jmaz

The standard black plastic pod section (just the black housing - not the lens or wiring) I've got weighs around 47 g (1.7 oz). So, pretty minimal mass.

I'd played around a lot with the Configurator and kept coming back to a white-with-blue-trim combination, with red versions coming in second place, so I was glad that white was one of the two no-extra-cost colors. Black is the other choice, which I think looks really sharp but I wanted a high visibility paint color. The other four Encore-theme choices cost an extra $1,750. If I'd wanted red or any other custom color, it would have cost $3K

The pods aren't all that bad, I think. It's just that the carbon fiber ones would look better with the CF wings and powder-coat black suspension.

Re. considering your order options: I ordered lowered floors for my S3 (which I'm now building) with the understanding that I could add spacers under the seats if need be. Seats are standard leather. I'm 5'7". With the seats set into the car, without spacers, the seating height feels good. But that's with just sitting in the car and using my imagination. I spent a lot of time trying to decide on the optional limited-slip differential (my car is a 310 Encore, so it's an option, not standard). For the types of driving I expect to do (mountain roads with the possibility of a few track days), I decided to stick with the standard open diff. There's plenty of info out there on the positives and negatives of the standard Titan LSD. I could see potentially upgrading to another brand of LSD at some point. One thing to consider regarding getting factory-built options vs. "saving money by doing it yourself later on" is that, even though it might be possible to add stuff later, there's work done at the factory that I can see would not be easy for someone like me to do later on. The space to work in is very tight in many cases, the wiring looms are not easy to trace, cutting access holes (for a heater, for example) would be a pain, drilling out rivets, removing and installing floor panels would be time-consuming, etc. That work could be rewarding in itself, certainly, but to me it definitely doesn't look trivial. The Encore specs are mainly a "R" model - sport suspension, light-weight flywheel, along with upgraded brakes, 13" wheels, leather seats, but minus the LSD. It also has a 620 nose cone and 420R radiator as standard. I was mainly happy with that configuration. Options I added, which I'm happy with so far (but I'm still building, not driving), include: - Track-day roll bar - Quick-release steering wheel - Heater (a "could live without" option but one that seemed worth the cost) - Clear indicator pack (they also send the amber lenses, but the clear lenses seem worth it) - I skipped the $1000 for Caterham's LED headlights since I can upgrade those for less money and likely better performance (for example, Morimoto Sealed6 replacements) - It wasn't clear in the Caterham specs, but the kit came with LED side repeaters (LED rear lights and LED side repeaters, but standard headlights and indicators) - half hood - crutch straps - I didn't select "fully carpeted interior", but I'm considering not installing all of the carpet bits they sent anyway Items that I i might have added in hindsight include: - battery master cut-off switch (I was leary of the exterior standard mounting, but I might have been able to get the switch factory-wired but positioned in a footwell) - painted headlight bowls (which now are a no-cost option) - I agree with JohnCh that the standard indicator pod housings don't look pretty cheap. Retrofitting different indicator pods once the full assembly and attachment is done would involve multiple steps - carbon fiber rear wings (at $1,150, I was trying to limit costs at this point but I think they would have looked really good. Something to maybe add someday) -

Current AI capability is already phenomenal. But weird. I've found that the conversational AI tend to be too self-assured, so I've asked it to assign "confidence" assessments to its statements. I was using Claude to help me develop a design for a 3D-printed bracket to handle a specific range of forces and environmental conditions. Claude kept making obvious mistakes about the optimal orientation of the part on the 3D printer bed that would result in the greatest strength in the direction of maximum force. When I dug into why it was getting this wrong, Claude finally told me that it's not particularly good with spatial reasoning on multiple dimensions, or something along those lines. I asked it why, given that knowledge, it tended to make very self-assured statements rather than offering any cautionary language. It basically said that that's how people talk on the internet! (Which its trained on, of course).

The tariffs for my 310 kit, which arrived in the U.S. in mid February, ended up being around 9.5% of the total. That was less than the initial estimate, which I think was around 12 to 13%.

Hi All, I'm in the early stages of assembling a 310 Encore. After reaching (and passing) retirement age, I figured it was pretty much now or never to scratch a long-time itch of owning a Seven, particularly if I was going to do the build myself. The 310 had always felt like the best combination of power and balance for my needs, so when Caterham announced this summer that they were planning a limited run of 25 new 310's, I decided to take the leap after some discussion with Josh Robbins at Rocky Mountain Caterham. The build has gone well so far, with no new issues encountered that haven't already been discussed in the various build blogs and forums. I'd like to thank everyone who has taken the time to document their builds and to help with questions and problems that other builders have run into. It's scary to imagine trying to put the car together using just the official manuals. Along with using Josh R. as a resource, my main go-to blogs so far have been caterham420detailedbuildblog.co.uk, 310build.com and www.caterham7diaries.com. I'll then check several others (cat310s.wordpress.com, www.caterhamr500.co.uk, purplemeanie.co.uk, www.caterham310.co.uk, caterham170r.wordpress.com, among others, along with some of the instructional youtube videos such as Caterham 7 Diaries and The Caterham Cave) to help fill in some information gaps. All of them have additional bits of detail and tricks to offer. I'm sure that, so far, I've spent way more time reading than I have on the actual build. Yoram's Yellowjacket build posts here on usa7s proved particularly valuable for suggestions on dealing with the initial hurdle of the crate delivery. Since I couldn't be sure that the delivery truck would have a forklift that would fit in my garage, and having 3 (4, as it turned out) big crates sitting on my driveway in the middle of winter wasn't ideal, I'd followed Yoram's suggestion and construction plans to build a dolly for the chassis crate so that it could be pushed into the garage. I made a second dolly for the engine crate. The delivery donkey lift did in fact turn out to be too tall for my standard-height garage entry, so the dollies saved the day. The tall crate was too high to allow use of a dolly, but the lift operator was able to nudge the crate far enough into the garage. Again following Yoram's suggestion, Once we'd pushed the chassis crate into the garage, my helper (son-in-law) and I used the engine hoist and lifting straps to move the chassis off the crate base and onto jack stands. (Here's a hint from "should have realized that" category: remember to unbolt the chassis from the crate bottom before trying to do the lifting.) I mentioned 4 crates. One of the crates was intended to be delivered to RMC but was left with me by mistake. The chassis is an S3 with lowered floors.

How did you manage to get the crates lined up so neatly in your garage? Were the delivery folks able to use their forklift to assist with that?

Regarding the transmission tunnel protection, instead of corrugated cardboard I was thinking of using waxed cardboard from milk cartons - thin and slippery. Your flexible plastic approach sounds better though. What specific material did you buy? I haven't yet found a good choice on Amazon - either they're in small sheets, or are more than a few mils thick

I've got a kit due to arrive in the US on 4 Feb. and at this point am looking at something like the original ~2.5% duty plus Trump's initial 10% to 13%, and now a bonus ("give me Greenland") 10% starting on 1 Feb. I'm holding my breath that he doesn't slap on another increment. I can't imagine how companies can operate businesses under this kind of uncertainty and risk

Thanks, Bruce and NSXguy, for your responses. I'm not currently trying to diagnose any issues but I expect to be starting a 310 Encore build next month. Jim

Are there steps that might be taken early in the build process to verify that the engine harness has been assembled correctly by the supplier? Are there similar factory-/supplier-related weak points that warrant checking in the kits, rather than assuming things are going to be OK out of the box (crates)? Volt meter connectivity tests comes to mind, but is that feasible and comprehensive enough? And is there a good set of wiring diagrams available? I've seen the ones in the 2015 Build Manual, but they're not very clear - at least, after an initial look.

What did you use to maneuver the crates into the garage? Pallet jack?

Thanks! Wise words that I'll keep in mind. The challenges are a big part (probably the main part) of why I want to do this, and I'm looking forward to the process.

I'll be starting the build of my 310 in a couple of months once it shows up in its crates, and one take-away I've gotten from reading build blogs and threads is that it's wrong to assume that the factory did even basic stuff correctly in terms of connecting up the electricals. That sure makes it tough to diagnose problems since my first assumption would be that I screwed up something during the assembly. I'm curious if these issues such as incorrect pin wiring, connectors not connected, etc. are typical or if they're just more apparent because they get mentioned when folks run into problems.

I hope you'll post updates on your progress. I'm interested in any thoughts you might have on which of the many available build blogs and threads are proving most helpful to you. I'll be in the same position in about 2 months when my 310 Encore kit is due to arrive.