Cardinal Wolseley

Southend Seafront Show today.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Ha. I win today.

Shoreditch obviously.

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

After a few days of CANNOT BE ARSED, I managed to rediscover my mojo for this one. 
 
Yesterday, I fully plumbed in the cooling system, and all initially seemed well. However, it was behaving like the 'stat wasn't opening. Rad stayed cold, until I turned the engine off. Then it got toasty.
 
Whipped the stat out this morning, and it was all fine then. Tested the stat, checked out, refitted it trying extra hard to ensure no airlocks. Had 'help.'

 
Seems to be ok. Gauge was high, about three-quarters, but the infra-red thermometer showed no scary readings. Rad was still oddly cool - 30-40 degrees, but nonetheless, it didn't seem like it wanted to overheat, so maybe that'll do.
 
I also plumbed in the fuel tank (temporarily, I need to add an inline filter) and all seems fine there. Sloshed ten litres in, which proved that the fuel gauge isn't accurate either. I also have no indicator warning light and I have an oil pressure gauge, but can't see where that plugs into the engine. I've found a likely looking wotsit in the engine bay.
 
But, it's been good fun to bomb up and down the driveway, enjoying the ridiculous turning circle. 
 
Jobs to do:
Bonnet hinge repair/bodge, then refit nose panel.
Fuel filter
Air filter (found the screws today)
Tidy up wiring (yeah, like that'll ever happen)
Ignition timing
Get all indicators working.
Attach exhaust properly (I think a strap needs to be hooked up)
Check front suspension (feels like something is a little loose).
Maybe actually pull the drums off for a look at the brakes.
Replace windscreen, with new seal
Re-attach door mirrors. Might need riv-nuts or something for that.
 
Blimey. That list seems reasonably short!

While superficially ok, this evening news van is a complete lash up. A phail this one! Not a fantastic model to work with.
 

"Mega rare barn find,i know what its worth, better than money in the bank, £17,900 if it don't sell i won't sell it"

 
Happily accept the death threats this is going to get me, was a mint low mileage 2.8 aswell

 
Worlds smallest polos,( 1:87 i think) wasn't red as it looked in the pics.

 
Something else i like other than shite cars

It was done by my mate Tony Cooper, he also resprayed a Schabak Fiesta for me, and did my Oldford Cortina model which is going up for auction in aid of the local hospice very soon.
 

 

Little white van. What would Billy Cavcraft say?
 

 
 
 

Right, time for an update!  I've have been busy working on the car as usual but much of it has been very repetitive boring work.  I've also missed out on a few weekends due to the bloody customers taking up space.  Who do they think they are!
 
Right now the car looks like this.  I've done quite a bit of paint prep to it but as I'm very inexperienced in doing it I've booked the car in with the painters to finish off some of the more challenging areas.  Once complete I will try to paint it myself but again I'm very much prepared to hand over to the painter if I get stuck.
 

 
It's exciting times so I've gone through all my spares that came with the car to establish if I'm missing anything seriously important.  It's also given me a chance to organise the parts ready for the reassembly process.  I found some really nice bits I didn't even know I had like these genuine S lamps which go for stupid amounts of money on eBay.
 

 
Work has also been very busy.  We finished the Austin 16 which went home just after Christmas.  The Mexico is painted and part way through reassembly with me along with the 205 GTi.  The bastard Rover P5 has pushed me right to the ragged edge by constantly malfunctioning and leaking.  I've spent a serious amount of time under that thing.  It's going to Spain so I'm not letting it leave until I'm sure its going to behave itself for the owner.  Various rot boxes have turned up so there’s been plenty of stripping and fabricating going on and the painters are turning out shells faster than I can build them, all good fun.
 

 
I'm making a start on the mechanics for the Granada so updates will be more regular.  Once the rebuild begins I hope to make some videos to accompany the updates.  Once it’s painted you'll be surprised how quickly it'll move on.
 
Cheers for now

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

My near neighbours 1954 A30 has made its first appearance of the season. What a lovely old thing it is.
 

Some West London spots

This made me smile:
 

 
Is the Commer a Jennings conversion?

Went on an Easter egg hunt in my dad's little village earlier, and saw some spots!
 

 

 
The 405 looked lovely!

Morris Ital spotted today. A very tidy one at that.

Here is something a bit special, a Mercedes Benz 450SEL Estate.
 
Here is my rubbish photo:
 

 
And some library pictures from the web:
 

 

 
I had a quick chat with the owner, it is a Crayford conversion using the arse end of a Ford Granada. He has put quite a bit of work into it to get it back on the road, but it is majority original.
 
Not the sort of thing you would expect to find on a quiet residential street in Nowra, I was only there to use the post box!

The Fiat is a recent arrival up the road from me, it means they have to park their Daf 33 on the street. They ought to be on here, really.
 

Some dull old rubbish by comparison, I shouldn't like that Ferrari replica half as much as I do..
This hasn't moved in a long time.

Ditto. There were four of these and a 100E but the guy seems to be cutting down.

Nice day to give the Escort some love.

Now I know this is a shit photo so you'll just have to believe me that this is a Lagonda 3-litre. It's not evident here but it's sitting nose-up so I suspect it's been engine-bummed for an Aston of some sort leaving essentially a worthless decaying carcass. Call me a cynic if you want but I reckon the next time this moves it'll be Pinto or Cologne-powered.

And to finish, I don't really like convertibles or white cars in general. But it's a fine example of how slotmags make many things better.

Seen today outside Greggs, very nice, unrestored low mileage example.

Remember back when I said that I only collected 1/43 scale things, plus the odd foray into 1/64s?
 
Well, apparently that did used to be a thing but seemingly not any more, as I descend more into old toy hoarder man, rather than 1/43 connoisseur*.
 
 
Trawling Trademe one evening, this popped up:
 

 
It's a Greenlight 1:18 scale rendition of an Impala that features in a hitherto unbeknown (to me) hit TV show, called Supernatural. I thought the dark moody shot suited the subject quite well, due to the, erm, supernatural element of the series. Plus it also helped reduce a load of reflection from living room furniture, which was pinging off that shiny black paint job. You don't seem to get such issues with smaller stuff! 
 
 

 
I must admit, I was rather looking forward to picking this up and marvelling at the sheer weight and scale of it, as I haven't bought a 1:18 since I owned a few Maisto models bought from Tesco back in the mid-90's. Sadly, this one has no opening features at all! So really, it's more of a highly detailed Tonka than the stuff I was buying for £12.99 or thereabouts 25 years back.
 
That said, this one came in a faded and slightly careworn box and has an A pillar search light that needs gluing back on but I think it's OK value for the £10 I paid. I'll no doubt try and hawk it off to my favourite toy shop for store credit, if they're at all interested.