MadaboutKitcars

Monday

Hi Scimjim, thanks for the tip, but I read it too late!

Well the magnetic strip finally arrived, so I got stuck in and finished the job, then read the bit you posted about the tube hinge!

Sounds like a really good idea, which I most likely would have done if I'd read your comments first.

having spent what seems like an incredible amount of time pissing about with glue, magnets and bits of alloy, I eventually got to where I wanted to be.

At least it works, and perhaps a hinge may come later, but I doubt it!!!!

I seem to moan a lot about fiddly-arsed jobs, but I have to be truthful, and this was another one!

Also, I have decided to fit a main battery lead cut-off switch somewhere under the dash.

To those not in the know, unbelievably, the Spitfire donar I have used for my build, only has three fuses, yes three, not 8,567 like most modern cars.

(I think all Spitfires are similar)

By the time I have done all the connections to my new Jag-type dashboard, I would imagine the chances of a fire due to a short, and only three fuses would be a bit higher than I would like.

Apparently cut-off switches come in two main catagories, one with a removable switch, and the type with a fixed switch.

I decided to go for the latter, as the removable type switch would be just gagging to get lost, and then I would be stuck.

Well, stuck under the dash with a pair of wire cutters at least, not what I had in mind.

The switch has not arrived yet, but I will need an extension piece of cable to re-route the wiring under the dash, so I made one.

When the cut-off switch is fitted, I will have peace of mind, fire-wise, and a car that is bit more secure from theft possibly, so it won't be a bad thing to do.


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Three fuses you say? Luxury. T't Vitesse only 'as two.

Seriously??? Wow!!

Two you say!

Luxury!

My old Sammio (Herald converted to a Vitesse) only had 1.

Well done Dave!

I cannot see anyone beating that!

My 50's landrover had that Lucas fuse thing with just a couple of fuses. What surprises me is that my 20's Citroen has 6 fuses.
I guess a classic example of the Prince of Darkness in action.

Simplicity, the fewer the fuses, the less searching needed to find the blown one!

In most 50's - 60's Lucas wired cars there was an 'Aux' circuit (green wires; indicators, gauges, wipers, etc.) which was fed from the ignition side of the key switch and a 'Power' circuit (purple wires; interior lamp and horn) which was permanently live. The lighting circuits (blue, red) were not normally fused, even on expensive cars.

Regarding the cut out (isolator) switch, never turn it off while the engine is running. Firstly (depending on how it's wired) it is unlikely to stop the engine, and secondly there is a strong risk the diodes in your alternator could be damaged.

The engine is unlikely to stop because it will still receive power from the alternator, the diodes don't like the absence of a battery and since there is no battery to absorb the surge in power, the alternator will go into overdrive, the voltage will surge and stands a good chance of destroying the internals and any modern electronics like a radio, electronic ignition, etc.

Competition cars which have FIA Marshals emergency isolator switches have a resistor which allows the alternator to dump it's output to earth via a large resistor; there is a secondary switch which isolates the ignition thereby stopping the engine.

Good advice Eight-valve!

Nice to know, although, the way I intend to use my switch would be to turn off the ignition, remove the key, and then, before I go and leave the car unattended, operate the cut-off.

Well today I re-routed the cables to be in the place where the switch will go, fabricated a bracket to mount the switch, and gave it a camo-coat of black paint before fitting it.

I trust you will all excuse me for not posting a picture of exactly
where I have positioned said switch, but as over 82 thousand people have looked at my thread, you never know!!
There could just be a sneaky little tea-leaf waiting for the right moment!

Having said that, after nicking it, it would hardly be a low-profile drive home :-)

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Isolator Switches

The removable red key cutout switch on my Marlin proved to be the culprit in my hard starting trials. The engine cranked well during warm weather but as soon as the load increased in the cold it began misbehaving. I cleaned and remade all the contacts, checked the voltage output, including under cranking load, charged the battery overnight, all to no avail. Dagenham donkey noises were all I got. I decided to by-pass the isolator switch and - bingo!

I think you're wise Scottie, to have plumped for the screw-in type which I'm sure has a much more robust internal connection than mine ever had.

I hope so Mick, knowing me, I'd probably lose the damn thing!

How is your build going?

Any low voltage, high current switch can be iffy, especially if it's in an exposed location. Scottie, have you considered just putting the isolator on the power feed to the car electrics and leave the heavy battery lead unbroken all the way to the solenoid? Fewer high current connections the better.

Usually I install my isolator switch next to the battery on the connection to earth. I weld a heavy tag with a suitable hole to fit the switch terminals, to the chassis; then bolt one terminal to the chassis and connect the earth lead from the battery to the other side of the switch. There is also a technical reason this may be better, with the switch being on the negative side of the wiring there should be less tendency for corrosion to occur on the contacts within the switch.

Looking good, Scottie.

If you have stalled with your camper, you could always go for this Citroen camper on eBay........"built by an aircraft engineer"........possibly Louis Bleriot.

Not been down there for about a month, what with Crimble.

Extended remote and cranked stick finished. Dummy spinners and Dunlop decals sorted. Footwells cut and new sections welded in to clear 15" wheels with 80 section tyres. Lock limited with hose clips to prevent wheels fouling frame. Repro. 'D' steering wheel bought and fitted with adaptor boss. Pre-distressed dummy electrics fitted to passenger side dash. Flip front hinges fabricated and fitted. Front electrics connected and tested. Tank and filler modified. Year's insurance bought (£122 comp.).

As soon as I get a dry day and my son's around, I'll glue the body on. Then it only needs the rear electrics connecting and it's MOT time. I won't fit the doors and boot lid until later so I can expect a couple of bodywork advisories. It'll be £50 well spent before I send off the V5. That's about it.

Excuse the pictures, my scanner came out of the ark!

p.s. That's the old steering wheel!

Wednesday

Blood hell Oxford! " Built by an aircraft engineer" indeed!

Well, if I ever decide to go into avionics and get an aircraft, I would not want him within a mile of my plane! What an awesome camper!

I have stalled a bit on mine, as I am at the stage of needing to strip the front of my van and attach the VW front.
This needs to be done in better weather than we have at present, so it will wait a while I'm afraid.

8 valve Ed, your advice is very much appreciated, but came a bit late for me.
I have just got back in the house, freezing cold, with numb fingers, having spent most of the day out in the cold tent working on my car.

I seem to have been beset by several small thing going wrong, which apart from being extremely irritating , have taken all the day to put right.

I went to test out my recently fitted stereo system, and it did not work.

So out it came, I did get it to work and re-fitted it. because of the limited space under the dash where I am working, I somehow managed to knock the heater hose off, which took ages to put back on.

I then worked on fitting the cut off switch under the dash, where I can operate it without having to get out of the car and open the boot each time.
While doing this job, I split the hose in half that had taken me so long to put back on! You can imagine the fury and rude words etc!

Being an incurable hoarder, I had saved some of the original hose. so I was able to do it.

With that fixed, I finally had it all under control, but it took all damned day.

The space to work under dash is so limited, and that is without, the centre console in place, the side panels, the gearbox tunnel the dash board and the seats, plus the steering wheel!

I should add that all the work that is being done in this area involves leaning into the car on ones knees, through the door aperture, and is high-stress back aching, abdominal crunching, cold painful and totally, and utterly fu**ing unpleasant.

I can imagine being asked at Stoneleigh, (if I EVER get there)

"I bet you had a lot fun building this?"

The honest answer would be "no I did not, it was a total pain in the arse"

Having said that I have enjoyed some of the work!

I remember an hour or two I enjoyed last year when I started the build......

If I ever need to work under the dash when the car is "finished" it will take a couple of weeks to strip all that stuff out just to get at it, I'm not looking forward to that.

However its done now, so that's another step in the right direction.

Unfortunately there are no pictures, but we can't have that can we?

So here is the camper that Oxford is about to bid on:

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Come on WCA!

Just got your post Mick!

Nice work, I like the wheels, and gear stick!

What is the story behind the wheels? They look really authentic?

Also the footwell pic reminds me of when I had to do a similar job on mine!

I bet you'll be bidding against Oxford for that snazzy camper!!

Scottie - Working in the cold is one thing, repeating the same job in the cold is another.

Even if your progress is slow, at least it is still progress and that is a good thing.

It certainly sounds like you have managed to tick off a few more fiddly jobs.

Good luck, Paul.

I think Oxford is planning on using the camper to tow his Sammio when he goes to race meetings! Keep it all period looking. Lol.

It looks like he made the front wheel out of grass!

Hey WCA! your rocking chair would look really cool parked outside that camper on the beach, you should put a bid in!!

'Dunlop' Wheels



They're TR6, so they had the big holes already. Like you, I had to drill 15 6mm holes between them. I made a U shaped steel jig that fitted tightly into the two large holes each side of where I was drilling to guide my bit. Worked well, although the jig's central hole was quite oval by its 60th mission.

To fit the Spitfire hubs, I bought Mike Satur MGF hub adaptors. These are great, but I had to do my homework and source and fit Range Rover studs, which of course were too long, so 16 cuts were needed. I then realised that TR6 wheel nuts are imperial and the Range Rover studs are metric. More research resulted in another purchase of nuts with both the correct taper and thread.

I then found the adaptors didn't sit on the drums very truly, so I had the drum's centres faced inside and out. Bingo! I had them skimmed at the same time and my handbrake is now excellent.

Great, I thought, but no, the wheels weren't central when bolted on. I took a wheel and adaptor down to a mate's place (he fabricates parts for adventure motorcycles) and we designed spigots that he turned out of aluminium bar.

Next job was fitting the Europa Spares dummy spinners. I made eared aluminium brackets and Araldited them to the spinner mounting bosses, which I'd Araldited to the spinners. They're held on to the central bosses of the spigots with hose clips. The picture should make this clear.

Last job, a rub over with emery cloth, degrease and a couple of coats of slightly thinned Hammerite Smooth, before the all important decals.

Tyres are classic VW Beetle with tubes.

I dare not calculate what all this cost, including blood, toil tears and sweat, but it's undoubtedly a lot less than even repro. ones - a set went for £800 on Ebay in December. These would have also needed a similar labyrinthine process to make them fit. No thanks.

Great looking wheels, well worth the effort.

Thursday

Really nice looking wheels Mick, it certainly was worth the effort.

I reluctantly went out to the car to do some work, and as usual in this weather,
tried to find a job I could half-do inside my (warmer) workshop/garage/junk store/ weight training emporium/ etc.

For a long time now my bonnet has been held open by the pink clothes prop
which I originally bought to hold the windscreen in place while I was working on it.

It occurred to me that if I ever get to Stoneleigh, the car may not look too cool with the pink thing stuck there, so for a while, I had been pondering on how I would replace it.

The bonnet strut need to be long enough to hold the bonnet open, but had to be much shorter when it was stowed. , it had to be adjustable somehow.

Over the last few months I had given this problem a lot of thought

Today, I had a sudden flash of brilliance, ( that does not happen often, I think the last time I had one of those, was when I was a schoolboy)

Anyhow, I decided to use the Triumph boot lid strut, which would be ideal, as it was extendable, so would close up for stowage under the bonnet.

A quick trip to the scrapyard yielded a chrome towel rail type thing, which I needed to attach to the strut to make it long enough.

At the end of the day, I had exactly what was required, and there was even a hole already in the right place in the old battery box, so it just bolted in really neatly. It looks the part and works well, including being stowed neatly also.
I will fit a clip to secure the end, both on the bonnet and where it stows.
But I've had enough for today.

Here are some pics:

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Look at Scottie with his fancy pants bonnet support...

what's wrong with a lump of 4x2?

;-)

I thought we'd done that one?

Doesn't look cool enough! :-)

ohh.... good timing that man, i'm possibly fitting my bonnet this weekend and i've been pondering/worrying about struts.
My initial idea was just to get some shaped steel rod, but i'd also kept looking at those old Triumph extendable thingies and wondering if i could get more inventive.

humm.... some more pondering to do i think