Winter Mods 2018 - 19

[Fury1630]

And now the 15 year old cam belt is in the bin & the new one on the car. Bit of an oops when I tried to start it the first time & the crank was one tooth out (DOH!) but soon sorted.

Just some cosmetics & some faffing to do now.

I want to strip the interior & cure the bubbling rust under the powder coat, Calibrate the rev-counter against the ECU & add a degree of camber at the back plus a few other bits. Looks like I might be out early next year .

[Fury1630]

I'm kind of moving away from the "barn-found '50s racer" theme the car's had up to now & moving on to a more "classic" sort of theme, so the plain black Megane door handles had to go & guess what - the Clio had handles with the same foot-print, chrome levers & a pair (Brand new in the Renault packet) were £8 delivered, so with the cut-out leather back off an old sofa I set to work:-
Drivers door not started yet-

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Passenger door finished apart from a little tidying

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I have enough to do the passenger door, dash, trim panels in front & behind the doors & maybe the tunnel top if nothing goes wrong.

The car will be taxed from the 1st Jan as I may have to move it at short notice, so I'll be out there again soon

[locost220]

Very nice.

[Fury1630]

There's a bit of a dash refresh going on. It is possible to get the dash out of the car, but it's not an easy thing, so with the recovering coming up I thought cutting the dash into three seemed like a good idea. I made the new centre section for the clocks & warning lights, clamped it to the dash & drilled the mounting holes, then cut the centre out of the dash (eek)

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New bit cut out ^^

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Cleaned up (I daren't say "polished") ^^

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That's where it goes ^^

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No going back now ^^

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It looks a bit garish at the moment, but I'm hoping the new dash covering will tone it down a bit.

There was also the problem of the Sat-Nav. I broke the XXL trying to modify it & as the maps were so old that as I got near the coast the voice said "here be dragons" I invested in a new(ish) TomTom 5100 which comes with a cradle dock which is quite neat. I thought "I'll get one for each car - 'til I saw the price, £35!!

Fast forward a couple of days while I wondered if the XXL's RAM mount could be adapted & I noticed a side ad for Halford's sale & an air-vent mount for a 5100 for £10 - which is much more like it. How I got one is a long tale I won't go into now, but eventually I had a mount that worked & was wondering how to butcher to fit. It works by having two rubberized prongs to fit over a grille bar & a large rotating disc which pulls them together, thus clamping the grille bar. I unscrewed it all the way & inside is an M5 thread that does the pulling

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I put some M5 studding in that, flattened off the face it clamps up to, drilled a hole in the dash, penny washer & nut on the other side & Bob is your uncle

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[DJ.]

Looks quite tidy already, i'll be intersted to see it in the new lighter covering

[Fury1630]

well, that went quite well.

I took the main part of the dash out, recovered it, put it back & did the other little bit on the driver's side, so apart from a couple of bits of trim it's all done.

I was wondering how to do the big bit, the leather wasn't big enough to do the whole area unless I had vertical seams every foot or so, after a while I had a flash of the bleedin' obvious & took a small section already folded for a seam, laid it on the biggest piece at a jaunty angle, superglued it, then sewed it on using the holes already in the small bit (I know what I mean), so it looks almost good. There's a matching angled seam on the driver's side. Down by the driver's knee was a black anodised switch panel for the rear fogs, screen heater & a USB socket. I tried to get the anodise off, I tried to put a chrome trim round it, in the end I just made a new one to match the dash centre section, it was quicker.

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[graham b]

Looking good....
But have you gone posh ..a bit

[Fury1630]

Looking good....
But have you gone posh ..a bit

Still got a bare aluminium transmission tunnel, so it's still 'ard.

[Rexholme]

Still got a bare aluminium transmission tunnel, so it's still 'ard.

I can help with that https://southernkitcars.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=10405

[Fury1630]

Today I raced home from the friends I'd been at for new year, taxed the Fury & headed out to meed my brother & my nephew at the Booklands new-years day run "about 1000 cars are expected" the website said, I set off, but at Stoke Cross (it's in Guildford, not Stoke) the engine faded & died at the lights, I opened the fuel cap & the rush of air confirmed what I thought - vacuum in the tank. I took the locking bit out of the filler & carried on, there were a bunch of TVRs & old Jags on the A3 & I turned off straight into traffic, meaning there must've been a three mile queue to get in, I turned to try going along the Seven Hills Road in case it was easier from the other direction & the engine died again.

Opening the filler had no effect, so I went under the back & wobbled the wires on the pump - it started & stopped a coupe of times, the the feed wire came away in my hand.

My brother happened along in the model A truck, but all attempts to find the other end of the live wire failed, so The Fury went home on a truck - it's first "proper" breakdown.

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Back home I unsticked the vent valve which was problem No. 1, the wiring took longer. The wire had come away at a spade terminal that must've been there since the car had a ticker pump & a crossflow, it was ty-rapped to a chassis rail 4" below the top of the tank & if I hadn't cut the access panel a while ago I would never have found it.

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So I've soldered a longer wire in & made it all nice.

(sigh)

Never did get into the show