After getting the engine fitted at the last big push I was keen to get the engine bay sorted so that I could start it so I concentrated a lot of my effort during this work period on that.

I started by mounting the radiator and radiator fan so that I could get all the water hoses plumbed in. This required me to make several brackets as the radiator in the MK2 Panda is completely different from the one in the MK1. This took quite some time, however, the end result is very neat and I'm quite pleased with it. As well as mounting the radiator and fan I also had to decide where the expansion tank would be located. I wanted to locate it as closely as possible as it would have been in the Panda and achieved this quite easily by mounting it on the wing next to the suspension turret. This required me to make another bracket as the tank is shaped to fit neatly into the area between the turret and inner wing of the Panda. Again, considerable time was spent designing and making a bracket but it now looks like it was meant to go there. During fitting the expansion tank I had to fit the bonnet to check that there would be no clearance problems. It's very very close but the tank fits exactly as it should.

With the loom and most of the engine components bolted in I only had to fit the distributor cap and rotor arm, and put in the fuel lines from the tank to the petrol pump in order to start the engine. It was a big moment in the progress of the rebuild. Unfortunately it was quite a let down as the car would not start. After making a few simple checks it was decided that either the distributor or coil was at fault because there was obviously petrol being pumped through the carb but there was no spark at the plug. This meant that I had to spend some time trying to find a scrap yard that had a suitable Panda in with the required parts still on it. It took half a day but I finally found one about 20 miles away so I went there straight away to get the parts. It was an injected model and the coil was slightly different but I bought it anyway, along with some of the wiring that I hoped I would be able to patch into mine, along with the distributor. Once home again I firstly changed the coil with the wiring temporarily jury-rigged but still got no spark when trying to start the engine. I left the replacement coil in place and then changed the distributor. This time the engine cranked over a couple of times then burst into life and ran beautifully! This put a great big smile on my face I can tell you. I then put the original coil back on and tried again. The engine still started, confirming that the distributor was faulty. I didn't run the engine for long as at this point there was only a small amount of oil in the engine and no coolant at all. But now that I had the engine running I changed the oil, temporarily fitted the heater (yet again) so I could fill up the cooling system and drained and refilled the gearbox with new oil. At this point I was almost ready to test drive but I wanted to sort out the brakes first.

I had previously bought most of the components I would need to completely overhaul the brakes so I got on with fitting new front callipers and pads, new rear drums, brake cylinders, shoes and brake overhaul kits, which contained new springs, retaining clips etc. Once this was done I needed to go shopping for some copper brake lines, flexible hoses, fittings and a tool to flare the pipes with. It didn't take long then to fit new brake lines throughout, as the braking system on the Panda is very simple. Once this was done it was quickly filled with new fluid and bled using an Easibleed kit. Once again, a problem arose in that the brake pedal still felt exactly as it did before the brakes were overhauled. It sank to the floor with no apparent effect at all. Repeatedly bleeding the system to make sure I'd eliminated all the air was no use. I finally had to drain all the fluid and remove the brake master cylinder to check it. Once off the car it was obvious that it had seized in the fully extended position and would no longer be of any use. I didn't manage to get hold of a replacement this trip so the brakes had to left until the next time.

However, I still wanted to see if the car would drive OK so I threw a toolbox into the cab to sit on, started the engine and very (VERY) carefully edged out of the garage. If I needed to, I had the handbrake to stop with. All seemed fine so I drove the car around to the front of the house very slowly and parked it on the grass to photograph it. This was an important moment in the rebuild and gave me a massive confidence boost. Once I'd taken the photos and published them on the Fiat Forum I went to drive the car back into the garage. This was when major disaster struck. Reversing the car up a slight incline in order to turn around there was a loud crunching noise and the whole car juddered. I immediately stopped and climbed out to see if anything had collapsed. I was imagining the suspension collapsing or an engine mount giving way but I couldn't see anything out of place so I tried it again with the same result. I still couldn't see what was wrong so I called in my brother to help. After a while I thought I could work out what was going on but I had to remove the passenger drive shaft to confirm it. I was right; the drive shaft kept popping out at the diff when under load. This damaged the tripod bearing on the end of the shaft so it will need to be replaced. It seemed that the tripod bearing did not protrude into the diff far enough to be secure. I thought that there might be differences in the length between MK1 and MK2 Panda driveshafts and tried to find out by asking on the Fiat Forum and referring to the Haynes and Porter manuals. Nobody seemed to know.

The following day I thought I'd have a good look at the engine and gearbox mounting arrangements and made the discovery that the bracket on the gearbox which attaches to the bottom mount is longer on MK2 Pandas. I'd fitted the gearbox complete with bottom mounting bracket from the MK2 Panda, assuming them to be the same. So I cleaned up the old bracket and fitted it, with the result that the bottom of the engine swung back about 10mm. A trial fit of the driveshaft revealed that this had allowed it to fit slightly further into the diff, but still not enough. I then turned my attention to the custom engine mount I'd had fabricated. I loosened it and tried to lever the engine sideways, towards the gearbox. This gave me about 5mm movement, allowing the driveshaft a little more protrusion into the diff. I still wasn't happy though so I took off the custom mount and modified it slightly by cutting down the rubber and sleeve to give a 5mm drop on that side of the engine. With all these adjustments the driveshaft now seems to sit in the diff a lot further but I'm still not sure it's enough. I had to leave it for this trip though as this was near the end of the time I had off and couldn't get any parts. It was quite frustrating, as with that and the brakes, I was so close to being able to drive the car properly. The next trip will see a proper test drive!

As I couldn't get on with the major stuff I tackled a few smaller jobs to keep the rebuild progressing. Without going into too much detail I managed to achieve the following:

Cut a circular metal plate to fill the hole in the side panel where the fuel tank filler neck locates. I cut a hole in the plate the correct size for the filler neck to fasten into and riveted it in place, and finally located the filler neck.

Manufactured a set of brackets to utilise the tailgate struts to open and hold the bonnet. Only one is fitted now as I only had one serviceable strut but all the brackets are in place ready to fit a second one.

Finally fitted the coil and washer bottle.

Trial fitted the exhaust to work out where to locate new mounts as the existing mounts don't work very well on the chassis. Also shortened it by approximately 12" by cutting the tailpipe. Also cut off the existing rear mount welded to the underside of the load area.

Trial fitted the dashboard pod. This allowed me to work out exactly where I would need to drill for the mounting bolts (easier and more secure than using the self tapping screws it's fitted with in the Panda) and locate the dashboard wiring.