I've saved the biggest piece of bodywork until last! Despite its size, I'm expecting this part to be relatively straightforward to fit. The six mounting holes are pre-drilled, as are the holes for the lights, fuel filler neck and boot lid hinges. Unlike the bonnet or scuttle, it shouldn't need any major cutting or filing, just some more drilling.
Quantum changed the design and manufacture of the whole rear end earlier this year. It used to come in seven pieces - the two main inner and outer centre boot sections, two wheel arches, two armrests and the boot lid. Now, it comes in just two pieces. The wheel arches and armrests are part of the main moulding and the inner boot section comes already bonded in place on three sides - it just needs drilling, sealing and bolting together along its lower rear edge. The second piece of the rear end is the bootlid, which comes already drilled for the hinges and lock. Apparently, the new style rear end takes about twelve to fifteen hours less to fit than the previous version, so I was very pleased that my kit came with the later style.
The bodywork is fitted by carefully lowering it over the roll bar and hooking it over the rear of the chassis. Despite its size and apparent strength, it was light enough for me to fit it on my own. As I've come to expect, the six mounting holes lined up perfectly with the captive nuts in the chassis. With it temporarily bolted in place, I marked out the position of the wiring loom and its mounting clips. The whole rear section of the loom is supplied separately and is connected to the main loom with a large multi-plug. By attaching the loom to the bodywork, the whole rear end can be removed by undoing the connector and earth strap, leaving the loom and lights in place on the rear body. Surprisingly, the connectors for the fuel tank sender unit are also part of the detachable rear loom, so I added a couple of crimp-on connectors and waterproof sleeves, to avoid having to remove the sender unit wiring and cable ties when removing the rear end.
Next, I adjusted the position of the fuel filler neck, to line it up with the hole in the bodywork. Helpfully, the neck is a tight fit in the tank, so it stayed in the right position after I removed the body. With the bodywork off again, I drilled the holes for the cable tie bases around the front and sides of the inner boot section and loosely tied the loom in place. I then fitted the larger breather pipe from the donor car between the tank and neck. It wasn't a very good fit at first, but after cutting off the right angle at the tank end, it was much better, although I had to heat up the rubber pipe to fit it on to the tank spigot, as the bit I cut off was slightly tapered. Next, I drilled the holes in the bodywork for the filler neck securing screw and the smart, stainless steel filler neck surround, and fitted some Titanfast trim to the bodywork where it goes around the rollbar.
The last job with the bodywork off was to fit the bootlid hinges to the top of the body, as there is no access to the front part of the hinges once the boot is fitted to the chassis. I fitted the supplied rubber seal to the lip around the aperture, fitted the bootlid and adjusted the hinges to get a good, even fit. The threads on the rear parts of the hinges were far too long - they fouled the seal when opening or closing the lid - so I cut them down to about half their original length. The bootlid sat slightly higher than the surrounding bodywork, but as the rubber seal may squash down a bit over time, I don't want to cut down the fibreglass lip it sits on just yet.
With everything finished, the body section was again fitted to the chassis and the two lower fixing bolts fitted and tightened. As the top four bolts will also hold the harnesses, I left these loose for the time being. Next, two small angle brackets are bonded to the inside of the wheel arches and screwed to the stainless side panels, to stop the front lower sections of the arches flapping about. I then fitted the filler neck and surround screws and made the connections for the lights and fuel sender. As the large multi-block is not the sealed, waterproof type, I smeared all the metal parts of the connectors with Vaseline and covered the plug and socket with a sheet of plastic to stop water ingress. I then drilled and tapped into the bottom of the rear lower chassis member to take the earth lead.
The rear lights were easy to fit - the lamp bodies fit on the inside of the holes, the lenses on the outside, with the bodywork sandwiched in between - very simple and quick, but effective. The lenses all have rubber O rings on the back, which should keep water out of the boot and the lamp bodies. The wiring was then pushed through the grommets in the back of the lights and connectors were then crimped on and pushed onto their respective terminals. All the lights came with bulbs, so with everything connected up, I tested all the lights and they all worked perfectly.
The number plate light was a slight problem. Eventually, I want to fit a boot-mounted spare wheel, with the number plate and light in the middle of the wheel. I don't think that my type of wheel would pass the SVA radius test if it were fitted for the test (not that I've got a spare wheel yet anyway!). So, having marked out the position on the boot where the wheel mounting bolts will go (using one of the rear wheels), I drilled the holes out to 6mm diameter and made a couple of small brackets to hold the light using these holes. After SVA, I'll drill the holes out to accept the 12mm bolts that will hold the wheel. I'll then remount the number plate and light in the middle of the spare wheel. I'm not quite sure how at the moment, but I'm sure I'll think of something when the time comes.
