Sold 1981 Austin Princess - [expletives removed]

[M'coli]

Good work going on on this, young Jedi-shite master. Re emissions: have you checked the choke is going off fully? Also look for the carb being too lean now too (if it hunts and burbles on idle it may well be).

[philibusmo]

I'm hoping that circlip is a temp measure . The originals are a twat to fit . In fact there is a special tool to do them . They should be curved spring steel .

It is meant to be a temporary measure as I realised from doing the drivers side one (which was a twat to fit) that they were curved and sprung.

 

I made the temporary circlip out of marginally thicker metal, and it certainly took some serious hammering to get into place, so I don't expect it will be going anywhere, but I'll check again once it is on the road and has gone a few miles before I make a decision either way.

 

Why BL didn't use bolts like every other manufacturer I have come across is beyond me - it surely can't be that much more expensive and makes the whole lot so much easier to change.

[Rusty_Rocket]

If it helps, that sprung wheel cylinder clip looks identical to the ones used on Minis, which are of course readily available.  They are ridiculous to fit without the push-on tool.

[twosmoke300]

Ldv's use em too . Pain in the ass . Ive (believe it or not) fitted them by hammering a socket over them before.

[Partridge]

Nice work! Keep the updates coming, it's interesting stuff

[michael1703]

Clip mole grips onto the hub flange so the body of the grips holds the wheel cylinder tight to the backplate

Best picture I could find

 

http://www.chicagolandmgclub.com/techtips/mgb/536.html

[philibusmo]

^{Just got an email from SU saying the rebuild kit I ordered is out of stock for 8-10 weeks. Fucking spiffing. Why is nothing with this car simple?}

^{EDIT: Does anyone have a rebuild kit for an SU HIF6 lying around?}

[cort16]

Bike carbs or mega jolt then you'll really, really lose the will to live.

[Talbotman]

Try ringing Tony at Zenith motor factors King Edward Road in Swansea. Hes got lots of Nos carb kits in stock. It might be worth a try.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

What about just getting a new needle and jet, at the end of the day theyre what sets the mixture. chuck some plasticene over the carb spindles on MOT day if you think they might be leaking.

[666jjp]

Rimmers say in stock

http://www.rimmerbros.co.uk/Item--i-RO1187

[philibusmo]

THANKS 666jjp - YOU ARE THE BESTEST.

 

I had a look at rimming bastards but I couldn't spot what I needed, so finding that rebuild it makes you the king of the internet or something. One rebuild kit has been ordered. TBH I'm quite looking forward to rebuilding it as I pretty much get the gist of how a Weber carb works, but SUs, despite being pretty simple are still a mystery to me.

 

I've mucked about with it a bit more this evening, cleaned it up as best I could and checked over all the obvious bits such as the needle and the amount of oil in the dash pot. I've flung it all back together, run it up to temperature and squirted some carb cleaner through it. There is still no difference what so ever and it thanked me by doing a massive back fire which blew some of my slightly delicate exhaust repairs to smithereens.

 

As it's going back in for the retest tomorrow I bodged the exhaust back together with yet more exhaust paste, this time with some wire wool pushed in the holes to strengthen it. It looks absolutely fucking horrible but seems to be leek proof again. As it had gone dark by the time I went to fix the exhaust, it wasn't particularly easy to fix as I couldn't see what I was fixing. I ended up with exhaust paste in my arm pit and had to T-cut it off the screen of my phone.

[philibusmo]

I checked my MOT fail sheet this morning and its actually 11 days since it failed. No free retest for me.

I'll wait until I've rebuilt the carb as I'm still fairly sure it would fail on emissions.

[dollywobbler]

Backfiring is usually either ignition timing way out or operating intermittently. My 2CV took to doing the latter in France on year after the points-assisted ignition module overheated and kept cutting out. Managed to sort it out before it blew the exhaust to pieces...

[michael1703]

Most things will pass the pre 1986 emissions test

[Noel Tidybeard]

I checked my MOT fail sheet this morning and its actually 11 days since it failed. No free retest for me.

I'll wait until I've rebuilt the carb as I'm still fairly sure it would fail on emissions.

 

dont forget its working days    

[Christine]

Road trip Phil .....another road trip..    http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1979-AUSTIN-MORRIS-PRINCESS-L-RED-/151405977444?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item23407fdf64#ht_678wt_958

[philibusmo]

Road trip Phil .....another road trip..    http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1979-AUSTIN-MORRIS-PRINCESS-L-RED-/151405977444?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item23407fdf64#ht_678wt_958

Too likely to pass an MOT - DO NOT WANT.

 

It was 11 working days, sadly, but anyway the carb kit has arrived (in part) and I'm going to fit a new condenser and plugs to make sure the spark is good enough to burn up as many hydro-carbons as possible.

[philibusmo]

Sadly, thanks to my imminent trip to Australia, the Princess is going to be up for sale very shortly.

 

Nothing has happened with it since September and it is sat without a carb and a charging fault, but I am determined to get this on the road with an MOT before I go. This afternoon I'm going to crack on with the carb rebuild and try and get it cleaned up, and ready to go back on the car before the end of the day.

 

I think I'll probably be looking for about £500 for it once it's roadworthy and usable.

[vulgalour]

I can let the owner's club know if you'd like me to put an advert up for you.  Can't guarantee a sale, but they'd be daft to pass this one up at £500 with the pain and suffering it's put everyone through effort that's gone into saving the thing.  It should by now be solid, if not quite reliable yet.

[philibusmo]

Carb is rebuilt.

 

Now to just wait for a gap in the rain when it's light and I'm not at work to fit it and see if there is any difference at all.

[vulgalour]

I vote we call it Polly, in honour of the dead parrot sketch.

[twosmoke300]

I gotta baaad feeling about suicidy !

[Rocket88]

Princess Lemming ?

[sloth]

i can scan and post the relevant pages from my su tuning bible if you like? 

[hauserplenty]

[philibusmo]

i can scan and post the relevant pages from my su tuning bible if you like? 

Yes please,

 

I spent some time mucking about with the carb today, and it's now running very very rich, the spiteful bitch.

A proper update will be along shortly

[philibusmo]

Things have occurred!

This weekend has been spent initially faffing about with the carb. I am rather ashamed to admit that the first, and most important part of the issue was that I had stupidly attached the fuel inlet and the fuel overflow the wrong way around, so it was simply pouring fuel into the body of the carb with no cut off. I'm amazed it ran at all.

 

That was yesterday afternoon, and this morning was initially spent getting it running half way right, which it now does (although needs a proper tune up) and then getting the thing to charge. It had been discovered some time ago to be the exciter circuit from the alternator which was fecked, I think by the clock not working. I really couldn't be arsed ripping the dash out again to fix it and mucking up all the work I did bodging the fog lamp wiring back together so I made a wonderful bodge of fixing* it under the bonnet.

 

Now when the car is started, simply open the bonnet and flick this switch on then off and suddenly there are many electricities, where before there were none. It runs from the alternator to the positive side of the battery and is helpfully screwed onto the battery clamp - switch was originally from a Shorts 360. It works a treat.

 

Secondly I went to affix the accelerator cable to the carb, but it was not in a good way at all and was frayed to hell at the end that needed to thread through a hole tighter than a midget mouse nuns snatch on the throttle spindle. The more I tried to fix it, the worse it got until it was completely useless.

 

This was a disaster, and my dad and I were looking at all possible ways of rigging something up temporarily, including nicking the throttle cable from the Fiesta and making a hand throttle out of a spare choke cable but both were dismissed as unworkable. Eventually in shear desperation we looked in the boot at the pile of spares to see if there happened to be a throttle cable in there which I had somehow never noticed before. There was not a throttle cable, but there was a random handbrake cable in a 'Rover' branded bag. Amazingly with only a little modification this turned out to be a perfect replacement for the original cable. All that was needed was for the lump at one end to be cut off carefully so it could be attached at the carb end and everything else fitted like it as made for the task and actually works slightly better than the original with the adjuster for the hand brake on the cable mounting perfectly to the carb bracket.

 

Finally, and no pictures of this as it was dark by the time we were done, but the back section of the exhaust was cut off. The rear box was blowing again after the unburnt fuel that had gone into the exhaust exploded when the carb was being set up and blew the previous repairs to  smithereens.

 

With the rear section cut off, the back box had two large patches welded onto it, one to the underside and one on the rear end. This was then re-attached to its hanger and then the ends cut off an empty can of brake cleaner which was then used with two clamps and a liberal dose of exhaust paste to attach the two sections back together.

 

Viola, no leaks. Although the exhaust is still very noisy as it would appear that the middle box has disintegrated inside at some point and is now a straight through box.

 

It would appear, that this car is now finally MOT ready, only 3 months after it failed its last one. With the carb properly set up it should blat around a treat.

 

I shall be booking an MOT this week.

[panhard65]

Fingers crossed it makes it. This poor old princess has seen it's fair share of problems and bodged repairs. I am sure someone will find a good home for it one day and sorry no I am not offering. I hated them when they were current and no matter how thick the rose tinted glasses are I will never own another BL product. BLMC maybe or Rover even but anything 70's was rubbish in my opinion.

[oman5]

I'm so glad things are looking up for this rare survivor, the poor things have taken more abuse than they ever deserved over the years. I've had two Princess 2s, they were decent cars, it's just that after the shit early models nobody cared.

How is the ride quality? A lot of hydragas era BL cars are now suffering from rock hard jiggly rides as the nitrogen has leaked away from the displacers, my allegro is a case in point.

I really rated the princess as a motorway cruiser, and,with all that interior space, as an impromptu f*ck truck for an impoverished teenager.