The carbon panels arrived safely and look great. The plan is to remove the aluminium panels early in the build process but not fit the rear panel and bow tube panels until the differential and rear end parts are installed. I figure this approach will give us better access and visibility during this part of the build.

The carbon panels I ordered a few weeks ago have arrived at Caterham and should be delivered on 17th February whilst I’m in India with work. Exciting as these will be the first parts of the car to arrive.

I gave the garage floor its final coat of paint last week and now that it is all dry I was able to reconnect the air compressor and airline as we will be needing to use the air rivet gun to fit them (Daniel French noted that 230+ rivets are required to fit these panels – and of course we have the same number to drill out in order to remove the standard ones).

The carbon-fibre headlight bowls with the gloss clear-coat finish have been on order for a few weeks now along with a few other bits and pieces. David and his team at Classic Carbon are working on them and I hope to receive the bowls at about the same time as kit delivery.

The plan is to remove the LED headlight inserts from the standard lights and bond them into the carbon-fibre headlight ring using Sikaflex 221. The carbon headlights will be installed during the main build instead of the standard items.

The other items (bow-tube protectors, coil-cover, light blocks) will be fitted toward the end of the build or after IVA so not as time critical as the lights, but I like to have everything to hand.

UPDATE: 8th February: Just received an email from David at Classic Carbon with an update on progress. The coil cover is complete and the other parts are in the process of having clear-coat applied.

UPDATE#2: 10th April: No parts have arrived yet although David is ‘hopeful’ of getting some parts out.

UPDATE #3: 25th April: Been in touch with David several times this week and now that the disruption from the Coronavirus lockdown has settled down he has made progress in finishing the parts. The bow tube protectors have been posted via Royal Mail and should arrive any day. The headlights are have also just been finished and will be posted today. The remaining parts are finished and we are just waiting for some neoprene gaskets before they can be shipped too. The bow tube protectors and headlights are the priority items and I am glad that David has got these out.

The Quantum Two-Zero digressive dampers and Hypercoil springs have been ordered from Simon at Meteor Motorsports. Delivery should be about 5-6 weeks which will hopefully coincide nicely with the arrival of the Seven kit itself.

UPDATE: Quantum dampers and Hypercoil springs arrived the week after delivery so all was OK for starting the build

When I paid the initial deposit I was given build week 4, 2020 as the date on which my Seven would go into production and true to form on 21st January I received an email from Euan at Caterham confirming exactly this.

Based on the standard 8 week build time this means the delivery window could open up from 16th March.

However, Euan went on to say that Caterham are currently running ahead of schedule raising the possibility of a slightly earlier delivery (maybe from the week before ? – 9th March onwards…we’ll see how things go).