7th August 2010-The Differential's out! Again!!!!!!

Once again the Rally car finds itself with its back end in the air and its vital parts missing! As someone pointed out on the Club Triumph forum recently......'OMG! Its only 60 days to go for the RBRR!'

The RBRR is the 'Round Britain Reliability Run' for Club Triumph being held on the first weekend in October 2010. It's an endurance run where we have to cover 2000 miles in a weekend. We have to average at least 40mph non-stop for 48 hours to cover the mileage required. Sleep deprivation, snacks, high energy drinks and a reliable car is the order of the day!

The fact that there's only '60 days' to go (56 at time of writing) has thrown everyone into sheer panic as 60 days translated into the 1 day every weekend that most people have to work on their cars, is not a lot!

With this in mind, I decided to remove the diff on the rally car to try and cure the leak. Diff removal on any car is never a pleasant task on any car and normally results in lumps of dirt, grease and dust getting in my hair, on on my clothes, and on my nerves! The leak seemed to be coming from where the diff joins the nose cone. This is where the oil seal is situated, so this would be a prime suspect. A new oil seal was purchased from Triumph specialist Chris Witor and fitted with the job of fitting the diff back in the car shortly after. (Never an easy job on your own and it never fails to produce fair amount of grunting and cussing!)

I also need to replace the seal on the oil filter adapter as this has decided to leak as well. (Only my cars make the decision to leak from both ends at the same time!) So as soon as I have cured this issue, I can test drive the beast and make sure I am leak free! 

I've also been trying to cure my ongoing overdrive problems on my brown estate. (Should the Rally car not be ready  for the RBRR or suffer any additional problems, the estate will be the back up vehicle) We've cured the switch problems, but still seem to have the problem of the overdrive not engaging fully. I now suspect we have a pressure fault, which means removal of the overdrive unit. To be continued.......

A day at the Seaside!!

Sunday 25th July 2010 saw a rare day away from working on Triumphs when I was asked to navigate in a 'London to Southend' Classic car run. The car I was to navigate in was a 1972 Ford Consul GT owned by my good friend Andy. (The car was owned by me until a few years ago, so I know it well)

The day started off at Fairlop waters near Hainault at around 9am, where we proceeded to take all of the 'scenic' roads up to the half way point at Basildon. Once there there we were provided parking in the town square where everyone was free to do as they pleased for an hour or so. We decided to go for a McDonalds breakfast and steal some crayons from the children's play area as being the top class navigator that I am, I'd forgotten to bring any pens or pencils! (or maps!)

The second part of the run took us once again through the back routes of Billericay, Hanningfield, Gt Wakering, and finally Southend.

Arrival at Southend found us being led into a closed off section of the car park and main road at Westcliffe where the cars parked up and occupants enjoyed a stroll along the sea front. There was also a few stalls and a DJ as well to keep the crowds entertained.

The weather was beautiful and it was a good day out with a nice relaxed atmosphere, some lovely cars and good company. I'm looking forward to doing it again next year. Although hopefully in a Triumph!     

Wobbly Pedals!!!

Since buying the brown estate I've had to put to put up with 'wobbly pedal syndrome'. I had the same thing with the Mk1 estate I used to own too. It tends to happen when people convert automatic cars to  manual and rather than change the whole pedal box, just fit manual pedals to the existing auto one. The problem being there is a difference in size on the auto & manual brake pedals where they hang from the bar that connects them to the pedal box. The manual pedals therefore need to have metal bushes fitted to take up the slack. without these bushes fitted, the pedals have room to move about and feel decidedly 'wobbly'.

So, seeing as there was nothing on TV and I was bored sh*tless on this particular Saturday night, I decided to head out into the garage and crack on with the job. Its a reasonably easy job, but an awkward one seeing as it requires lying across the passenger and drivers seat to get at the bolts for the pedal box. I removed the steering wheel for better access and also found myself having to remove the speedo cable and a heater hose to make life easier. Two hours later the job was done and the car no longer feels like the pedals are going to fall off every time you brake or dip the clutch! Success!  

Pedal box removed and dismantled

The four metal bushes that were required.

Repairs to overdrive gearbox!

I've had an overdrive issue lately with the Brown estate. The overdrive works fine when cold, but wont kick in when the car's warmed up.

A few people suggested it could be the valves and filter in the overdrive sump clogged up, so I removed them and cleaned them all out. I also managed to destroy the gasket while I was taking off the sump so I need to order one of these on Monday. I also robbed a solenoid switch off of another gearbox I had laying around as I strongly suspect this could be the issue as well.

I'm now considering using this car for the Round Britain run in October instead of the rally car, (More room to sleep in the back of it!) so I need to get all of the outstanding issues sorted.

Other jobs consist of: Changing the pedal box, (It was converted from an auto set up to manual, but they didn't use spacer bushes, so the pedals are wobbly!) fixing the handbrake which is non-existent on the off side, finding out where the 'knock' is coming from on the offside front whenever we hit a pot hole or bump up a kerb, and maybe fit power steering. 2000 miles in a weekend with no power steering is just not funny!

Club Triumph Autosolo

Sunday 18th July 2010 started with a 5am alarm call ready to leave Essex for 6am. We arrived at Bovingdon Airfield at around 7.15am and started preparing the car for scruntineering.
With that out of the way we did our final checks and preparations and the autotest started at 9am.

My Rally co-driver & navigator Dave Saunders was using my car for this event too, so the car wasn't going to get a chance to cool down much!   

Bearing in mind that this car is still fitted with a bog standard 2 litre engine and has only had a strut brace, anti-roll bar and lowered springs fitted, it was coping quite well. At the half way stage I was in joint first place with a Triumph 2000 Mk1 with a fast engine and a well 'set up' suspension. Dave was struggling a bit at first it has to be said, but then Dave doesn't know the car as well as me, plus I think he was being a bit conservative with it not being his car.

As the day progressed we both got a bit sleeker and faster and Dave got his times down from 1 minute 25 seconds on the first run down to 1.04 on his last, while I managed to get from 1.08 down to 60 seconds point 58 on my last run.  

We both enjoyed the day a great deal and will be definitely be entering again next year. Our overall results were 4th in class for Dave and 2nd in class for me.

More progress made!

Saturday 11th July 2010. One of the hottest days of the year so far and this was my view of it for most of the day.

I was underneath my Green Mk2 estate refitting the exhaust, propshaft, clutch slave cylinder, and also discovering the differential had decided to relieve itself of its oil all over the back part of the garage floor! I have no idea why as it was fine when it was reversed into the garage the week after Easter and hasn't turned a wheel in anger since!

I also discovered that the ignition wiring has failed somewhere along the loom and the indicators have appeared to go on strike action! Whats wrong with this bloody car??? Does it not want to go back on the road??  Anyway, I had now run out of time with this car as I had to get on with a few other small jobs to get the rally car finished and ready for the club Triumph Autosolo at Bovingdon next Sunday.

The car will be driven round a layout of traffic cones in the fastest possible time, so another set of wheels & tyres have been prepared. Because of the amount of wheel spinning that'll be going on, the tyres will be shredded by the end of the day, so it's best to take another set just to use for the autosolo, then change back onto good tyres for the drive home! Of course this also means taking a trolley jack, wheel brace and in my case, another set of wheels nuts as the two sets of wheels I'm using are totally different.

Anything loose inside the car also needs to be secured or removed due to the speed the car will be flying round the course. After all, we don't want to be hit in the head by a flying fire extinguisher do we? Looking at the entry list on the website there seems to be 55 entrants!

Some work done at last!

After weeks of doing absolutely nothing due to losing motivation, I finally booted myself up the arse and made myself get out in the garden and work on the rally car.

My co-driver and I are entered in the Club Triumph Autosolo event at Bovindon airfield on July 18th. The event will consist of thrashing the car round a load of traffic cones in the quickest time, so a small suspension upgrade was called for.

Early Mk2 saloons such as mine weren't fitted with an anti-roll bar. So, with the parts raided from 'Ugly Pig' (Now scrapped) I set about fitting them. To fit the anti-roll bar, the front cross member has to be changed too and the link arms that bolt through the chassis. It was a pretty straight forward job with nothing going wrong, (Unusual) nothing breaking, (even more unusual) and completed in record time. (Bloody unheard of!)

I already have two other cars in the garage, so I had to do the rally car outside. The timing was pretty good really, because just after I had finished the job and put the front wheels back on...it started persistently raining!

All I need to do now is find some motivation to fix the two in the garage!!!!!!