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Sunday, May 13, 2012
Back Up And Running
Apologies for the lack of photos. I started off the day by jacking the car back up and giving it a
good going over and bolt-check. Mostly all in order apart from a missing rear damper nut! I found
an old one in the garage, but will have to get a couple of nylocs for this job I think - something
to keep an eye on.
With that done, I set about refilling with fresh coolant, and bleeding the system. This went ok
and soon enough I was all done. I later took the car out for a short drive to make sure that
everything was back to normal, and it seems to be. And the end result was just a possible drip
or two from the crank seal... hmmm... better than it was before though, so I'll see how it goes.
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Posted by
DH2 at
6:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Saturday, May 12, 2012
Bit Of A Battle
I did a bit more on the car yesterday evening, but it started to become hard work - in trying to
disconnect the steering rack and column, the pinch bolt just wouldn't budge. I ended up spending
too long having to chop it up and beat it out.
The battle continued today... Having been off and picked up the required new parts - oil seal,
timing cover gasket, and new pinch bolt - I set about the job. First tricky bit was getting the
crank pulley bolt undone. In the end I resorted to wedging the breaker bar against the garage
floor, and breaking the torque using the starter motor. So after a short while I had the cover off,
cleaned up, and then refitted.
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Getting the pulley bolt done back up turned into something of a challenge. I couldn't get enough torque
against the compression of the engine, even with the brakes wedged on. So I had to remove the
starter motor so that I could block the ring gear. However, to remove the starter motor, requires
the engine to jacked out of the mounts so the motor can clear the footwell. Then I found that it
wasn't quite far enough, the carb heatshield was against the drivers footwell. So I ended up having
to remove the carbs to make space, which in itself in an incredibly fiddly job.
After far too long, and alot of swearing, cursing, and stomping about, I managed to get it all
back together and ready to receive some coolant.
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Posted by
DH2 at
7:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Might As Well Get On
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Having realised that I can't do the timing cover without removing
the radiator, as I had hoped, I decided to get on with further
dismantling this evening. So I dropped the coolant (and managed to
not spill much), and removed the radiator. I made a start on undoing
the steering rack so that it can be moved out of the way - I'm again
hoping to not actually have to remove it altogther - but got a bit
stuck with disconnecting the column.
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Wednesday, May 09, 2012
Back In The Garage
So, it's been a while... Nothing much has happened in that time,
mostly winter, where the car sat in storage off the salty roads. It
has been out a few times this year, on a couple of trips, but I have
been wanted to fix the crank pulley oil leak, as I don't want to
make alot of mess of the engine bay again. Meanwhile, I have been
working away on the other car project...
But, a time slot has
appeared, the other project is away for a couple of weeks having
some work done, so I have moved the car back into my garage to have
the oil seal replaced, and a general bolt-check over.
To that
end, I set about starting work. First thing was to get the car
jacked up and onto the axle stands. I then spent a while trying to
remove the fan. This was very fiddly as I could only just get at the
bolt heads, and only once I'd done this, I realised that the fan
won't come off with the radiator in place (I thought it might just
fit)... which means that the radiator has to come out...
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Saturday, December 03, 2011
Times Up?
Not written anything in here for a while - there's not been alot to report, I've been using the
car on occasion for getting around locally, and haven't had any further issues since installing
the fuel filter.
I've been lucky with the weather, but the roads have been gritted a couple of times recently,
which might spell the end of using the car for a while. After some overnight rain cleaned the roads
up, and they dried out, I ran a couple of errands in the car this morning. Afterwards I decided
I should put some anti-freeze in it, so drained the water out of the cooling system, and put a
mix in, and got it bled. Then just time for a quick clean and a blast with the hose around the
underside.
We'll have to see what the weather does as to whether it will get another run out this year, but
I've managed just under 200 miles since it hit the road, so that's a nice run-in.
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Posted by
DH2 at
7:00 PM
Categories:
Driving,
Fettling
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Fuel Filter
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So I ordered an inline fuel filter, which arrived today, so a quick hour in the garage this
evening to get it fitted. I have done it in a semi-temporary way for now, partly to ensure that
it all works, and also whilst I think of the best place/method to attach it. It is plumbed in
and tie-wrapped to a few points to hold it in place - I gave it a quick test and it seems to work ok.
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Posted by
DH2 at
7:30 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Monday, October 24, 2011
A Minor Breakdown
Nice weather again yesterday, so I went out in the afternoon for a bimble around. After a while,
as I was driving through a village, there was a pretty distinct smell of petrol. I stopped to have
a look, and sure enough, it was coming out of the rear float chamber at a reasonable rate. I left
it to cool down a bit, and set about a roadside repair - I removed the lid of the float chamber
and blew through the valve, as I could see some crap in the bottom of the chamber, so this was
probably the problem. It was, but the problem then moved to the front one, so I ended up doing
the same to that! Fortunately, it stayed dry all the way back home.
So this evening I removed them again to clean the float chambers all out. You can see in the
photos there is some detritus in the bottom, which I think is from when I stripped a fuel hose
pushing it onto the rigid pipe. I took the needles out to check them, the rear one seems ok, the
front one is a bit scored, but they seem to seal ok to blowing through them. I also took the
gauze filter out of the fuel pump to ensure that was clear - it has a small hole in it which is
probably how the rubbish is getting through.
Put it all back together and started the car - will have to see how it goes... Will think about
fitting an inline filter near the carbs to prevent further roadside issues.
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Posted by
DH2 at
8:00 PM
Categories:
Driving,
Fettling
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Hit The Road!
There's been a couple of hold ups this week on getting the car finished. Firstly, the trim strips which
I re-fixed last weekend, didn't stay fixed for long. Although the tape did, as I had to spend another
hour or so removing the tape from the car again. I've ordered some different tape to try, but not
got it yet, so that job will have to wait.
Secondly, I had some problems with the wiring of one of the front indicators when I re-fitted them
after the painting work. I spent an age trying to diagnose it, it seemed to be a problem in the
connectors into the loom, so eventually I decided I should replace the connectors with something
more modern. So after a few evenings work, I got them all done and seemingly working ok.
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With that done, that's it! Well, that's it for now. Time to get some miles on the car and see
what goes wrong. So I pushed the car out this morning and gave it a quick wash to get all the
dust off it. Also cleaned out the inside and the glass, so it's looking fairly tidy now. It
could use a proper clean and polish, but all in good time.
I took the car out for a while, and put about 30 miles on it without any problems, so that's
good. More miles to come tomorrow whilst the weather has perked up a bit again.
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Posted by
DH2 at
7:00 PM
Categories:
Driving,
Fettling
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Finishing Off
Finishing off takes ages. But I'm almost there now, I think. Well,
for some value of finished, of course. Anyways, first job for today
was a second coat of underseal on some of the areas under the floor
where the welding was done. This was followed by a second coat on
the wheel arch edges. I ran out of time yesterday to start on the
lower edge of the sills, so I prepped them and got the first coat
onto them.
After a bit of a break, I was able to get the second
coat on the sill edges, and then remembered that I needed to put a
coat of underseal on the inside of the inner arches - particlarly
where the washer bottle sits, as this is a classic rot spot.
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Since I'm nearly done, I decided to give the wheels a good clean
while they are still off the car. They are starting to look in need
of a refurb, I suppose it has been about 20 years since they were
done! They are ok for now though, something to leave until spring I
think.
Final job for today was to re-do the trim strips along the
top edge of the sills. They have been starting to come unstuck for a
while, so I needed to remove them, clean up all the sticky mess left
behind, and then re-apply with double-sided tape. Hopefully they'll
stay put...
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Posted by
DH2 at
6:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Masking
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Next up was to prepare for painting the arches. This actually seemed to be the longest task, as it
took ages to carefully mask up around the front suspension etc...
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:30 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
The Final Fettle?
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Get on with it I did. Once I'd driven the car home, I got it
straight into the garage and back up on the axle stands to get on
with the painting. First up was to get a couple of coats of paint
onto the patches, followed by a build up of underseal to make them
blend into the rest of the arches a bit better.
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
One More Step
Not quite Monday, but Tuesday. I picked the car up today, with it's shiny new MOT certificate.
Just got to touch up the rear wheel arches where the extra welding was done, sort out the front
wheel arches, and seam and under seal the underside. Better get on with it...
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Friday, October 07, 2011
Tuesday, October 04, 2011
Dead Axle Strap
Another quick hour to spend before the MOT appointment tomorrow. I
wanted to have a go at re-tightening the front suspension with some
weight on it, as I'm not wholly convinced it is sitting correctly on
its bushes - they might be getting twisted. I also needed to tighten
up the suspesion u-bolts and rear shackles with the weight of the
car on them. This was all a bit grovelly fiddly, and I'm not sure I
made any difference at the front end.
Whilst I was grovelling
under the rear, I noticed that the nearside axle strap appears to
have self destructed after just having the axle weight sitting on it
for a couple of weeks. So I pulled it off to take it back.
So, it's off back to the garage tomorrow to have the remaining bits of rust (as previously described) sorted, and an MOT,
which surely it will pass with flying colours...?
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Monday, October 03, 2011
Anti-Roll Re-fit
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Whilst I think the car is ready for MOT, a spare hour spent in the garage re-fitting the anti-roll
bar to the front suspension. This went on fairly smoothly, though access to the lower drop link
nuts was somewhat tedious - half a flat at a time. I was also going to fit the front tie-down
brackets, but the threads are a bit painted up, so I'll have to sort this some other time.
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Posted by
DH2 at
9:30 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Saturday, October 01, 2011
First Moves
So, during the week I had spent time doing some repainting of the underside of the car. I stuck a
couple of coats down along the seams where I had removed the sealer, and also along the chassis
legs which I cleaned up.
First job for today was to get the sump back on. Having acquired a fresh gasket and some Hylomar,
I set about re-cleaning the mating surfaces, applying some sealant, and the gasket. From there it
was fairly simple to get the sump back on and torqued up. This was plain sailing apart from the
rear two bolts don't want to tighten up much - I think the threads are bit knackered in the rear
engine plate, which is aluminium. I stuck a load of threadlock on them, so hopefully they will
be ok for now.
After that, I set about getting the car back down onto it's wheels, re-filled with oil, getting
the engine re-started, etc. A brief sanity check over the car, and I decided to wheel it out and
took it for a brief test drive (on my private road). Everything seems to be working ok, so I think
we are pretty good to go for the MOT... which I have booked it for on Wednesday.
Apologies for the lack of photos...
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Posted by
DH2 at
7:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Sunday, September 25, 2011
De-seaming
So, due to the sump issue, I've resigned that I can't finished
things off for an MOT this week. As such I decided to look at
something I was previously going to leave until later. Something
Mark had mentioned to me when he was doing the welding, was that on
the underside of the car where the floorpan meets the sills, the
seam sealer is either absent or needs some attention. So I figured
it shouldn't take too long to fix, and so this morning I got the
screwdriver out and scraped the old sealer off - I reckon it will be
better to start from scratch and redo it all.
A side-effect of
this is that I am reassured that things seem to be generally good
and solid in this area, though I did find one tiny hole in the edge
of the floor which I will get Mark to weld up.
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Posted by
DH2 at
2:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Saturday, September 24, 2011
De-sumping
Whilst overall the engine has been relatively continent, there were a couple of slight leaks which
appeared to be coming from around the sump. Unfortunately, they were a bit more of a drip than
I'd be able to ignore, so I resolved that I would have to remove the sump to attempt to fix it.
I think the mistake I made was to refit it with just the new gasket and no sealant. This would
probably have been ok with the old style waxed paper gasket, but the new ones are just cut of out
of thin card.
So I drained the oil, and removed the sump. The gasket broke as I did so, and so I'll need to
get another new one - maybe I can try to find the older style one? I then spent a little time
cleaning up the sump, some of threads in the bottom of the block, and the mating surfaces. Something
else I thought about was to check how flat the sump face is, so I tried to bash it a bit straighter.
Unfortunately, as I don't have a spare gasket, I can't really do much more with regard to getting
things finished. I did a couple of other little jobs, and popped out to buy another length of
fuel hose to re-do the one at the back.
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Posted by
DH2 at
7:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Interior
As you may note, I've not done much in the garage for a couple of
weeks. I spent a while pondering what to do about the steering boss
situation, and in the end I cleaned up the splines and refitted the
original one - it is well on there, and will do the job for now.
So
today I set about refitting the interior. I started off by working
on the steering cowl. This seems to have never fitted all that well,
so a little fettling was required, but I have now got it all fitted
and done up neatly.
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After that I started on refitting the trim panels and carpets. The
carpets are looking a bit tired these days, but I'm not in the
realms of a re-trim yet - enough has been spent on getting the car
back into mechanical form. Not much more to say on this really.
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After lunch I continued working refitting the interior - finished
off the carpets, the rear shelf trim panel, the seatbelts and seats.
I then refitted the strip along the back of the hood, and fiddled
around a bit trying to get the hood fitting correctly - I don't
think it's quite right, but it's not far off. Also applied some
highly technical gaffer tape to torn seam in the hood.
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A final couple of little things I sorted out (because the parts were
hiding in the car), was to final fit the battery and its clamp, and
attach the heater box duct, and fit and adjust the control wire to
the flap mechanism.
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Posted by
DH2 at
6:00 PM
Categories:
Fettling
