Zel's Motoring Adventures...Volvo, Renault, Rover, Trabant, Invacar & A Sinclair C5 - Updated 13/11.

[Zelandeth]

On 4/19/2022 at 7:42 PM, 4wheeledstool said:

I have a decent selection of rubbing strips for Manta + mk1 cavalier. I'll have a look at the weekend for you. I have a couple of sets of VAUXHALL lettering for the rear panel. I don't know if the chevette used the same ones, if the ones offered above don't fit, the ones I have are from early and late Cavalier mk1. (slightly bigger font on late ones)

Thanks!  Will keep things updated here so will get back to you if the ones we have aren't the right size.

-- -- --

Have had TPA out and about quite a bit the last couple of days.

The replacement air cleaner has definitely reduced the induction noise a lot at speed.  There's still quite a growl there, but it's nowhere near as boomy.  I think any apparent performance increase is purely psychological as the car is quieter so it feels like you're maintaining the same speed with less effort just because of the improvement in refinement.

Oh, and I remembered to put the clock forward at long last.

 

[Zelandeth]

Well this was unexpected!

Someone on UKSaabs pinged me a message a couple of days back saying they had something nice for the Cavalier.  It arrived this morning.

Was thinking that repainting the badge was going to be one of the first quick jobs that would tidy the front up a lot.

Having a nice new one will save me a bit of time there.

[Talbot]

Whenever I see an IBM Model M, I think "why is there a photo of my desk on the thread?"

Then, "Oh yes... other people like them too.  That's why they're expensive..."

[Zelandeth]

10 hours ago, Talbot said:

Whenever I see an IBM Model M, I think "why is there a photo of my desk on the thread?"

Then, "Oh yes... other people like them too.  That's why they're expensive..."

Wait until you see what Northgate OmniKey Ultras go for...

Still have never forgiven IT for making off with mine when they "upgraded" my workstation PC while I was out of the office...to say I was livid would be an understatement!

Nice little upgrade for the Caddy has been dropped off.  One thing about it that I actively dislike is the steering wheel.  It's a really hard plastic one, and aside from not being pleasant to hold, if like me you have really dry skin it's bloody slippery.

There we go, a leather wrapped version should be rather nicer to use.

[beko1987]

I used to pull model m's out of skips all the time. Then use them, abuse them and generally put them back in a skip. 

My life is full of regrets like that, it was all trash back in the day before the waste regs came in and fucked everything up 😢

[Zelandeth]

Last time I had TPA out she wasn't behaving quite right just as I got back to the house.  I also thought she was wandering around the road more than usual initially, right up until the point where I got out of the car at my first destination and realised it was a lot more breezy than I thought it was when I left the house!

It felt like I had an intermittent miss, which on closer examination seems to be a clogged accelerator jet I reckon.  As cracking the throttle open there's a brief pause before the engine picks up.

Did give me a good reason to have a nose around the engine bay though, as to be honest I don't look closely at things anywhere near as often as I probably should.

I've done away with the screen type fuel filter, as it just doesn't seem to be doing anything and I've had several people tell me that it will unscrew itself and I'll die in an inferno at the side of the A5.  Despite the fact that how I had it fitted all of the components where fixed in position so couldn't rotate.  Not like it was dangling by a fuel line.

Nevertheless, these undeniably do a better job of filtration.

Have tried from yet another stockist for these filters, let's see if these ones don't fall apart internally like the last lot did.  Place your bets...

Ran out of time this weekend but I'll take a closer look shortly.  Most likely I just disturbed a bit of crud when I swapped the gaskets out recently.

I want to give the air cleaner a splash of paint anyway so may as well do this at the same time.

Speaking of things I really should properly sort at some point, the engine bay tinware is really rather sad.

Changing this properly involves pulling the engine because of how it's attached.  That ain't happening in the near future.  I think what's much more likely to happen is a couple of bits of steel getting attached to patch the huge gaping hole.  Both to stop it vibrating so much and to help keep some crud out of the engine bay.

I think someone asked precisely where I had the emergency kit stowed these days - the answer is down here.

That bag contains a spare CVT belt, the tools needed to change it, and a very basic selection of tools.  There's a really convenient little void down there that it sits securely in which isn't wasting any valuable actual storage in the car.

The same space on the nearside is where the heater booster fan I plan to fit one day will go.

[Zelandeth]

Uuuh...well that was a quick fix!  Haven't done a test drive yet, but I have confirmed the accelerator jet is working again.

Ya remember that a couple of weeks ago I had the top off the carb to replace the gasket?

You know one really important step of that job I apparently missed?

Yep...final tightening of the carb lid screws.  All four were less than finger tight allowing the lid to wobble.

Oops.

Pure dumb user error that one!

Have got the air cleaner off and cleaned up ready for paint...and the heavens have just opened.  Go figure.

[Zelandeth]

Weather decided to co-operate and stop raining so I could throw some paint at the air cleaner housing.

Then after a while some top coat and left to dry for an hour or so.

Doesn't that look better than what we started with?

Stuff in this engine bay gets dusty in a hurry because of the amount of airflow through it, so it'll dull down to being less in your face shiny pretty quickly.

Hopefully get it refitted tomorrow.  Not sure if I'll have time to get a test run done to see if screwing the carb back together has sorted my fuelling issues or not.  Sadly the school is back from the holiday now so it's back to being a nightmare to try to find enough room to get into or out of the garage.

EDIT: All back together.

The paint is the same as what's on the fan shroud so should blend in better after a bit of time.  Looks better than rusty anyway.

[Zelandeth]

While I had the painting supplies out I gave the engine cover stay a going over too as it was very conspicuously rusty.

Makes the engine bay look a bit tidier.

Carb is better but definitely still not 100% happy.  I really hope that my leaving the top cover loose accidentally hasn't wrecked the new gasket I just put in there...the £30 odd the kit cost was moderately irritating for what it was, but the month it took to get here from Italy far more so.

I did spot something after the test run today though which had the potential to be really "exciting" if I hadn't noticed it.

See anything amiss there?  See the line between the driveshaft and the back of the hub?  That's a gap.  That should not be there.  All four bolts on one side and three on the other were several turns less than finger tight.  Now I admit to probably have forgotten to properly tighten the carb top cover screws last week, but making sure the driveshaft couplings were torqued up properly was *definitely* done when I installed the engine.  So they have loosened themselves over time.  

Given the vibration and shock loading that coupler will be subject to running 10" wheels with the state of the roads around here that's not necessarily a massive surprise, but the potential for Bad Things to Happen if a driveshaft came adrift means it's a checklist item that has definitely been added to the regular service regime.  I think I will look to add some locking tabs to there too (there are already spring washers under the heads).  Just glad I spotted this as the nearside is pretty much entirely hidden from view unless you're under the car as the battery tray and heater ducting obscure your view.

One you might well want to take a look at on TWC when you get a chance @dollywobbler given you've had the engine out there too so the couplings have been apart in recorded human history.

Think I basically need to just spend a day going over every single nut, bolt, screw, clip or other fastener on this car and make sure it's not managed to shake itself loose based on my experiences over the last week!

[LightBulbFun]

Eeep! the air cleaner disassembling itself in transit was bad enough, but you dont want to be driving down the road and suddenly see half of your cabrettor bouncing down the road behind you, much less a drive shaft!

seems like TPA heard you saying you where planning on going through all the nuts and bolts and decided to get its money worth out of that!

@red5 I dont think REV's engine/gearbox has ever been removed, but I dont suppose you could check the above drive shaft coupling bolts just to be safe (ill also tag @Harriytait and @adam1db since I know their respective Model 70's have had engine changes,)

 

on the carburettor gasket front, even if it has been damaged, can you measure its thickness with a set of callipers and use it as a pattern to make another one? it looks like standard flexoid gasket material to me, so id think you could cut your own?

[Zelandeth]

15 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

Eeep! the air cleaner disassembling itself in transit was bad enough, but you dont want to be driving down the road and suddenly see half of your cabrettor bouncing down the road behind you, much less a drive shaft!

seems like TPA heard you saying you where planning on going through all the nuts and bolts and decided to get its money worth out of that!

@red5 I dont think REV's engine/gearbox has ever been removed, but I dont suppose you could check the above drive shaft coupling bolts just to be safe (ill also tag @Harriytait and @adam1db since I know their respective Model 70's have had engine changes,)

 

on the carburettor gasket front, even if it has been damaged, can you measure its thickness with a set of callipers and use it as a pattern to make another one? it looks like standard flexoid gasket material to me, so id think you could cut your own?

I think a lot of this is just standard on cars of this sort of age, it's why you need to keep your eyes open whenever you're doing anything on the car.  

In these days of locking fasteners, thread lock and things being torqued up to 7000000 foot pounds it's just not so much of the sort of thing that happens on moderns.  

The carb top couldn't actually have gone anywhere, the driveshaft however absolutely could.  

The air cleaner I really should have spotted before it exited the vehicle.

If we had actually lost a bolt I'd hopefully have been notified by a vibration as it would have knocked the driveshaft quite a bit out of balance.  If not however and we'd lost three, the coupler then would have been able to shift.  This would likely have let it move sufficiently to contact the surrounding suspension arm.

Best case?  It makes an absolutely godawful racket and vibration, I do an emergency stop wherever I am and end up getting recovered.

Likely alternative?  It jams itself against the suspension arm, locking it up.  I suddenly find myself with a single locked up rear wheel.  The result of that is almost definitely an interface with the scenery or other traffic.

Or the driveshaft exiting the vehicle entirely, quite possibly through bodywork and ending up going through someone else's windscreen.

I have been in a RWD car (not driving, not my car) where the propshaft came unbolted from the diff without any real warning, so this sort of thing can happen.  

You can see why I've decided that a locking tab is a good idea for these bolts.  In the meantime I'm putting a paint marker stripe on them so I can at least easily visually confirm they haven't moved.  

To be fair, a lot of this is the sort of things I'd expect on a car of this sort of age, especially given the horrendous state of the roads around here.

[bobdisk]

@Zelandeth, do I remember you put a dual circuit brake master cylinder on TPA, making at a dual circuit system? As the Daf needs a new master cylinder,  I was thinking of doing the same. What  car was it from, and how much? The Daf one is about £135.

[Zelandeth]

1 hour ago, bobdisk said:

@Zelandeth, do I remember you put a dual circuit brake master cylinder on TPA, making at a dual circuit system? As the Daf needs a new master cylinder,  I was thinking of doing the same. What  car was it from, and how much? The Daf one is about £135.

Yes, I used a master cylinder for a Triumph Spitfire.

It was about £40 if I remember right.

[bobdisk]

@Zelandeth Wow !! £40 is a bit different to £135 !!  Was the angle of the reservoir any problem? The Dafs cylinder is horizontal, I think the model 70 has an angle.  It will not be difficult to make up the pipes.  What is the distance between the fixing holes?  The Daf holes are 55mm apart. 

[Erebus]

On 4/22/2022 at 9:45 PM, Zelandeth said:

Wait until you see what Northgate OmniKey Ultras go for...

Still have never forgiven IT for making off with mine when they "upgraded" my workstation PC while I was out of the office...to say I was livid would be an understatement!

Nice little upgrade for the Caddy has been dropped off.  One thing about it that I actively dislike is the steering wheel.  It's a really hard plastic one, and aside from not being pleasant to hold, if like me you have really dry skin it's bloody slippery.

There we go, a leather wrapped version should be rather nicer to use.

Steering wheel looks mint! Can I ask where you got it done please? Apologies if you've already mentioned it

[Zelandeth]

Had a bit of a crap day today because of the general public being inconsiderate morons and wasting several hours trying to fix things that an Android update that installed itself last night managed to break.  Oh, and the engine bay undertray of the Caddy decided to eject itself somewhere just north of J13 on the M1 this afternoon.  Irked there as it was securely attached when I last looked (albeit with a few fasteners replaced with cable ties - but that's expected on a 20 year old car) and it was likely last disturbed last week when a garage changed the aux belt pulleys for me.  My bad there for not checking it was properly secured when I got it back I guess.  Hardly the end of the world, just annoying.

Hoping to change the tone a bit, later in the afternoon I decided to try to get a couple of easy jobs done.

First up was sorting this.

The replacement blanking panel turned up a couple of weeks ago, I'd just not got around to fitting it.

Next to it is the replacement expansion valve which will hopefully sort the air con properly.

If you know this model better than me you'll have spotted the problem there.  That blanking plate didn't have a recess or cutout in it to accommodate the towing eye.

Well not until I attacked it with the grinder anyway.

Not pretty, but it's one of those things you'll never notice once it's in situ, and my patience was already frayed at that point by yet another part being wrong despite my having triple checked the part numbers cross referenced correctly.

Much better.

Next up for the front end has to be getting some paint on the bumper.  Not having a gaping hole there though is a definite improvement.

Second job for the day was to fit the leather wrapped steering wheel I'd picked up.  Simple enough job.

Disconnect the battery and wait five minutes before touching anything to ensure there's absolutely no way I could piss off the airbag.  I disconnected both terminals just to further reduce the odds of something managing to drop back into place.  The roll of tape is wedged in between the positive terminal and battery post.

This serves a double purpose here...one I obviously don't want the airbag to deploy in my face, though the odds of that happening are really small in reality.  The second is that I really don't want to trigger a fault in the system as there's no way to reset the warning light without VAGCOM apparently.

Two hex head bolts on the rear of the wheel release the centre/airbag module.

Disconnect the push fit connector then that can be put aside somewhere safe.  Note that the connector itself and the wiring going into the clock spring on these are reputed to be quite fragile, so be careful not to break anything.

I chose to refit my existing module into the new wheel as I don't know the history of the one that came with the new wheel - see my earlier comment about fault codes.  They're an identical type in this case as aside from the one having a leather wrapped rim the wheels are otherwise identical.  If they were different styles obviously that wouldn't be possible.

The wiring to the horn buttons can then be unplugged.

Before the three small Torx screws holding the clock spring housing to the back of the wheel are unscrewed.  Then the main steering wheel retaining nut (24mm) can be undone.  In theory.

Turns out it was biblically tight.  Not necessarily a bad thing given the application, but a problem nevertheless.  Helpfully I do own exactly the tool for this job.

Which proceeded to spin the nut off as though it was less than finger tight.  Impact guns are bloody useful tools.  This one is heavily and unwieldy in tight spaces, but it's one of the most useful bits of kit I've ever bought.  When you need one you really need one.

The wheel is then ready to be removed.  What you want to do here however is to thread that nut back on a few turns so you can remove the wheel in a controlled way.  Give it a firm tug towards you and it should slip off the splines.  If you didn't have the nut there you'd probably smack yourself in the face with the wheel and tear the airbag clock spring assembly to bits.

With the wheel loose the airbag and horn wiring can be carefully threaded out through the old wheel as it's removed.

Reassembly as the manuals love to say is simply the reverse of disassembly.  Though unlike VW originally I did take the time to fit the horn wiring into the grooves clearly intended to keep it tidily out of the way.

Once everything was reassembled the battery was reconnected...

Making sure that I had the keys IN MY HAND when doing that in case the central locking decided to lock the car.

Then the ignition was turned on with my fingers crossed that this light would go out after the self test.

Thankfully it did.

Then of course had to go through the ritual of setting the clock etc again.

Thankfully the stereo retained everything aside from the time and date data.  That's a big positive as doing all the configuration from scratch again is quite a chore.

Doesn't really look any different!

However is far, far more pleasant to hold than the old one.  Given it's your main driver control having a nice wheel is kinda high on the wish list.  Given that the old one was really quite unpleasant to hold it's an upgrade I'm glad I made.

Also glad someone was willing to make me a decent deal on one given that these wheels seem to go for £200+ on eBay which was way more than I was willing to pay for something like this.

Nice easy job which has a very tangible positive impact on the driving experience, I'll tick that off as a win I think.

So while it's been an annoying day at least I got a couple of simple things ticked off the to do list successfully.

[Zelandeth]

14 minutes ago, Erebus said:

Steering wheel looks mint! Can I ask where you got it done please? Apologies if you've already mentioned it

It's just a factory wheel as used on the Mk III Golf I believe.  Think the so called Mk 3.5 cabriolet used them longer than the rest as that was based on the older platform for quite a while after the Mk IV had replaced the rest of the range.

I was just lucky that someone got in touch who had one doing nothing they were willing to sell me for sensible money as they seem to fetch daft sums on eBay.

[AnnoyingPentium]

3 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

The second is that I really don't want to trigger a fault in the system as there's no way to reset the warning light without VAGCOM apparently.

Correct, or at least it's the case on the later A04 platformed cars and given the presence of an airbag in yours I'd assume so too, even if it's on the older platform.

Also thinking about going with one of the leather steering wheels from the Fabia Elegance because my existing one has worn smooth and isn't very grippy.

[Zelandeth]

3 hours ago, bobdisk said:

@Zelandeth Wow !! £40 is a bit different to £135 !!  Was the angle of the reservoir any problem? The Dafs cylinder is horizontal, I think the model 70 has an angle.  It will not be difficult to make up the pipes.  What is the distance between the fixing holes?  The Daf holes are 55mm apart. 

I'll need to have a look regarding the mounting holes.  Still have the single circuit one floating around somewhere I think.

Angle shouldn't be an issue as the cap is still at the highest point and both of the ports are fully covered and the baffles can still work as designed.  The angle the Invacar one sits at is less than the intended application so the reservoir doesn't sit level.

Though there's nothing stopping you removing the reservoir and swapping to a remote one if you wanted a more tidy solution.  My intention has always been to swap to a Lada Riva one, also allowing me to easily add a brake fluid level warning light to the party.  Just has never made it to the top of the to do list yet.

This is the style Lada used which is ideal for remote installation as it's a nice easy shape to work with and doesn't really look out of place in any car of this sort of age.

[Erebus]

40 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

It's just a factory wheel as used on the Mk III Golf I believe.  Think the so called Mk 3.5 cabriolet used them longer than the rest as that was based on the older platform for quite a while after the Mk IV had replaced the rest of the range.

I was just lucky that someone got in touch who had one doing nothing they were willing to sell me for sensible money as they seem to fetch daft sums on eBay.

Ah, right. I was thinking you'd had it retrimmed with leather. Thanks anyway

[Zelandeth]

Spot the difference...

Think it's fair to say that looks a bit better.  The finish up close is horrible in several places but from ten feet it's a lot more presentable.  Mainly thinking of our poor neighbours who have to look at it all day!

I had hoped to just pull the bumper off to paint it, but a plethora of metal-rusted-into-plastic fasteners had other ideas.  So it wound up being a really quick and dirty mask off and spray job.

 The paint reacting with the existing primer on there was an extra layer of excitement I could have done without.

Still definitely looks a lot less scruffy than it did 24 hours ago I think.

The radiator grill has several broken mounting tabs so I'll need to hunt down a replacement at some point.

I also need to go on the hunt for a new under tray.  Had a closer look today and can confirm that this is the only bit that is now left.

Hoping that will be the same as used on several VAG vehicles of the time so hopefully won't be too hard to find.

[AnnoyingPentium]

2 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

I also need to go on the hunt for a new under tray.  Had a closer look today and can confirm that this is the only bit that is now left.

Find a neighbour's 90s Polo and steal bits aff it. 🤣

[Crackers]

That looks miles better and and in silver vehicle shocker, it even seems to match quite well!

Also, I'm hopefully not the first to point this out but your number plate says "POO SIZE" which I'm afraid I find funnier than I really should.

[Dobloseven]

23 hours ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

Find a neighbour's 90s Polo and steal bits aff it. 🤣

The Caddy van is actually a badge engineered Seat Inca. The front bits are the same as the contemporary Seat Ibiza. The saloon and estate verions of which were known as the Cordoba and Cordoba Vario. They were sold with VW badging as the Polo Saloon and Estate. Quite different to the contemporary Polo hatchbacks, being somewhat larger cars getting closer to the Golf in size. All a bit confusing. How I know all this, son had a V reg Cordoba Vario for some years which we kept running despite his best efforts to kill it! 

 

20 hours ago, Crackers said:

That looks miles better and and in silver vehicle shocker, it even seems to match quite well!

Also, I'm hopefully not the first to point this out but your number plate says "POO SIZE" which I'm afraid I find funnier than I really should.

Well this is Autoshite! 

[AnnoyingPentium]

1 minute ago, Dobloseven said:

The Caddy van is actually a badge engineered Seat Inca. The front bits are the same as the contemporary Seat Ibiza. The saloon and estate verions of which were known as the Cordoba and Cordoba Vario. They were sold with VW badging as the Polo Saloon and Estate. Quite different to the contemporary Polo hatchbacks, being somewhat larger cars getting closer to the Golf in size. All a bit confusing. How I know all this, son had a V reg Cordoba Vario for some years which we kept running despite his best efforts to kill it! 

Ah, I had thought the Caddy had drawn from the Polo, didn't realise it came from the Inca/Ibiza - which I knew was different. Thanks!

[PhilA]

3 hours ago, AnnoyingPentium said:

Ah, I had thought the Caddy had drawn from the Polo, didn't realise it came from the Inca/Ibiza - which I knew was different. Thanks!

So, coming a modern method of naming things, that makes this an iBitsa?

[Zelandeth]

Really wish someone had just drawn up a list of which bits came from which parts bins!

Mechanical bits (rear suspension aside) generally seem to all be Ibiza at least.  Bits of trim etc though sometimes require a bit more digging!

[AnnoyingPentium]

14 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Really wish someone had just drawn up a list of which bits came from which parts bins!

ETKA, I think. Ye'll have to pay for it though - but you can download the files, but it'll give you part numbers which you could throw in a search engine.

[barrett]

Mk1 BX being broken here. Difficult to tell what shape the inside is,  utterly it could be a source of seats etc...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/224962978495

[Zelandeth]

3 hours ago, barrett said:

Mk1 BX being broken here. Difficult to tell what shape the inside is,  utterly it could be a source of seats etc...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/224962978495

Cheers for that.  Rear bumper is definitely of interest too!  I'll drop the seller a message.

-- -- --

This afternoon the new rotor arm, and more importantly distributor cap were dropped off for the Trevi.

Let me try to visually show you how worn the old cap was.

Those contact post surfaces should be flat.

That's the best part of a millimetre of material that has been worn away.  It's no surprise the car wasn't running well.

New cap and rotor on vastly improved things. 

...For about 1/2 a mile of the test drive, at which point I spluttered to a halt at the side of the road.

Managed to get going again...for about another quarter of a mile.  Wound up having to push the car out of the way and eventually roll into somewhere out of the way where I could fault find.

Still had a plenty strong spark from the coil.  So initially I wondered if we'd got a fuelling issue.  Closer look though showed no spark coming out the distributor cap.

Well that went well.

No idea if it's a case of the part being wrong or just poor plastic that started breaking down in ten seconds flat.

Old rotor arm back on, we were back to running pretty well.  I got back home under my own power then and set about doing a bit more fine tuning.

Turns out setting the carb up when the ignition system was acting up results in it being set up way off the mark.  

After a not insignificant amount of chasing my own tail we got to this point.

 

Idle speed needed to be nudged down a bit when I took that video, and I still want to check the timing as I'm not 100% sure it's not also off the mark.

I'm not totally convinced the carb is properly jetted for this engine, this is about as rich I can get it at idle by adjusting the idle air mix screw.

While I'm not totally convinced of the accuracy of this meter, I've had it on the right side of the scale on TPA, so it's definitely a useful ballpark indicator.  I think the idle jet could just do with being larger (or smaller of it's metering air rather than fuel - don't know the carb well enough to say).  I wound up just aiming for the smoothest idle I could get rather than worrying about numbers so much.  

I need to do a few more test runs to build up a bit more confidence (especially given the epic fail on the first attempt), but I think we're at the point where I can start thinking about actually getting this car returned to its owner (as a running vehicle!) soon.