In this blog you can follow the restoration of a D reg 27 year old Panther Kallista (meaning small and beautiful). Each part of the restoration will be covered with photographs and video's, anyone with a comment on how to improve the restoration or if in the area can come along and give advise.
A good day today I really enjoyed working on the engine, I do this for a living but its different when its at work and a fuel pump requires a crane to lift it and an injector has to be carried on your shoulder.
Also a lesson to be learn't for those out there who are somewhat reluctant to get your car serviced, strangely I was watching a you tube video I came across about not changing your oil regularly and guess what I found when I had a look at mine.
I started out this morning having to go and buy some more rotary wire brushes as I wore mine out yesterday and also payed a visit to the nut & bolt man at the flea market and stocked up on stainless nuts & bolts, got quite a collection now. I carried on cleaning the engine starting with the air inlet manifold and had this complete when I thought I'd get the rockers of and have a look inside, this is what I found.
The dreaded black sludge; I guess this car has had either no oil change ever or its been a long time ago as it only has 35,000 miles on it, maybe 10 15 years ago when the last owner was keen.
There is no way I would ever leave it like this so its back to my original plan of a full strip down and clean, it also leads me to wonder whether the last owner was diligent about the unleaded additive so I am going to remove a valve or two and check the seats. So where to start, rockers first so off they, came and got a good cleaning before putting safely away.
I stripped the first one and cleaned with white spirit and it came up nice in comparison the the other.
This one got the same treatment.
All clean
These were easy enough to strip and clean, I left the centre hold down in position and cleaned around as the Granada manual says that a groove is cut at the end and should face down for the oil ways, well there is no groove on mine. Maybe I have a later model, think I'll bin the Granada book and stick to the Capri, anyway I left the centre hold down in position so as not to lose the oil way position.
I next started on the heads working from the centre out I broke the torque on the head bolts and removed all of these, I then removed the air manifold bolts and nuts and was ready to lift. One problem that I had is that the engine stand is bolted to the bell housing holes, which is the only place it can go, unfortunately there are 3 clutch positioning pins that stick out of the fly wheel which prevent the engine from turning more than a few degrees either way as they hit the stand off. To remove the distributor I really should have have unit #1 at tdc but I can't turn the engine to get it there, the other problem I have is that the timing plate with the engine markings on is so badly rusted that there are no readings (just bought a used one from eBay) so it would be difficult to find where #1 tdc is. So I had to remove the distributor without it being in the correct position which I imagine will cause me all sorts of problems later on.
Once all the bolts were removed I took a large screwdriver to the corners of the heads and lightly levered until the seal was broken
The air manifold lifted straight off
The gasket was well stuck but a large knife slide around lifted it off.
Lots of sludge in the corners.
The heads came of next
On close inspection its not just black oil deposits but the waterways are also partially blocked and I bet the oil ways aren't much better.
So a lot of work ahead to get this mess cleaned up and a lot of learning, I shall buy a spring compressor tomorrow to check on the exhaust valves and see if there is any damage, I have a full gasket set already bought so no problem there. The main problem is getting the engine to turn, I may have to get the crane out again to take the weight while I fit spacers as I doubt I'll be able to remove the pins inserted in the flywheel but I'll give it ago.
Today been all about cleaning the engine and removing parts, I started at 0830 and finished at 1700 and I reckon there is still a day or 2 left.
I started with the oil pan, it was pretty thick down in the depth's but once the heavy was removed and a good spray with thinners soon had it all clean. They was also a fair amount of rust on the flange area which should not be there, I cleaned all of the rust from the flange with a wire wheel so it should seal well. I still need to remove the flange strength bar that runs under the flange and is kept in place with knock over tabs. I had already bought a set of upper and lower gaskets, but I can see by the quality of the one that's on that the ones I bought are not of sufficient quality to go back as the sump gasket is in 4 pieces as opposed to the 1 piece rubber that's fitted. I have seen the rubber one in the Burton's for around £25 plus p&p, I originally said no chance at that price, but I don't want to have to remove it again so I'll bite the bullet.
The sump pan went back on before I started cleaning as the inside's are bad enough and don't need any more dirt inside.
I think because of the state and the long time it been sitting in the gunk I may remove a couple of the bearing caps and check the shells as I remember on the tv program A Jag is reborn that the bearing were damaged by acids in the oil after sitting for a prolonged period.
I am very pleased with the engine stand and I now realise that there would have been now way of doing it without the stand although it is very hard to turn, I would have had a smear of grease on the turning part if I had of realised.
I started on one side and removed the exhaust manifold, I managed to remove 1 nut with just the impact wrench but the other 3 would not budge even with heat applied so I had to resort to a chisel to split the nuts, even then it took a lot of persuasion to get the manifold of its gaskets.
Once of I got stuck in with the rotary wire brushes.
This was the really bad oily side and it is coming up very nice, when this was done I turned the engine and repeated on the other side.
The removal of the viscous fan took a bit of a effort, the Haynes manual for the Granada had every fan in apart from this model but I found it in the Capri manual, this fan has the temp controller fitted and instead of 4 bolts at the front, it has a concealed nut at the back. Unfortunately it is very difficult to get at without the correct spanner which is 32mm or 11/4" and only 5mm thick, you can fit an adjustable by removing 2 of the pulley bolts but the spanner still won't fit as the remaining 2 bolts won't let it slide in as the gap is to small. So I took my large adjustable to the grinder and made it fit, a couple of good whacks, remembering its a left hand thread and off it came.
With the fan off I was able to clean up the front of the engine.
The water pump connection was removed and the thermostat housing, this was in a pretty bad state.
Somehow I don't thing this will have worked to its optimum performance, I need to look at the pump next and see what condition this is in, they are plenty of these available so no problem sourcing one.
Plenty to carry on with in the morning, especially the 3 sheared bolts that need drilling & tapping and who knows what else.
Today was pretty momentous as far as the strip down is concerned as it was engine out day.
It came out quite easy, due mostly to all my prep work yesterday i had only left 2 nuts to remove. The hardest part was the building of the crane, this was originally from a garage before the paint shop got it and its a pretty heavy bit of work.
The strop I had was a tie down strap around 20ft long so I had to knot it to get the correct length, not something that's allowed on board ship. But no one was looking.
I started to lift with a central pull, the strop was through the exhaust manifolds but the engine started to drop back, so I used the jack to lift the back of the engine and fitted a second strap around the fly wheel.
It took a bit of shaking to free the rubber mounts, but once loose it was just a matter of guiding the engine clear of obstacles while pumping the handle.
Once the engine was clear I pushed the car back until well out of the way of any accidents.
I have been waiting for this moment since the day I opened the bonnet.
Once free I could really get a good look at the engine and see just how bad and where the leaks are, and it looks like the rocker covers may have been to blame all along.
Now time to strip it, I removed the mounts first and put these in the powder coating box, the clutch came next.
This was pretty simple, just a half dozen bolts and the pressure plate dropped of (literally)
I still had one of the hoses attached from the water pump and this is what greeted me
I hope the ally parts clean up as I have been searching on eBay and a thermostatic housing is on for £96 plus £8 postage, so once they are of a lot of careful cleaning work ahead of me.
The last thing I had time for was the removal of the oil pan,removing this has created a lot more work as 3 of the bolts have sheared, strangely none sheared where the oil leaks are, wonder why.
Don't know why I was surprised with what I found in the sump, although this is the first one I have had off so it may be normal, somehow I doubt it though. Just thick black gunk.
The inside of the crank case needs a good clean as well.
I was just going to rest the edges of the block on wooden blocks until I saw the condition inside so I had a need of an engine stand were I can spin the engine. My boss Richard was going to show me how to strip and re-build the engine but now that I have lowered my ambitions I saw no reason to drag Richard down here just to help clean the engine. He has an engine stand he was going to lend me but as he is building a mini for his son and may need his, so I am now the owner of a lovely red Machine mart stand.
Before bolting it on I got out the wire brush and cleaned up the fly wheel and plate gearbox mount gasket as the stand bolts onto the gearbox mount.
I am pleased with progress so far, and will carry on with the strip down tomorrow.
After dropping Lynne's car of at the paint shop I got a lift home from Tony the boss who is going to do the re-spray on my car and he wanted to have a look, I am pleased to say he is quite looking forward to doing the job. He is already suggesting paint and say's Jaguar do a lovely plum colour with flecks in it and is considering designs.
My friend came round after to help turn the car and this went without a hitch, I am pleased to say that the steering which was one of the MOT failures performed great, as if it was powered, I even gave the car its first wash and the garage floor as well.
While Ben was here I roped him into helping with the bonnet, only 2 bolts each side and 1 in the stay, which is also looking a little worse for wear. I have seen these on a site for around £15 maybe car solutions, I'll check.
Now it was time for the engine;
I have borrowed the lifting gear from Tony who dropped it of when he delivered Lynne's car and a proper heavy one it is to.
I started by photographing and videoing all around the engine then labelling everything as my dread is not having a clue where bits go when re-building, so it was hoses and electrical connections first. Its not before time either that the hoses are being changed as the fuel pipes especially are quite bad, I would imagine that they were flexible once but now its as if a steel tube was inside the rubber. The inside of the water hoses are quite bad also although these are full of a white oxide so the pump will have to come off and either be replaced or see if it cleanable.
The alternator and bracket was next, this to was seized and no way would it move to tension the belt without a crow bar on it, I have had to leave the bracket in place as the torx bolt attaching it to the engine is seized solid. I have it soaking in WD40 overnight but even with the impact gun it would not budge.
I'll have another go when the engine is out as the bracket is for powder coating.
The next major part to remove was the carburetor, lots of connections on this to remove so as well as the photos and video I did a drawing of each connection.
The first part was the throttle control linkage and bracket, only 2 bolts hold this on and 1 clip to the carb.
On having a good look at the linkage I can see basically how to detach the wire and mechanism from the frame as again this needs to be powder coated, I shall spend a bit more time having a good look and a read of the manual before I attempt it.
Only 4 nuts holding the carb down and these came of without a problem and I carefully laid the bits down as they came off, I did not realise how many plates and gaskets were under the carb, somehow I thought it was just bolted down.
There are a total of 7 parts here, gaskets plates a hose and the carb, I have been making enquiries about the carb; is it Solex or Pierburg. Every search comes up with the same carb, and the answer (i think) is that they are one and the same animal. The outside looks stained and dirty but looking inside from underneath it is pretty spotless, so a good clean and polish and a good blow with compressed air on the spring should clean it up. I now need to track down the gasket set for re-fitting.
The inside of the air intake manifold is also spotless and to keep it this way I have plugged the holes and shall make a cover to go over the top for when the dirt is flying. You can see the white oxide on the thermostat housing, this is also inside the pipework, the lower pipe was mostly plugged with the stuff.
I have undone what bolts I can on the engine mounts and hope its enough to lift, if not I shall undo the bolts holding the brackets to the engine, other than that the engine is ready to lift, but that's a job for tomorrow.
Ever woke up in the middle of the night knowing there was something you forgot to do and not quite knowing what it is. When I got up it dawned on me that I hadn't fed the wiring thru for the sender unit when I fitted the tank yesterday, so first job this morning was to check
and my dream came true. There was the wire still in the filler hole where I had tucked it away to prevent it falling down, easy you would think, just feed a bit of wire thru, tape the ends on and pull it, na; I had to drop the tank to make room which meant removing the brackets again then feeding the wire thru.
I fitted the sender yesterday but when I tried to fit the rubber gasket it had shrunk quite a fair bit, I have stocked up on gasket material so I made a new one and it fit in nicely.
Once the petrol tank was back in position I masked off the rest of the area and set up the Tetra spray gun, I had already bought a new tin and just had to heat it up in boiling water for ten minutes, the result is quite impressive.
Hell it comes out so good I may have the whole car done in Tetra Shutz black although it goes a little dull when dry.
When buying the Tetra I also stocked up on oils and brake fluid, I still had to finish filling the diff so I bought another liter of Comma gear oil and topped it of till it came out off the fill hole. I have also bought 2 Lt of semi synthetic gearbox oil, I have drained the gearbox and its just sitting there dry inside, I am a bit worried about moisture getting in so I'll fill it tomorrow and give it a turn by hand every now and then to coat what gears I can in oil.
My main task today was to get the car on its wheels so it can be turned around, 2 jobs to accomplish first.
The engine was being supported by a axle stand which had to go, so I strapped the engine to the inner frame and tightened up hard.
I then jacked up the engine to release the stand and it held quite well.
Next was the brakes, although the handbrake works independently of the hydraulics I still wanted it all up and running while the wheels were of to save future wheel removal. I still have not found the nuts to secure the brake pipe to the new brackets or the old brackets either, but to future proof and to save losing the new bracket I have fitted it. When I eventually get nuts I shall just clamp the brake pipe and fit it.
I have a auto brake bleeder that works of my compressor and make single handed bleeding a doddle.
I started at the rear drivers using DOT 4 and sucked it through until the bubbles started to go, I then moved to each side of the front doing the same topping up the reservoir as it dropped and worked my way around to the rear again. To test the brakes I jammed a piece of wood under the steering wheel holding down the brake pedal then went round each wheel hub trying to turn it. All tight and would not turn.
Nice and simple now just 4 wheels to bolt on and I was ready to lower, it was at this point that I remembered doing the suspension on my MX5 and that I had left the bolts slack until it was down on its wheels, I know this is the procedure for void bushes but was not willing to take any chances with my poly's. So back under the car and everything got slackened off.
I had forgotten just how high I had the car jacked up and had to lower it in stages but eventually I had it on the garage floor, now the difficult bit of getting back under the car and tightening all the bolts again, this is one low sitting car. Once tight all round I moved onto the tie rods, the front subframe had to be jacked up a little and the 2 bolts slackened off to center the rod and bushes then tightened until the bushes where held in the small sockets for them although one of mine was mostly rusted away it still tightened Ok.
Now it is back on its wheels I can see that my efforts the other day trying to straighten the steering wheel was in vain as it is still out of alignment so another job on the list.
I have given a friend a call and he is coming round tomorrow morning before college to help me push the car around so the engine faces into the garage, when its out of the garage I can get the pressure washer out as both the car and the garage floor / walls are desperate for a clean, you can also see the oil under the car from not tightening the drain plug hard, this will have to be gunked.
So now that the suspension and underside are all finished/ish its time to move onto stage 2, the engine.
I have, after discussion's watered down my engine re-build plans and the reason is the reason I sought and bought a low millage car. It just don't need it
So the plan is still to remove the engine as it needs the oil leak found and sorted, the oil pan and removable parts taken off for powder coating or painting.
The heads will remain on and they will stay un-leaded.
The rest of the engine block will get the same treatment as the gearbox, a lot of hard cleaning work with wire brushes and elbow grease and painted with engine enamel.
The carburetor will just be cleaned up and re-fitted, if and when it don't work then its byby Solex hello Webber.
New plugs and leads
New hoses.
New K&N round intake
So new challenges and plenty of mistakes to make ahead of me.
Well a bit of a busy weekend and most of it based around these Mustang heads I have bought.
There are 2 different points of view on the heads.
On the one hand it was a pretty big mistake and on the other they are the best things for this engine out there.
Both camps have good and valid arguments and in the end I have gone with the person who has given me sound advise since day one and the heads have gone.
The person who sold them say's they will fit perfectly and that in the 80's these heads from the Mk2 Mustang were worth more than their weight in gold and that fights had broken out over them; and the people who have just been round to pick them up seem to be of the same mind.
The other camp say that I would have big problems with them and the tuning would be a nightmare and quite possibly I may need American cams to suit.
The person who sold them is adamant that all cams and everything else will match perfectly.
Obviously I would need new inlet & exhaust gasket of which I sourced in 2 minutes and these are of the shelf stock, the big problem comes with the carb and this is a problem. I have been through the web tracking down the carb which I now believe is a Motorcraft 2150-2v or possibly a Holly 5200 of which the USA eBay site is teeming with, but the big crunch is my ability to do the job.
So, as I have said before this is all new to me and you are reading the chronicles of a beginner, although I am learning each time I put a spanner to the car. At the moment I have an engine that runs with the correct carb and that the future may be a lot easier if it stays that way. So I decided yesterday morning to re-list the heads on eBay, within 30mins I had 2 watchers 5 hours later 7 and 6 hours later they were sold; basically for what I paid for them, Ok I lost £30 mostly the cost I paid for delivery but I'll put that down to a very steep learning curve.
The 2 guys who bought the heads live local, around 10ml away in Washington and came cash in hand this lunchtime, only in they early 20's and have already restored a 66 Beetle, a Sierra XR4 and are now restoring a Mk3 Cortina fitting a 2.8 Cologne Injected engine and are converting that to a carb. They are having Specialist engines re-build the engine and have already contacted them about the suitability of these heads and have the thumbs up that they are good, so it looks like they will be skimmed and ported and made new again. Best of luck, best thing is they don't have a garage and do all this at the side of a house. Brrr
With all this going on I have still managed to get some work done and the good news of the weekend is that the Battle of the Bush is over. Floflex delivered on Friday, it was Lynne's day off but luckily I managed to be in for the delivery. Now that I know the pitfalls of bush alteration it went without a hitch and fit perfectly so all finished.
After this came the fitting of the fuel tank, this really is a 2 handed job but with the use of my jack I managed to get it into position only to find that I could not get the inside brackets to bolt on as the holes didn't line up. I remember when I removed the tank that both brackets were a bit twisted and very tight against the tank so out came the junior hacksaw and drill and I slotted the holes, after that it went straight in.
After it was in I painted it with a coat of Tetra shutz, I didn't want to spray it on in case it went everywhere but on looking at the photo I think tomorrow I shall mask up and the spray gun will be out, I'll make sure I get the bits I missed plus the spotted spray pattern looks a whole lot better.
So basically that is the underside all finished, I've stripped everything apart, sanded, rust proofed, painted and Tetra Shutzed the underside, sent what parts I could to be powder coated, sandblasted and sprayed what couldn't, had polybushes made and re-modeled those that were close but not fitting. Sourced and fitted new dampers, re-built the brakes, cleaned and painted the fuel tank and put it all back together again. It took a little longer than anticipated, mostly because of the bush problem but that's all part of the fun.
The filler connection was looking a bit rusty and I have been trying to figure out how to remove it for a while now, I seem to remember reading that it was from the Vauxhall Viva (maybe wrong).
Anyway I could not see how to get it out without resorting to a hammer which I certainly didn't want to do so I rotary wirebrushed the rust and got most of it off, I then painted it with rust converter as there was still some rust on the inside edges that I could not reach and when that dried I masked it off.
This is a coat of silver metal paint, it doesn't look to great but once the car is sprayed the rough edges will be cleaned up.
Hopefully tomorrow is the day it goes back on its wheels, to do this I need to get the brakes all working, I have bought and was going to re-fill with Silicone brake fluid but after taking some advise and doing a lot more research I have realised that this could create some bad braking problems.
When converting to silicone all contamination with dot 4 must be removed as when combined with silicone forms a sludge that can block things up. I was hoping to just flush through a couple of times but that's not enough, after my research I have found that every damn thing needs replacing, master cylinder & pipework and calipers (mine have been re-built). Seeing as these are all new from the last owner I am going to put the silicone on ebay and have a trip to Halfords.
Got back to the freezing weather last night and a bit of a shock to the system after being sheltered in an engine room for 2 1/2 weeks and not seeing the sun or snow except from a cctv camera. Brrrr!
Been busy in my off watch time and have been patrolling eBay with some success, I have managed to get hold of most of the parts I needed all bar the nuts for the brake hoses, guess I'll have to do a more of a thorough search of the garage as I am not sure of the size they are. I have been reliably informed that they are metric but must be of a very fine thread as my set of dies are 1.5 pitch and are huge in comparison. The flea market is on tomorrow so I am going to search the tool stands and stock up on all imperial taps and dies I can find.
What did I manage to find.
Well I down marketed the E clips for the handbrake to steel instead of stainless, I found a pack of 20 mixed for around £2.50p I shall protect it with a smear of silicon grease and if it rusts I have 3 more.
The gearbox mount was easy to source once I realised that Ford used the same mount on most every car fitted with the type 9 gearbox and probably a few others, so you just have to search for a Capri, Mk4 Cortina, Mk2 Granada and even I believe; a Transit van.
Gearbox mount
Here you can compare them both, lots of damage to the old one, the new one is not an original Ford, which is hardly surprising as they stopped making them years ago but still looks good quality.
You can see just how much damage has been done to this one considering it has only done 35,000 miles its ripped at the top and split down past the center hole. It is an easy item to change and at only £17.50 including postage it may be worth getting your hands dirty and checking out yours.
The other bits I have been after for a few months are Ally rocker covers, the original ones just don't do it for me and as I am going to fit a round K&N filter it just would not look right, so seeing as how I have worked an extra 5 weeks overtime since April last year to pay for these bits I thought I would splash out, I have seen these go for upwards of £160 so £130 for the pair was about average.
Rocker covers
I haven't decided on what colour to have the engine powder coated but have seen a set of rocker covers on the front page of http://www.peintureenpoudrepb.com/ that have been done the same colour as I plan for my paint job, so maybe plum with the Ford logo and bars polished natural.
The next and most surprising purchase was defiantly not what I was expecting to buy and blew my budget for the rest of the month, but seeing as how I planned to spend the money doing what this item comes already done I thought it would be well worth it.
What am I blathering about; in 1973 Ford came out with the Mk 2 Mustang and one of the optional extras was a 2.8 Cologne V6 engine, in total over a 4 year period over 1 million Mk2 Mustangs of various models where produced and within these million a good few thousand must have been fitted with the V6 Cologne engine option and maybe only a few hundred left in the world.
These Ford Cologne V6 being for the American market did not have the inconveniences of the European models and so were produced with hardened seats for unleaded fuel and even more importantly with the 6 exhaust ports instead of the siamesed exhaust ports of the european version.
On sale on eBay was the heads the matching inlet manifold and the matching exhausts manifolds (headers). You can see from the photos that the seperate items came from different engines or someone had a strange colour scheme but they all match up.
I bought these from a business called Tickover Retro Ford Parts and this was their write up on eBay.
Here we have a pair of Ford 2.8 V6 Cologne heads with a difference. These are the American Ford Mustang spec units, and as such have the full 6 port arrangement for the exhausts. This pattern was copied by a well known tuning company in the 80's and 90s in an effort to emulate the vastly superior flow characteristics these have over the European versions with the lame siamesed setup. Well these are the proper Ford ones, not a set that has been cut open and extra material welded in! Other advantage being that these come factory fitted with hardened seats so that can run properly on unleaded fuels. We have included the matching inlet manifold and exhaust manifolds, in this auction, so all the ports will line up correctly. These parts will fit onto any 2.8 or 2.8i Cologne V6 engine and work correctly with the existing camshaft and other hardware.
I have always planned to have my heads converted to un-leaded fuel and have searched out 2 firms in the North East that can do this with a price I believe of around £400, so it was a no brainer I get the unleaded conversion and a better exhaust flow and all for £313 plus £25 delivery. I am hoping to get the money together for stainless side exhaust so a lot of the weight (55Kg) will disappear with stainless piped headers.
Mustang Mk2 heads
No way am I put of by a bit of rust and different paint jobs, I have had a good look and these will be great with a bit of work.
This is what its all about, the 3 port exhaust.
3 port exhaust
One of the studs looks a little bent, not a problem.
Inlet manifold
Exhaust manifold
So as you can see they show their age, I have already ordered a twizle stick and lapping paste just need a spring compressor. I shall remove the valves and get a little blasting done and see what they come up like, once the valves are lapped in and have had a smoke test or petrol test I shall be able to see if the valves need changing but if ok they will stay. I shall probably have the heads skimmed just in case of any warping over the years, but judging by the weight of these things it would take a dip in a volcano to warp them.
So a productive time and hopefully there will just fall on and work fine.
I have also managed to get a bit of work done today, the main job was to drop the axle to fit the upper arm on the nearside, I was hoping the new bushes I ordered from Floflex would come today and finish both sides but no such luck. Lynne has took Friday of and wants me to take her somewhere for the day which means missing the delivery, so unless I sweet talk her out of it I may have to wait till Monday for an alternate delivery date. So to get things moving along I swapped the upper arms over, I had fitted the offside arm last time home and all it took to fit to the nearside was to drop the lower arm and undo the damper. I just pulled the axle and the arm that was trapped dropped into place.
I had to do this as the upper arm would not fit in position as the Panhard rod brackets prevented it, I have made a little video to explain the problem.
I changed over the already sized bushes and the arm just slipped in nicely
Upper arm fitted
The gearbox mount was an easy job, just bolting to the cross member, you can see straight away the reason for its failure. If you look at the photo you will see that each corner is a lovely little water trap, as no drainage has been incorporated. I have painted the underside with tetra shutze before bolting it on and filling the four corners with the tetra. I can't stop the water sitting in but I can slow down the rot.
I also re-fitted the hand brake bar which I had removed to paint the axle, the e clip just pushed into position, next came the brake pipe work which I also removed for the painting.
If you remember a few months ago I fitted the front sub-frame and got the steering out a few degrees and I hate driving a car with an un-centered wheel, I was going to wait until I was ready to fit the new wheel and try to re-align it with the boss. I decided not to wait as it may not have worked and I will have had the paint done by then so I thought I'd have a go. I had to center the front wheel hubs as best I could by eye then unbolt the track rod end on the steering side, out came the bolts holding the steering rack and I took out the linkage bolt from the uv joint and tapped it off. I centered the steering wheel and refitted the uv coupling, re-fitted the track rod end and checked the center. I was happy with the first fit so bolted everything tight again.
One other job that needed doing to progress was the testing of the petrol tank sender unit, this is a resistance test. As the float rises and falls the arm makes contact with a coil, the movement across the coil changes the resistance in the field and is measurable. This test measures the resistance in Ohms, using a multimeter set to 20k Ohms, connect the red lead to the spade connection and the black lead to an earth point, then simply move the arm up and down slowly and you should get a reading of zero at empty up to 20 at full. I only got 19 which doesn't really matter as with the price of petrol in this country I won't be able to afford a full tank.
I have lots of jobs planned for the next 2 weeks and hopefully a moving car.
