Sold 1981 Austin Princess - [expletives removed]

[PhilA]

You're having some of the fun* I was with the Renault.

 

If it's made from plastic, it'll be brittle and break these days.

If it were made from metal, it'll have lots of corrodey holes in.

 

I guess we could shoot for requesting the parts made in ceramic or something

 

 

--Phil

[KruJoe]

Don't bin that washer bottle just yet. I once did this to a Rover radiator:



Find a dis-used wheel rim, and wiggle out one of these, lube will help:



Widen out the hole in the bottle to the same size as the one in the rim (I used a soldering iron), and pull the valve stem through from the inside (I went in through the top hose hole).



This fix* lasted for the life of the car, it held pressure well.

 

 

Next bodge:
 

 

 

You can try this for nowt, (I know I would if I had no cash) find some suitable strapping (old leather belt / webbing / seatbelt / that metal strapping with holes in) and a nut, bolt and two washers. Drill a hole near the broken end, and bolt on your re-enforcement nice and tight, from one side, around the broken end, to the other side. Five minute fix for free, worth a try?

[vulgalour]

Washer bottle - repaired with some all-purpose glue which has sealed the crack that was leaking.  Bottle no longer leaks.  Cost of repair: £free

 

Washer pump - ordered a replacement for £2.95, it'll be here next week.  Kept the old pump so I can fit a pipe connector into the body of the pump through the original hole and then seal it with some sealant of some sort.  Cost of repair: £0.50p probably

 

Rebound strap - I'm not bothering to repair these.  If they're so badly made that not even the full weight of the suspension arm they're supposed to prevent from moving too much pulls straight through like that I'd rather just bin them.  I've got a contact that has some with proper strengthening in and who has had the same issue with new versions, they're £8 each posted and for the hassle of trying to make the current ones good again I'd rather just pay the money in this instance.

 

Top tip on the rad repair.  I'm fairly sure my brother did the same thing to a rad on one of his cars, but I can't remember if he repaired it or bought a fresh rad, this would have been a useful bit of thinking at the time, I'm sure, and I have filed it in the Useful Stuff box at the back of my brain for future reference.

[KruJoe]

I hope you realise that once this is MOT'd and sold, there's another in the queue..?

 

 

Does anyone fancy the first Wedge to fart its way off the production line? Price: £0.

 

 

Sam

 

 

You know it's got your name on, right?

[MikeKnight]

OH GOD JOE DON'T ENCOURAGE HIM.

 

I'm going to have to house all this tat excellent rust free metal when he moves in.

[vulgalour]

... yeah, I know about that car, I've sort of discussed it...

[vulgalour]

Got myself another can of fuel today and made another attempt on this car to get it running.  Happily, after a bit of a grumble, it did fire up again but then seemed to drop to running on three before cutting out.  I did get the car restarted once, but after that it just wouldn't bite.

 

Happily, the fuel filter is now full of fresh fuel, all that nasty orange stuff has gone.

 

I'm thinking this is an ignition issue, probably spark plug or lead related, so I'll pull the plugs and check the condition and gaps on them.  I'm happy enough that the car fired up and the old fuel is now out of the system.  I'll go through and check sparks and whatnot and get it sorted out.  I'm plodding away at brakes and suspension insofar as things are soaking in penetrating oil until I can do anything else with them.

[vulgalour]

Managed to grab a couple of hours this afternoon to get stuff done.  First up was to refit and refill the washer bottle since the new pump arrived today.  I cleaned up the bottle for the repair and cleaned up the bulkhead bracket which had some bodyfiller and chewing gum on it just like the bottle did.  I'd already tested the bottle to see if it leaked and it all appeared fine with plain water so I risked filling it up with screenwash.  Time will tell whether or not my repair is good enough, I may need to redo it if it leaks again but that's no big deal.

 

The new washer pump arrived and is identical to the old one and works so I got that fitted.  Trimmed the washer hose down to get rid of the stuck nub from the old pump and applied a little heat from one of those long-nose gas lighters you get for gas cookers, barbecues, candles, that sort of thing.

 

Then I pulled the plugs to have a look at them.  These plugs are brand new and were fitted when I rebuilt the head, they've done 0 miles so far but they were black with soot which confirms what I already knew about the car running rich.  Gaps all look about the same, but my feeler gauges have *disappeared* so I couldn't do any more with this as by the time I'd bought some new ones it was too late to do anything about it.  Now I've got the gauges I'll get these gapped properly, get the mixture where it should be on the carb and try again, it looks like there's enough fuel going through to just swamp the plugs and prevent the spark from doing its job.

 

After this I had a go at replacing the handbrake cable and the rear flexi.  The rear shoes are actually in reasonable shape so I'll likely leave them, the handbrake was very good before we cut the cable earlier this year so I'm happy with those.  On removing the old cable the circlip that holds it in place in the car snapped, I bought some new ones to sort that out.  Again, didn't get any further than threading the cable into place as I just didn't have the time today.

 

The brake hose I've managed to unseize most of the way but the end of the thread won't come all the way out of the union and I ran the risk of twisting the brake line which is something I really don't want to have to replace.  The other issue was when dry fitting the new hose, it only seems to want to cross thread into the union on the hub which I'm not thrilled about so I've got to try and clean the union out so that it doesn't cross thread and I can plumb it all in.  Plus-gassed everything that needed it and I'll tackle it again tomorrow.

 

Final haul for today was a pack of circlips, some grease for the hub and pivot shafts, a tin of plusgas and some exhaust paste, that combined with the 6 litres of oil, new oil filter and hydralastic fluid should see me sorted.  I've not had another go at the spare sphere yet beyond taking it out of the vinegar which has removed a *lot* of rust and dousing it in plusgas ready for an attack with the hammer tomorrow.

 

I must not be beaten by these last few jobs.

[twosmoke300]

That klarius exhaust paste is great stuff . I got supplied some other shite this week and its rubbish compared to it.

 

I have found that plus gas isnt what it used to be though, I started using a product called AC90 a year ago and reckon its bloody good. Problem with these sprays is that its all subjective because you will never have the same componant/corrosion again to test them.

But ..... ive either been very lucky for as year or its good shit. Cheap too.

[vulgalour]

I got some good news in the form of an offer of garage space recently, all I had to do was get the car rolling and some form of braking so that I could get it there.  With that in mind, I finally got the rear brake hose replaced (I'm aware of the missing locking nut, I need to get one).  I also got the new hand brake cable fitted (apart from a cable tie to hold it to the trailing arm as per the manual), having to replace the circlip inside the cabin as the old one broke apart on removal.

 

On refitting the rear shoes, one of the locking washers pinged off and I couldn't find it.  Went and bought two new ones only to find the one that had pinged off had got lodged behind one of the shoes.  I've done something wrong though because these shoes now drag, I'm fairly certain I put the adjuster back on in the wrong place.

 

So, the car was no rolling and stopping, after a fashion.  Fired it up to see if it would and it did so we were confident that if we towed it to the new garage it would haul itself up the driveway to its new home.  All was well, we arrived at the garage without drama, unhitched, reversed the car a bit to line up and then it died.

 

Tried to restart and it tried very hard but was soon pouring fuel out of the air filter.  Removed the carb to find it full of jellied petrol.  The fuel filter was also not too clever looking so it must have dragged something horrible through from the tank again.  Put a fresh line from the pump to a can of clean fuel in a jerry can and after cleaning up the carb and reassembling we tried again.

 

Car fired up and ran nicely, no crap out the exhaust, no horrendous smell.  Started to drive up the incline and then it bogged down and died.  A look under the bonnet revealed it was throwing fuel out of the air filter again but this time it couldn't be down to crap in the system as it was running on clean fuel.

 

Took the fuel pipe out of the jerry can, fired the car up on what was left in the pump and carb and it ran far enough to get stuck in an awkward spot and then flat out refused to run without pouring fuel out the air filter.  This was getting seriously tedious now.

 

Loathe to pull the carb off and rebuild it again because it was getting dark, we tried to give it a bump start and that worked brilliantly until we tried to turn the car around and line it up with the garage at which point it poured fuel out the air filter, died, flattened it's battery and refused to start again.

 

ARGH

 

Towed it back home, trundled it down the drive to the hard standing and fired it up, which it did without complaint or excess fueling... and then flattened the battery again.

 

It's either the float that needs adjustment or the car is scared to go back in a garage after having been abandoned in one back in 1997.

 

One result of the tow is that I got a better feel for how the car behaves on the road.  I know the new speedo cable works, up to 10mph at least.  The wipers are a mystery, turn them on and they go to intermittent and stay intermittent even when you turn them off.  Turn them on a second time and they work normally and stay off when you turn the off.  No idea what that's about.  The car pulls heavily to the left, this is probably down to the completely dead track rod end.  Headlights, reversing lights and interior lights work.  Suspension, even with one blown sphere, actually works very well.

 

A frustrating day really, but not an entirely fruitless one.

 

[Squire_Dawson]

Have you noticed a clonking coming from the back end? One of your brackets has unfortunately gone.

[vulgalour]

Not noticed any clonking.  I don't think that bracket has gone either, I had an axle stand under the crosstube.  When the car is on its wheels the pivot shaft nut is central as it should be.  If it has, never mind, they're gettable.

[Squire_Dawson]

The trouble is that, as no doubt you know, the bonding of the rubber sandwich to the metal fails over time due to age or incorrect suspension height. One side of the bracket drops due to this failure of the bonding and the large nut passing through moves upwards, contacting the metal and clonking as you go over bumps.

 

If the bracket has actually gone then save yourself some hydrolastic fluid and change it before pumping up the suspension. There is an important instruction to follow about tightening that nut also, or the rear of the car will sit far too high.

[vulgalour]

I will do the checks when I bolt it all together.  This will have to be checked for health when the new sphere is fitted at any rate.  I'm just wanting it on the road and gone at this point, it's a lovely car and has the making of a great car about it, but I've had enough of it now because of all the other stuff going on in my life.

[jbz2079]

That problem with the intermittant wipers is just how they were the late Marinas were the same.

You set or cancelled the intermittant wipe by flicking the switch onto the spring loaded single wipe possition.

So comming back to the off position would often leave the intermittant in the on possition.

[PhilA]

Things look right on the shoes picture except the left shoe there isn't in the lower handbrake bar correctly and isn't sitting on the piston right. Did you correct that after taking the picture and reassembling? The way it's sat, the service brake may work and the handbrake would also but it'd be pushed outward by about a quarter inch- enough to make it bind.

 

Phil

[vulgalour]

I think you've explained what I've done wrong there, Phil, sounds about right.  I've been pretty burned out this week, I keep making daft mistakes.  It would explain why it was so difficult to get the hub back on too.  I did make sure the shoes sat in their grooves as they ought, but the bottom half seemed too big and I couldn't seem to get it to go smaller, I bet the adjuster moved while I had it in bits and it needs pulling in again.

[PhilA]

I think you've explained what I've done wrong there, Phil, sounds about right.  I've been pretty burned out this week, I keep making daft mistakes.  It would explain why it was so difficult to get the hub back on too.  I did make sure the shoes sat in their grooves as they ought, but the bottom half seemed too big and I couldn't seem to get it to go smaller, I bet the adjuster moved while I had it in bits and it needs pulling in again.

 

 

You should be able to do it without having to remove springs and things.

20140323-02 by renault9gta, on Flickr

 

Unless I'm horribly wrong, the shoe should have a [ shape that the handbrake bar sits in. It stops the shoe wandering also. It looks as though it's sat on the outer peg.

 

The mechanisms can be a bit awkward to get back into place- there's usually a rivet or something that stops it moving the last fraction of an inch. A jolly good wiggle with a screwdriver and a few swearwords normally see it fixed.

 

 

--Phil

[vulgalour]

Behind the circle is a bracket with a D shaped hole that the silver-ish bar has a tongue that sits in it.  Does that make sense?  Further up above the circle you've drawn is the adjuster, I think that's what I've got wrong... I don't know.  If this car that's appeared in a scrapyard has a good rear axle and parts it may be a moot point as I may just be swapping the whole lot over complete.

[PhilA]

Well, it helps to know how it sits

 

Possibly the silver bar sits on the cross-bar, and the shoe sits in the D.  I don't know exactly without a HBOL for it and/or an exploded diagram.

 

--Phil

[vulgalour]

Today I have been exhausted and plans to do any work on the orange breaker car were thwarted by the simple fact I just didn't have the physical energy or mental faculty to do it.  I did not want it to be a wasted day so I took a look at what could be done on the HLS to get it that bit more sorted.

 

To start, I removed the dead bonnet struts from the car to replace them with the good ones on the orange breaker.  It is much nicer to be able to work under the bonnet without having a prop in the way.

 

Next, that rear window.  One issue with living here is that things go missing, nobody will ever put their hands up to it and things usually turn up again, but it's always the one thing you need that disappears.  In this instance it was the fixings for the rear window guides that had vanished (and today, the box of drill bits I could have done with have wandered off). Happily, the fixings I need are on the orange car so I got things all swapped over and fitted.

 

I also liberated the better interior light lens from the orange car.

 

While I was at it, the central cubby got swapped in too so I don't have to repair the one that was originally in the red car.  These are admittedly little things but they do make me feel better about the car and make me feel more encouraged to work on it.

 

Rather than go headlong into any really big jobs, I decided to give myself a mojo boost by giving the red car a wash.  True to form, it's the car that keeps on giving, and it gave me this pinhole in a common rot spot.  It's not serious yet but it will need fixing within the next year or two, not really my problem but one for the new owner to address.

 

Car has been sat outside for a while now, longer than I wanted really, so it's been looking a bit sorry for itself.  I reckon all projects go through this stage where they just seem to demand more money and time and effort than you have the will to put into them, then they get looking neglected and it compounds the issue.  Traditional bucket shot here.

 

 

The bodyshell isn't bad at all on this car and the new panels have much better paint so while it's a bit flat, as is the wont of red cars the world over, some G3 action and a full Vulgalour valet should see this looking very smart indeed.  For now, it's just a quick wash to make me feel better about the car, which I do.  I now want to get on with the mechanical maladies again as today has felt like a better day to own this car.

 

[Angrydicky]

This is looking great! I really fancy a Princess. The later cars never used to appeal to me but I think this one looks fantastic in red with the gold coachstripe.

 

Must be nice to have a spares car you can get swap little bits and pieces from. Having seen the photos of the orange one I think you made the right decision breaking it

[vulgalour]

Sometimes it's the simple things that are the problem and you miss the obvious. Turns out the overfuelling issue was just that.

 

As you may recall, I've been having issues getting the car to run without throwing a lot of fuel straight out of the air filter. I'd already cleaned out the carb twice, the first time replacing the needle valve and valve seat. After running the fuel in the tank through the system it got gunged up and I had to clean it a third time but the sodding thing just wouldn't run and kept throwing fuel everywhere which was not an ideal situation.

 

Today, took the carb apart again and found the float had jammed in place with sediment, presumably pulled up from the tank. Cleaned it out, checked the float was okay and working, rebuilt and put it back on the car which ran lovely from a jerry can of fresh fuel for a few seconds and then overfuelled massively. Remove the carb, check the float clearance which needed a little tweak, since we were running from a fresh fuel supply there was nothing in the carb that shouldn't be there so plumbed it all in and tried again to the same result.

 

Checked the spark plug gaps, which were spot on, and the timing which needed a little tweak. Checked the points, rotor arm and distributor cap all of which were healthy. Good spark, no arcing in the leads, battery healthy, no issues with alternator or starter motor and all fuses still good, so the electricity side eliminated as the culprit at this point.

 

Back to the fuel side of things, suspected the mechanical pump may be pumping at too high a pressure so used the lower pressure electric pump to the same result. Removed the carb yet again and inspected it to find all was as it should be and still lovely and clean inside. Topped up the squelch pot and then noticed the problem.

 

 

The above illustrates the carb correctly plumbed, I'd put the vent and inlet the wrong way around. Of all the things it could be! I could have fixed this problem ages ago had I realised this, but at least now the carb is spotless inside. Fired the car up and it ran very nicely with no horrible smells or noises. Tried to adjust the choke a little and found it was very stiff and then wouldn't move but I was at least happy the engine was running and sounded pretty good.

 

Investigated the choke cable next, I had a very good one liberated from the orange car so when I saw this I wasn't too worried.

 

Easy way to do this is to undo the steering column cowl, unplug the relevant bit of wiring and pull the choke cable through into the cabin once you've disconnected it from the carb. Slightly tricky to rethread because you can't really see what you're doing, but with the factory choke cable being bright red you can leave it partially threaded so you can find the relevant bulkhead hole to thread the new one through from under the dash.

 

Emerges from just beside the brake master cylinder, pretty fiddly location.

 

Thread back into the carb, tighten up and then put the airbox back on now I feel comfortable I don't have to remove the carb again. Next big fuel related job is to drop the petrol tank to clean it out and I'll use the electric pump to pull fresh fuel through the line and into a separate container so I know it's as clean as I can make it here before reconnecting the engine to the fuel tank.

 

Last thing was to put some water in the system. I know the radiator leaks and now I know exactly where from: top hose joint. I'm not sure if the leak is from where the metal pipe joins the radiator, the rubber hose or a bit of both so I'll carefully remove the top hose to check. If need be I have what appears to be a good spare radiator and top hose from the orange car to use.

 

Today went okay.

[stuboy]

good to see things being fixed

[320touring]

Good progress chief, excellent

[vulgalour]

Got the replacement track rod ends fitted today.  I knew the passenger side one was ruined and it was making the wheel sit very strangely indeed.  I wasn't expecting it to come apart in my hand on removal, nor for it to be quite so easy to remove!

 

New one went on very easily.

 

Driver's side came undone easily enough, but required judicious application of a hammer and balljoint splitter to unseat the old one, refitting the new TRE went very easily indeed.  Checked the wheels for play, which there appears to be none of, and I'm happy that we're probably okay up front now.  There is an oil leak from somewhere underneath the engine, but it's not clear exactly where, nothing particularly serious just the odd drip.

 

Interestingly, the brake fluid looks really clean and the calipers on the front look like the bleed nipples have been disturbed in the not too distant past so I wonder if they've already been bled through.  I'm going to bleed them again anyway as I did fit a new rear brake hose so there's probably air in the system but the front discs and pads looked meaty enough and I know the rear brakes work quite well.  I'll bleed the clutch fluid too, just to be sure.  I've pencilled this in as my job for tomorrow, if I get more done than that I'll be happy but I'm not pushing myself too hard with this now.

 

Jobs:

Flush fuel tank and replace hoses/filter

Bleed brakes and clutch

Resolve radiator leak/replace radiator

Earth dashboard

Fit legal tyres

Fit one rebound strap

 

There might be more, I'm struggling to think of things it needs for its MoT so I must be nearly done.

[vulgalour]

Made a tiny step forward towards MoT status today by removing the dead rear sphere.  This was the sphere that was on the beige car that I swapped with the one formerly on the red car, now I have the complete axle from the orange car I can swap things back so the red car has a full compliment of decent spheres as it did when it arrived here back in... September I think it was.

 

Support car and axle separately.  Disconnect brake flexi, hydragas pipe, handbrake cable (cabin side) and rebound strap.  Undo pivot shaft nuts.  Pivot shaft is known to be seized and this hasn't changed, so disconnect axle mounting bracket from body and axle so that the trailing arm, brake drum and sphere can be removed as a complete unit.  Reattach axle mounting bracket (which is on it's way out, I have a replacement) to axle and car so it can be supported safely in the absence of the replacement components.

 

Then realise that you're actually still pretty ill when you try and move the whole unit up the drive and nearly fall over.  Never mind, it's a job that needs doing and is now done and will allow me to remove the relevant parts from the beige car to swap back over and get the red one pumped up and brakes bled properly.

 

Finally, point out your invisible repair to the C pillar vinyl because you were fed up of catching your fingers on the raggedy edges of the old brittle vinyl trim.

[purplebargeken]

Progress is progress fella. Loving the wedge lifestyle!

[320touring]

Loving the vinyl roof repair- wish I could get white Gaffa tape to fix my 320..

[vulgalour]

you can get white gaffa tape, and if not I know where to get my hands on some for about £3 for a massive roll.