Gearbox refurb

Its been a while since Ive updated how things are going but now that most of the bodywork has been completed (just some grinding and cosmetic work to go) its now time to look back at the engine and gearbox before reinstalling them.

My youngest son, the little darling has managed to insert various bits into the engine as it has been sitting in the garage awaiting refitting. If it wasn’t for the fact that I saw some green zip ties poking out of the water pump, I may not have noticed his handy work.

So I have dropped off the gearbox to a local automatic gearbox specialist for a clean up and refurbish. I should be able to do a limited strip down on the engine before it is finished just so I don’t find any other little surprises deposited by my little angels.

Its all coming together, slowly, very, very slowly but surely.

Parts Arrived

The parts have arrived from the UK and now I have to get my welding skills honed up to get everything back together.

All the bits I had to cut out, note the incredibly intact (not at all rusted out) crows feet. It seemed such a shame to have to cut out the crows feet especially when everything I read about Daimlers or Mk2’s show the crows feet looking like brown swiss cheese.

  and the new metal ready to be fitted. Next step is welding everything back in place. 

It’s been a while….

Well it has been a while since I posted and I didn’t manage to get to Peking or Paris in 2013. A combination of family, friends and finances meant that the car had no chance of being finished on time. The old girl went under quite a bit of scrutiny, gnashing of teeth and some soul searching whether the project would continue after some serious rust was found in the front end.

Since then she sat dormant for some time but with a flash of inspiration,  we are off again. I cut out the rust in the front cross member, the front of the chassis rail. Unfortunately to replace these rusty parts I had to cut out the both the left and right crows foot, the left and right outriggers. From all available Jag Mk2 and Daimler 2.5 articles say these areas are rust traps in the vehicles, the painful part for me was these parts were almost pristine but had to be cut out to replace the other bits that normally aren’t rusty.

So after a few attempts the parts are on their way from the UK and hopefully will be here in the next week or so (allowing for the vagaries of the mail system to the deep north of Oz).

Slightly off track

I haven’t written anything in a while, have been traveling and working but I thought I might share this gem from Alice Springs airport.

A 1920 Alpine Eagle Silver Ghost bought by Connellan Airlines in 1939 and brought to Alice Springs converted to a utility, built in radio communication, tools, chains, dual ignition, dual fuel system, spotlights and even fitted with a gun rack!

Simple, elegant, tough and effective

it even has the original tool kit

It would be the perfect car for the Peking to Paris!

 

 

Had to take a little time to fix something

Unfortunately I have had to spend some time away from the Big Green Machine over the last few weeks due to a training course last weekend and to deal with some fuel issues with the MGB. Everytime I turned on the fuel pump, petrol poured out of the carbs down over the exhaust manifold, not a good thing. you can read more about it here.

Still Plugging Away

I am still plugging away (literally) as I replace the wiring. I have made a few nubie errors so far which resulted in fitting a lot then coming to the realisation that I would have to undo it all to fit another area first! Slightly frustrating but essential so that I can do it right.

The downside of course is that regardless of how soon i can get it all together, I won’t necessarily know it all works until I get the engine back in. Oh well, I better cross my fingers and hope that I get it all in the right order!

Now while I continue doing the electrical work, I need to find someone who can help with uprating the transmission.

Understanding the Electrical Spaghetti

An expected arrival this week brought me some joy as the new wiring loom from Vintage Wiring Harness arrived.

After nearly 50 years, the old wiring was well past its prime and the new harness is definitely needed as the covering was shredded and the wires were brittle. So after a good clean and scrub, a whole heap of sound deadener and the engine bay is already looking so much better. From this

Not looking so good

and you can see the covers all frayed and torn

To this

Much cleaner much simpler and much, much better. Thanks to Paul for the easy to follow instructions that means a novice like myself can put it all together.

It is not finished yet and tomorrow I plan on tackling the interior which may be more of a challenge if the first few glimpses are anything to go by but i am set and ready for the challenge.

More on Door Panels

Making the new door panels has been fairly straight forward with and I thought I might share how I have done it. The doors were in pretty bad shape with moisture, dirt and time taking their toll on the flimsy old fibre board card.

The interiors were virtually non-existent having been rotted away. So to put a temporary replacement into place, lightweight, cheap and expedient for the rally.

So I started by making sure that the rust in the interior was treated and prepped so that it would not get any worse, giving it a good coat of rust converter, a good zinc rich primer and etch primer etc. Making sure all the drain holes are well cleared so that it won’t fill with water and cause more problems in the future.

Making sure the panel fits properly and the clips are in the right place is probably the most tedious and frustrating but has to be done, again and again till it fits “just right”.

Once that is done several times, I then put a waterproof membrane over the door, in this case of sheet of heavy duty plastic  that was laying around the house , held in place with some race tape. This should stop moisture ruining the card and material in the future.

Then I use spray adhesive to attach some woolen backing material left over from my wife’s quilting experiments.

Give that a chance to dry, then attach the facing material

Trim it all to size and then stick it down making sure it all fits properly and doesn’t cause any creases, then it is just a matter of fitting it back onto the door.

Then fitting the classic Jaguar/Daimler walnut wood trim

Then Ta-Da a new door trim! Simple easy and quick steps to a better looking interior. I am keeping all the original trims so that I can have new, flash looking door trims made when the car becomes a normal car again in its post rally life.

 

 

 

One step forward…

Continuing on the interior I did some work on the doors, replacing the tatty, worn door trim that looks sad and definitely in need of some refurbishment, being held together with tape and good intentions

Thinking of how to make cheap and easy interior trim, I was lucky enough to have some old core flute boards and my ever resourceful wife found some cheap material at the post Christmas sales (only $2.10 a metre!). So with a little bit of ingenuity and a can of contact adhesive I managed to turn this

into this

then finally into something a little bit more respectable for the big green car

I plan on having the original door trims remade but that is not going to be for some time.

Unfortunately as the title suggests while carrying out the cutting and fitting for the passenger door I managed to find firstly a small hole, which after some poking and prodding turned into a rather large hole!

Some head scratching and soul searching stopped me from just filling it with bog and ignoring it but to fix it properly so I don’t become a “dreaded previous owner” and I would always know it was there. It turned out most of the bottom of the door was pin holed with rust.

So taking the door off to access the rusty bits, I cut them out, cut new metal to fit and used the new welder to fix the shiny new metal in place.

Now it looks a lot better but still not finished yet.

Unfortunately I have to return to work tomorrow but will try to get everything refitted and fixed up sooner rather than later.

 

It’s the little things…..

Strangely enough sometimes doing some small things suddenly makes a big difference. I discovered this today after doing some work on the interior, I decided to trial fit some new floor carpets. I bought some cheap, hard wearing carpets and using the deep, expensive but very old carpet as a template, cut the new pieces.

So it has suddenly gone from looking like this

Overall a little bit ratty, tired and worn

To this…

Looking pretty flash!

Well parts still look tired and ratty but the floor looks great!

I’ll wait till I get the wiring before fixing the carpets in place and  will look at doing some more interior work over the next few days to get that wonderful sense of accomplishment!