Ah, fudge

[Joey spud]

That is one lovely car you have there.

Ref the foot pedals being arse about face back in my orange van days I went out to this 1934 Aston Martin that had cut out near Sevenoaks. Luckily the fault was just a shorted out fuel gauge that had blown the ignition fuse so was easily disconnected and the engine was now ticking over very sweetly again.

The elderly gent had owned the car for a fair few years and jumped back in it ready to drive away when he called out and said don't go yet the engine won't rev up.

I was walking back to the car thinking surely disconnecting the duff fuel gauge wouldn't stop the engine revving when the old boy laughed and said sorry my mistake I keep forgetting this one has the throttle in the middle.

[Zelandeth]

Common layout on commercials back then too, 1929 in this case.

[Paul-l]

5 hours ago, HMC said:

I had a 12/4 from 1929 last year. Had some fun with it..

I remember reading about it. From what I hear the 16/6 is identical chassis and body to the 12/4

did you find that the thermometer on the radiator did anything, or you could see it while driving?

[Paul-l]

3 hours ago, Joey spud said:

I was walking back to the car thinking surely disconnecting the duff fuel gauge wouldn't stop the engine revving when the old boy laughed and said sorry my mistake I keep forgetting this one has the throttle in the middle.

And that’s what put me off the cars with a different layout, well more jumping back in the modern and not hitting the brake automatically - I had that when riding bikes with the controls swapped - of course all the people you ask say “ oh I never have a problem swapping between the two” . Right. . . Not sure if I believe that.

[Paul-l]

14 hours ago, Dyslexic Viking said:

But I would prefer a model A over a T as the A is a much better and usebale car.

I had a Quick Look at model As too. The Ts were just odd. As a useable car I drew the line at having brakes on each wheel as a minimum!

 

10 hours ago, ETCHY said:

think ( could be talking crap) that Austin were the first mainstream manufacturer to start putting the pedals in the conventional layout we use to this day.

I think Model As in the left hand drive layout had the now conventional pedal layout, the RHD models had centre throttles instead. Don’t know what sort of time that was though. The UK cars also tended to have smaller engine due to the tax regime at the time.

[Paul-l]

3 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Common layout on commercials back then too, 1929 in this case.

There does appear to ba a good reason for it though - you can heel and toe  the throttle and brake much easier with the centre throttle arrangement, which is useful if you have a fully crash box

Vauxhall 14/40

[Paul-l]

Treasure!

I was wondering why the rear seat wasn’t fixed and just resting in around the right position. So I pulled the base and back out and found: a soaking wet lifting strop, 2 large shackles, a wad of cotton stocking material, and an 80s vintage fire extinguisher liberated from BR- very broken and empty.

i also pulled out the wet sound deadening felt. The seats are ok, just a bit damp on the frame of the back. I’ll dry and clean them before putting them back.

Good News! The clock keeps good time. It looses about a minute per day and seams to run for about four days before needing a rewind. I don’t like to over wind the spring incase it breaks.

also in garage fiddling mode I did a compression test on the engine and got 110psi on all cylinders, which is nice that they are all equal. It suggests to me that at some point it’s had a rebuild. Cleaned the plugs off too as they were a bit sooty - more ordered for spares which were obviously out of stock and may arrive by February!

[Matty]

That dash 😍. Do us a drivers view next please bud 👍

[Paul-l]

18 hours ago, Matty said:

That dash 😍. Do us a drivers view next please bud 👍

Here you go, poor view out of the windscreen due to it raining outside and I want to dry it out.

Also pictures of the handbrake which is huge and clamps in on the drum on the back end of the gearbox

[Matty]

Phwooaarr! Thanks for that 👌

[vtec-e]

Very nice dash. My friend from Uni days has a 1925 12/4 van, that started off as a Clifton Tourer. He's owned it over 45 years. Your dash is remarkably similar to his. His has the 1.5L short stroke engine, so top speed is little more than 40 mph, unless going down a long hill! Presumably it is a cut down version of your 6 cylinder engine. These days the lack of reasonable performance means it rarely travels more than a few miles from home, which is a shame.

I'm looking forward to your updates and seeing how you get on with it. 

[Paul-l]

21 minutes ago, vtec-e said:

Presumably it is a cut down version of your 6 cylinder engine

Not sure, from what I can tell the 16/six is more related to the 20 than the 12. The pictures I’ve seen of some 12/4s the carb is on the opposite side to the exhaust - I can’t quite work out how they did that with a side valve engine.

[comfortablynumb]

Don't bin that fire extinguisher, I bet there's a railway licker that'd sell their right kidney for that!😁

 

Edit- whys it called firesNow? Oh wait..😀

[Paul-l]

On 05/01/2026 at 14:02, IronStar said:

I see that there's a geabox with synchromesh on 2-3-4, and it's not even all that expensive. Worth an upgrade?

Sorry, I completely missed this.

its not something I’m going to do with the car for two reasons. First originality - I’m not that much of a nut counter, but the car is pretty much original as far as I can tell. Second, it’s part of the reason I got the car - I had a look and drive of a later car, but it was too close to driving any modern car. Third, there’s quite a few differences in the hand brake mechanism with the later cars with the synchro boxes, to the extent that it might not be that easy to even connect the drive shaft up.

and that was three!

 

Edited January 12 by Paul-l
I can’t count

[Paul-l]

This week’s progress, well probably a fortnight - I’m not that quick. I made up some new battery cables and included a battery isolator switch. Like I mentioned before I don’t think there are many fuses in the system, and the wires are getting on a bit so better safe than sorry.

Flushed and refilled the cooling system. Apparently fernox stuff for central heating is really good for anti corrosion on these old engines. At 25% it also gives antifreeze protection down to -11 Celsius - that’ll do for me. I used the fernox recommendation for flushing - it seams to have worked a treat, the stuff coming out looked like hot chocolate and took about 10 full refills and drains to run clear. Did that flush stuff twice for luck.

While looking at the cooling I also installed a temperature sensor in the radiator, and now I can see that the engine barely gets above 50 with the fan belt installed, and 65 with it off. It’s a nice little unit with an internal battery which should be good for 5+ years, the sensor is pushed between the radiator fins, meant for trail bikes.

also decided to have a look at the fuel gauge. It was disconnected because it leaked petrol into the car! It’s really clever how it works ( or should do!). Basically a manometer for measuring pressure at the bottom of the fuel tank. The sender unit in the tank uses the sloshing of fuel in the tank to pressurise the system to get a reading. Unfortunately the gauge part had cracked allowing the special fluid ( toxic and carcinogenic ( tetrabromoethane with Sudan red dye mixture)) to escape and then petrol to follow. I’m tempted to try to fix it , but may make an electronic replacement, we will see.

did manage to take it out for 1/2 an hour between rain, I’d re adjusted the timing and it seams much more sprightly. 50 mph was quite easy on the flat. Also adjusting the brakes so that they worked on all wheels made braking more positive.

[Matty]

Itd be good if you could restore the fuel guage. If not simply just because you actually understand how it works. I would be making a dipstick round about now 😁

[Paul-l]

11 minutes ago, Matty said:

Itd be good if you could restore the fuel guage. If not simply just because you actually understand how it works. I would be making a dipstick round about now 😁

Currently I’m relying on guesswork and estimated consumption!
I found this description and service instructions

http://www.hells-confetti.com/Images/Instruments/Telegauge/Hobson Telegage instructions.pdf

I’ll need to brush up on my soldering to get the gauge working - the die-casting has cracked in the gauge and  the tank sender was not sympathetically disconnected 

[Matty]

Be worth it to do it right 👍

[Paul-l]

I like the idea, the fluid is a bit pricey when bought off the shelf  £ 80 for 50ml, and may be a bit tricky to buy the components as an individual 

2 minutes ago, Matty said:

Be worth it to do it right 👍

[Paul-l]

Poking around in the engine bay the other day resulted in one of the headlight wire splices falling apart. So as normal once  I find something I start picking at it. Before long I decided the wiring loom was a fire waiting to happen. . . .

so now I find myself ordering enough wire to replace almost the whole system

 

[Matty]

Much better once youve done it though. Peace of mind. Number one loss of old cars to a fire imo.

[Mr Pastry]

On 25/01/2026 at 21:01, Paul-l said:

I like the idea, the fluid is a bit pricey when bought off the shelf  £ 80 for 50ml, and may be a bit tricky to buy the components as an individual 

I was aware of these gauges but have never played with one.  Having read the instructions you posted the thing that sticks out is that NO OTHER FLUID WILL DO!   OK, why not?  They would say that, wouldn't they?  It's just a manometer, so any liquid would show the pressure change.  I can see that you want something that doesn't freeze or evaporate easily, so coloured water wouldn't do.   What about a light oil, e.g. power steering fluid?  It might tend to stick to the glass so you wouldn't get a rapid indication but that probably doesn't matter, its not going to be super accurate anyway, and you only really need to know when the tank is empty.

[Paul-l]

 

11 hours ago, Mr Pastry said:

I was aware of these gauges but have never played with one.  Having read the instructions you posted the thing that sticks out is that NO OTHER FLUID WILL DO!   OK, why not?  They would say that, wouldn't they?  It's just a manometer, so any liquid would show the pressure change.  I can see that you want something that doesn't freeze or evaporate easily, so coloured water wouldn't do.   What about a light oil, e.g. power steering fluid?  It might tend to stick to the glass so you wouldn't get a rapid indication but that probably doesn't matter, its not going to be super accurate anyway, and you only really need to know when the tank is empty.

Well yes any fluid would do, but you have to have a U-tube manometer that can accept a pressure equal to the depth of the fuel tank. The height that the manometer needs to be depends on the density of the fluid being used. So if my tank is 1 foot deep, then I need a manometer capable of one foot of petrol pressure i.e. 1 ft between the fluid levels if the fluid is petrol, about 0.8 ft if the fluid is water, and about 3 inches if the fluid is four times as dense as petrol.

Now since my dashboard, and the instrument is significantly less high than one foot then the instrument needs to have a dense fluid otherwise the indicating fluid will be expelled from the U-tube manometer,  followed by a small stream of petrol as the tank sender attempts to pressurise the system!

Actually manometers can be really quite accurate - we use them to calibrate electronic pressure transducers at work to less than  0.2mm water pressure. And with the tank neck filling inside the car with no way of seeing or measuring the depth ( and the pumps won’t click off automatically given the configuration) it’s useful to know how much I am able to fill the tank with.

Edited March 11 by Paul-l
Correctness

[Matty]

21 hours ago, Mr Pastry said:

I was aware of these gauges but have never played with one.  Having read the instructions you posted the thing that sticks out is that NO OTHER FLUID WILL DO!   OK, why not?  They would say that, wouldn't they?  It's just a manometer, so any liquid would show the pressure change.  I can see that you want something that doesn't freeze or evaporate easily, so coloured water wouldn't do.   What about a light oil, e.g. power steering fluid?  It might tend to stick to the glass so you wouldn't get a rapid indication but that probably doesn't matter, its not going to be super accurate anyway, and you only really need to know when the tank is empty.

 

9 hours ago, Paul-l said:

 

Well yes any fluid would do, but you have to have a U-tube manometer that can accept a pressure equal to the depth of the fuel tank. The height that the manometer needs to be depends on the density of the fluid being used. So if my tank is 1 foot deep, then I need a manometer capable of one foot of petrol pressure i.e. 1 ft between the fluid levels if the fluid is petrol, about 0.8 ft if the fluid is water, and about 3 inches if the fluid is four times as dense as petrol.

Now since my dashboard, and the instrument is significantly less high than one foot then the instrument needs to have a dense fluid otherwise the indicating fluid will be expelled from the U-tube manometer,  followed by a small stream of petrol as the tank sender attempts to pressurise the system!

Actually manometers can be really quite accurate - we use them to calibrate electronic pressure transducers at work to less than  0.2mm water pressure. And with the tank neck filling inside the car with no way of seeing or measuring the depth ( and the pumps won’t click off automatically given the configuration) it’s useful to know how much I am able to fill the tank with.

You two might as well be talking a foreign language at this point 🤣

[Paul-l]

2 hours ago, Matty said:

You two might as well be talking a foreign language at this point

Would it help if I did it in SI units with equations and stuff?

[Mr Pastry]

1 hour ago, Matty said:

You two might as well be talking a foreign language at this point 🤣

I think Paul's point is, if the tank is 1 ft deep, when you fill it with petrol the top level of the air in the manometer pipe will rise 1ft.  But if the gauge tube on the dashboard is only 3" tall, you need a heavy fluid in the gauge so that it will compress the air in the process, and it will only rise 3". 

I'd still try any interesting fluids I had lying around though.

 

[Paul-l]

Old wiring loom* removed. 
 

*loom is a bit strong - more of a collection of wires that may have been tied together here and there at some point, and were all the same colour, and had no other markings on them at all!

now replaced with a collection of wires all the same colour, but with numbers on each end, so I can trace them later if needs be.

[Rocket88]

On 05/01/2026 at 11:59, ETCHY said:

Lovely old thing.

I think ( could be talking crap) that Austin were the first mainstream manufacturer to start putting the pedals in the conventional layout we use to this day.

Cadillac 

[Paul-l]

Ah, joy!

had a lovely trip out in the sun yesterday and got a puncture half way home. Luckily the jack works and I had a spanner with me to get the wheel nuts undone. Also it was light, not raining, and the spare wasn’t flat!

On the other hand, Anyone know about dynamo systems? It is frying the battery - there’s no regulator, only a cut out, as it’s a 3 brush dynamo

[Matty]

Ah wow 😍