It's running!

Spent this weekend with Paul working on the Magic Rabbit. Friday I worked to get all the temporary wiring done so that we could attempt to start the GTI on Saturday. Here I am working on the wiring and Paul under the car working on the fuel line. Paul first was removing an extra fuel line the previous owner had added as part of the NOS system which was never finished. Then Paul was replacing the hose from tank to fuel pump when he discovered that the fitting on the fuel tank had been bent when the car slipped off the jack stands when the engine was being installed. At the bend there was a hairline crack which required the use of JB Weld to seal up the crack!
Now it is time to put the fuel injection system back in, Paul cleaned it all up. I am holding the fuel distributor in my right hand and all the fuel lines to each cylinder in my left hand. Paper on the engine is my wiring diagram drawn just for the Magic Rabbit.

In this picture you can see the temporary controls bolted to the front fender. The controls has ignition switch, starter push button, fuel pump switch and radiator fan switch. Also a switch to open up the cold start fuel injector which acts like a choke, adding more fuel to get started.
Notice the fine and detailed craftsmanship in the temporary batter hold down, bungee card works perfect!
Time to bleed the brakes, make sure we can stop before we can go. Here is Nancy helping Paul bleed the brakes, "down, now hold, OK up, down again and hold, OK up". Many times, but we have nice firm brakes and clean fluid.
Check out those pedals, and those shoes. Red to stop, green to go! KISS principle, keep it simple, stupid.
OK, here is the best picture of the weekend. Victoria found these hats on line, I ordered them through Amazon last week. Just perfect, look at those two loons! Rabbit ears, magicians hat and the checked flag bow tie! Nothing could be more Lemons than those hats. Thanks Victoria for the perfect find!

OK, now for what we have all been waiting for, firing up the beast. Here is video of one of our first runs, loud but running smoothly after we discovered we had the plug wires for #2 and #3 reversed!! But not before we checked compressions, checked the spark plugs, checked for spark, could the timing be way off, bad valves, .....we where running through all kinds of disasters before going back to basics. What was the last thing we did, install the spark plug wirings, are the correct, we thought so, but no we found a mistake. Fixed and now it runs nicely, here is a video of the a running engine!

OK, that took me a long time to load the pics and write this blog, after 11pm on Sunday night. Very productive weekend, but so much more to do. Thanks to Rye for the pics and video. Now off to bed and dreams of the Magic Rabbit.