears, so I bashed the firewall back about and inch and took a drive around the yard.  Just right!

This leads me to the step of finalizing the wiring and installing the carpets.  The carpets were a dirty mess when I got the car, then a year of sitting on the floor in the shop with sawdust was not a pretty picture.  Fortunately I have an electric pressure washer with a "gentle" tip, so I first soaked each piece, then sprinkled environmentally-friendly detergent on them, then spent the next hour and a half cleaning and rinsing with the pressure washer.  I was amazed at how much dirt and grime came out, and how long I had to rinse to get all of the foam out.  I let them dry in the sun (did I mention it's the day after Christmas and it's 67F and sunny?) and install them tomorrow.

I have some 1" wire loom on order so I'll pick it up tomorrow morning and protect and run the big cable bundles under the dashboard and down the center of the car, then pop the carpeting on top.  I do have some major work to fix the pad that goes behind the seats, it has some major tears in the vinyl.

Here's all of the carpet drying in the sun.  I'm really glad I have the little mechanic's rolling seat as all that time bending over with the spray nozzle would have killed my back.