invacar LightBulbFun's Invacar & general ramble thread, index on page 1, survivors lists on Pages 24/134 & AdgeCutler's Invacar Mk12 Restoration from Page 186 onwards, still harping on...

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

I meant to tell you it's got a two handed handlebar control system, but surprisingly inside the car it has a single handlebar control so could be changed......ideal for me in the future as I am disabled and have problems with my hands at times....... Just hope the control I've found is not 'handed'!

[LightBulbFun]

1 hour ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

I meant to tell you it's got a two handed handlebar control system, but surprisingly inside the car it has a single handlebar control so could be changed......ideal for me in the future as I am disabled and have problems with my hands at times....... Just hope the control I've found is not 'handed'!

ah thats good to know, that was going to be one of my next questions!  

sadly the tiller controls are handed so I hope they match up with what your looking for!

do have to chuckle a bit as the owner  of XEV88S/VES108S converted his from Tiller to Handlebars! but he may still have the tiller bits so I can check if its any use?

[LightBulbFun]

2 hours ago, somewhatfoolish said:

Do they really have no numbers, or just they're in an obscure place or have been covered with paint? Seems remarkable the DHSS would have equipment with no means of IDing it.

no they would have had numbers, but it was standard policy to remove/destroy Chassis plates and  Reg plates when decommissioning/scrapping invalid vehicles sadly

(Model 70's thankfully have a semi-secret location where you can find the chassis number on the chassis itself but where/if other Invalid vehicles have such a chassis stamped chassis number is not known sadly)

[High Jetter]

2 hours ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

I meant to tell you it's got a two handed handlebar control system, but surprisingly inside the car it has a single handlebar control so could be changed......ideal for me in the future as I am disabled and have problems with my hands at times....... Just hope the control I've found is not 'handed'!

Wow. I is impressed, wish I knew more about these to help you. Others do, though

[somewhatfoolish]

26 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

no they would have had numbers, but it was standard policy to remove/destroy Chassis plates and  Reg plates when decommissioning/scrapping invalid vehicles sadly

(Model 70's thankfully have a semi-secret location where you can find the chassis number on the chassis itself but where/if other Invalid vehicles have such a chassis stamped chassis number is not known sadly)

A little work with an angry grinder and a knotted wire wheel might pay off, the chassis for one of these things can't be very big.

[LightBulbFun]

1 minute ago, somewhatfoolish said:

A little work with an angry grinder and a knotted wire wheel might pay off, the chassis for one of these things can't be very big.

yeah its something id love to try! although id probably take a more gentle approach dont want to accidentally sand the number off!

[somewhatfoolish]

Wire wheel won't touch a stamped number, not in steel anyway; shifts paint though.

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

Updates on new Invacar.....up early this morning, it's had a good scrub with bleach and hot water and a good hose down! Before and after... More pics to follow

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

Here's some more pics, seems complete, minus the coil...... Need to sort out all the spares next..... mileage shows just over 26,400 possibly correct??Loving the old thing already.... 

[R1152]

Wow... what's with those old batteries?!

[mitsisigma01]

Spacious interior👍

[Dick Cheeseburger]

2 hours ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

Updates on new Invacar.....up early this morning, it's had a good scrub with bleach and hot water and a good hose down! Before and after... More pics to follow

LBFs could do with the same treatment! Looks 100 times better already. 

[R1152]

I really must stop looking at pictures and threads on Invacars, because the more I do, the more I want one. On the plus side, it'd lower the tone beautifully around here where BMWs and personal plates abound.

[LightBulbFun]

2 hours ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

Updates on new Invacar.....up early this morning, it's had a good scrub with bleach and hot water and a good hose down! Before and after... More pics to follow

 

2 hours ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

Here's some more pics, seems complete, minus the coil...... Need to sort out all the spares next..... mileage shows just over 26,400 possibly correct??Loving the old thing already.... 

ah Awesome stuff! she is looking good!  

Looks like theres a nice stash of parts in there which is always very handy!

will be interesting to see whats what as you go through it (I already spot a couple exhausts there, hopefully those are in good shape )  

 

are you able to grab a picture/tell me whats marked on the carburettor? I notice that she has been fitted with an engine from a much earlier Model 70 at some point in her life

(note the cartridge oil filter rather than the spin on type) and so im curious if this early engine has a 32ICS3 carb or a 32ICS10 carb? (it could also be a Solex carb too, but I have never seen a Model 70 fitted with one)

Part number for an ignition coil is  Bosch 0221119027

and heres a Lucas equivalent I think (they are from the Parts stash I got with REV so I assume they are compatible with a Model 70!)

lucas 17M12 is their PN i think

BTW when looking at the photographs I just noticed another difference between AC and Invacar Model 70's

the "Passenger carrying is forbidden" plaque, on an AC they are always black text on a white background, but an invacar they are white text on a black background

here is TPA's for example (and on later AC's they moved the plaque to where the Dash changer would have gone, under the courtesy light, but on Invacars they kept them in the same place throughout production)

2 hours ago, R1152 said:

Wow... what's with those old batteries?!

those will be the Batteries for the Stanley Argsons  

 

12 minutes ago, Dick Longbridge said:

LBFs could do with the same treatment! Looks 100 times better already. 

Yeah I really do feel bad about that and wish I could do something about it!

tho the good thing about Model 70's and being fibreglass, is they can look like utter shit, but clean right up really well with just some scrubbing etc

cuz it all just falls off the fibreglass bodywork! and fibreglass is not really affected by dirt and grime in the same way some fancy paint job steel body work car is

[R1152]

22 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

those will be the Batteries for the Stanley Argsons

Lead/acid or NiFe?

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

3 hours ago, R1152 said:

Wow... what's with those old batteries?!

They came with the old Argsons I've bought!!

[R1152]

Oh, this is going to be a must-see - move over "Furious Driving" with your Sinclair C5 restomod!

[LightBulbFun]

pleased to report I go the Chassis Number details of @OldBlokeInACaravan's Model 70 so I have been able to ID it

and it is VJN953S, dont think its one that was on anyones survivors list and certainly not one I knew survived until now, so a new one for my list where it has been duly added on page 24  (for once I actually have a decent overview picture so I am able to ad it to the list, im still waiting on overview pictures from Adam and Scott with regards to their Model 70s so I can add them to the list)

should be a simple V62 and bobs your uncle as they say!

for a Ministry vehicle its had quite a few keepers!

[LightBulbFun]

3 hours ago, R1152 said:

Lead/acid or NiFe?

Lead acid

[bobdisk]

19 hours ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

Updates on new Invacar.....up early this morning, it's had a good scrub with bleach and hot water and a good hose down! Before and after... More pics to follow

Fantastic Invacar, makes me want one even more! They dont have any more where this one came from do they?

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

4 hours ago, bobdisk said:

Fantastic Invacar, makes me want one even more! They dont have any more where this one came from do they?

Sorry no mate, they only had this one 

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

Just a quick question anyone.... I'm just sorting the spares out, I've noticed there's no seat belt, but it's a 1977 vehicle.... Will it need one fitting? Does anyone know? Cheers David

[LightBulbFun]

22 minutes ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

Just a quick question anyone.... I'm just sorting the spares out, I've noticed there's no seat belt, but it's a 1977 vehicle.... Will it need one fitting? Does anyone know? Cheers David

it should have one fitted!

from what I can tell with front seatbelts they had to be fitted to new Cars from 1967, and Cars from 1965 onwards had to have them retrofitted (but it only became compulsory to wear them in 1983)

 

from the Factory a Model 70 would have had a 3 point or race car style full harness fitted (because keep in mind if you have 1 arm and no legs, a normal seatbelt wont keep you in place!)

 

could be tho that whoever was the last user of this Model 70 had a medical exemption from seatbelts and they simply just removed it, but I have not seen that before. but its a Model 70 and like I said, no 2 are the same!

 

should be fairly easy to fit a new seatbelt in, I understand all the mounting points are fairly standardised 

upgrading the seatbelt in REV from her manual adjusting type to a modern retracting/self adjusting inertial real type is probably something I will end up doing to make my life a bit easier and give me better movement capabilities once seated

I think Securon are the go to these days for aftermarket belts

On 26/07/2020 at 13:47, LightBulbFun said:

for some reason until Dollywobbler and someone who's name escapes me at the moment fitted modern seatbelts to their car

it never occurred to me that you could change/update seatbelts if you wanted to

but has made me I wonder what options there might be for REV, as she currently has an old style fixed belt, that I think would be a good idea to replace with something more modern to make things a bit easier for my already limited mobility

so I would like to replace it with a better inertia reel one at some point in time, tho obviously I currently have bigger things to worry about like actually getting her road worthy first!

 

it is interesting to note the Spare parts list does actually list an inertia reel seatbelt, but I think this was something that replaced the fixed belt part later on in time (the parts manual being from 1984)

ie if a Model 70's seatbelt got damaged and needed replacing then it would be replaced by this inertia reel seatbelt rather then a fixed type one (I cant find any mention of any other seat belts in the parts list apart from the inertia reel and full harness ones)

 

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

6 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

it should have one fitted!

from what I can tell with front seatbelts they had to be fitted to new Cars from 1967, and Cars from 1965 onwards had to have them retrofitted (but it only became compulsory to wear them in 1983)

 

from the Factory a Model 70 would have had a 3 point or race car style full harness fitted (because keep in mind if you have 1 arm and no legs, a normal seatbelt wont keep you in place!)

 

could be tho that whoever was the last user of this Model 70 had a medical exemption from seatbelts and they simply just removed it, but I have not seen that before. but its a Model 70 and like I said, no 2 are the same!

 

should be fairly easy to fit a new seatbelt in, I understand all the mounting points are fairly standardised 

upgrading the seatbelt in REV from her manual adjusting type to a modern retracting/self adjusting inertial real type is probably something I will end up doing to make my life a bit easier and give me better movement capabilities once seated

I think Securon are the go to these days for aftermarket belts

 

Thank you so much, to the rescue, again!! 😉

[LightBulbFun]

3 minutes ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

Thank you so much, to the rescue, again!! 😉

oh while im on the Subject since you Have a Model 70 now, you will probably want/need this  

DHSS Workshop Manual For The Model 70 Three Wheeler(OCR).pdf

(OCR means optical character recognition, it means  its been scanned in such a way that you can search if for a specific word/term etc tho its not perfect!)

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

6 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

oh while im on the Subject since you Have a Model 70 now, you will probably want/need this  

DHSS Workshop Manual For The Model 70 Three Wheeler(OCR).pdf 20.17 MB · 46 downloads

(OCR means optical character recognition, it means  its been scanned in such a way that you can search if for a specific word/term etc tho its not perfect!)

That's brilliant!  Thank you. I'm definitely going to need that!! 

[LightBulbFun]

6 hours ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

That's brilliant!  Thank you. I'm definitely going to need that!! 

one other thing to watch out for is Model 70's that have been laid up for a long time like to drop their centrifugal Clutch shoe linings

this can manifest in 2 ways

 

this first way as nasty sounding crunch as drive is taken up once the engine revs increase sufficiently  

an example of this crunch can be heard here just after the engine starts, around 6 seconds in

 

 

or secondarily by simply by jamming the whole clutch mechanism up so its stuck in drive effectively  , this is the one to watch out for particularly, as it means if you accidentally start it in gear it will then try and drove off on its own!

 

otherwise if you do have dropped linings it not too much of a worry although it is an engine out job, you can simply have the clutch shoes relined, but when you do just watch out for high spots in the new lining as they can cause the same clutch jamming on issues

 if you end up having your clutch shoes relined,  the clutch shoe lining ie the friction material should be thickness of about 4.17mm, and check for high spots, anything above 5Mm should be sanded down level

 

and as a general side note, you should never start a Model 70 in gear, because if for whatever reason the engine speed increases above the engagement speed of the clutch, say if you have the choke on, the car will drive itself forward! so you must always start the car in neutral so this cant happen!

 

and finally when going from forward to Reverse or vice versa just after driving or revving the engine, make sure you wait in neutral for about 5-10 seconds before selecting drive again to let the internals of the gearbox finish spinning down, or you will go crunch like so

(do excuse my laughter at the end! pretty much all of us went CRUNCH at one point or another!)

[OldBlokeInACaravan]

That is a serious top tip. Thank you!  Weather has been gawd awful today, not a lot done apart from the battery and the coil ordered, had left the existing battery charging overnight  but not even a dashboard light, so only fit for the tip!  Will get the pics of the carb tomorrow weather permitting!! 

[LightBulbFun]

50 minutes ago, OldBlokeInACaravan said:

That is a serious too tip. Thank you!  Weather has been gawd awful today, not a lot done a part from the battery and the coil ordered, had left the battery chartering overnight on the existing one, but not even a dashboard light, so only fit for the tip!  Will get the pics of the carb tomorrow weather permitting!! 

No problem happy to help! I look forward to seeing your Model 70 return to the road

 

I would not be so quick to write off the battery, pretty much all the electrics goes through 2 fuses in a fuse holder, mounted to the front bulkhead under the dashboard (plus a 3rd fuse in the engine bay to do with the Dynastarter charging)

these are your good old Lucas Glass fuses, 25A and 35A in the case of the cabin fuses (note these are Lucas fuses, so DONT put regular 25A and 35A glass fuses in there as they are not the same)

as such you will probably need to take the fuses out clean them up and and fuse holder contacts scrubbed up as well before things actually work 

(something I need to do on REV as at the last FoD Gathering I had to give them a spray with some electrical cleaner and spin the fuses in the their holders to get things working)

[bobdisk]

12 hours ago, LightBulbFun said:

one other thing to watch out for is Model 70's that have been laid up for a long time like to drop their centrifugal Clutch shoe linings

this can manifest in 2 ways

 

this first way as nasty sounding crunch as drive is taken up once the engine revs increase sufficiently  

an example of this crunch can be heard here just after the engine starts, around 6 seconds in

 

 

or secondarily by simply by jamming the whole clutch mechanism up so its stuck in drive effectively  , this is the one to watch out for particularly, as it means if you accidentally start it in gear it will then try and drove off on its own!

 

otherwise if you do have dropped linings it not too much of a worry although it is an engine out job, you can simply have the clutch shoes relined, but when you do just watch out for high spots in the new lining as they can cause the same clutch jamming on issues

 if you end up having your clutch shoes relined,  the clutch shoe lining ie the friction material should be thickness of about 4.17mm, and check for high spots, anything above 5Mm should be sanded down level

 

and as a general side note, you should never start a Model 70 in gear, because if for whatever reason the engine speed increases above the engagement speed of the clutch, say if you have the choke on, the car will drive itself forward! so you must always start the car in neutral so this cant happen!

 

and finally when going from forward to Reverse or vice versa just after driving or revving the engine, make sure you wait in neutral for about 5-10 seconds before selecting drive again to let the internals of the gearbox finish spinning down, or you will go crunch like so

(do excuse my laughter at the end! pretty much all of us went CRUNCH at one point or another!)

Same applies to the Daf Variomatic. They actually say start it in gear, but I prefer to start in neutral, and let the revs (!) die down to about 600 rpm before engaging gear.