MadaboutKitcars

I didn't put any in it Mr T, it came ready to use, and I still have'nt worked out why it is grey and not silver like it says on the tin!
Of course, I don't have the damned receipt, but after all its only a tin of paint, but annoying to say the least.

Today I bought a tried and tested litre of Hammerite silver, which I will do the passengers floor with.

Tuesday

This morning I carried on with the build, derusted the minor surface rust on the passengers floor and got a good coat of silver hammerite onto it.

Upon checking the boot paint, (which was bone dry where the battery went back in) I found that on the parts of the paint that are in contact with the Sikaflex sealer/bonder stuff, the paint is STILL very wet after 6 days!

It has to dry eventually, does'nt it? (Should be dry by the time I get to, or if I ever get to Stoneleigh)

On my stereo unit (which is now fitted hidden under the dash), there are 4 or 5 coloured lights that when the unit is in use, flash all different colours, a bit like a mini-disco. This has always annoyed me, and is not in keeping with a 50's style car, so I have stuck some aluminium tape over them, which has done an excellent job. So now they are none functional from a visual point of view.

In my spare time, I work on the glove box lid hinge problem, a fiddly, frustrating awkward job, a bit like most of my build I suppose!

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Wednesday

Thanks for the advice Jagtvr and WCA!

I am already thinking along the magnetic catch route.

I have fannied around with this job for so bloody long now, I have grown tired of it.
At the end of the day, the hinges are not important, to me at least, what is important is to stick to the principle of my idea,which is to have access to the space behind the lid.

So, sick of wasting so much time on such a mundane (un-important) job,
I have fallen back on plan B, and my compromise is as follows:

I have glued the rivets into the lid, drilled holes in the dash, so the rivets will fit into, and locate the lid onto the dash, and when the magnets arrive through the post, the lid will stay in place magnetically.

So, I have not wasted any more time, and will still get access to the glove box behind the dash, which I can fabricate at any later stage.

At least now I can move on with the more important stuff of the build.

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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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Seriously??? Wow!!

Well done Dave!

I cannot see anyone beating that!

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

How is your build going?

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!!

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

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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I thought we'd done that one?

Doesn't look cool enough! :-)

Davcymru said: "wondering if i could get more inventive"

You mean like WCA, and go the 4 x 2 route? :-)

Monday morning

I have had another minor setback, I posted earlier about the hidden stereo not working correctly, and having to remove it to sort it out.

Well I did get it going and replaced it back in the car, , but when I came to try it out yesterday, a sort of spot check if you like, it did not work, so I left it, with the idea of retuning later.

When I came back to it, it had actually started working, and was blaring out music very loudly.

Not really what I want, so at the price I paid, its not even worth sending it back under guarantee, so I have ordered another one.

This has to be done at this stage because of the constricted space problem.
I cannot start paneling around it until it is working okay.
Its bad enough trying to get it out and putting another one in now!So watch this space.........

Paul, when I fitted the stereo unit in the car, I also fitted one in the wall next to my bed.
Every night when I go to bed I play music on the unit, and it has always been perfect, so I have no reason to think that another unit would not be the same regardless of price.

When it arrives in the post, I will test and fit it in the car, I have no worries on that issue.

You are right about the access, but a friend of mine came up with a good idea.

I was explaining how hard it was to get the bolts and nuts in place on the unit, and he suggested that because it was hidden out of sight, I should fix it in place with cable ties, then if it had to come out it could be snipped out.
Much easier than fiddly nuts and bolts, so that is what I will end up doing I think.

I will bear the cable tie routine in mind for future awkward tasks that are not visual or structural.

That thought had occurred to me, but being basically lazy there is too much work involved, so I will just test and fit the new one Paul.

Tuesday

So, the new stereo arrived in the post today, which I thought was good, as I only ordered it on Saturday.

I went out to the car and had the faulty unit out in about 2 minutes!
I have got slick at this operation now.

The new unit which I tested extensively first, went in the car, but took a little longer to fit.

I did use cable ties, and that proved to be a good idea, which I will keep in mind for future projects. It was certainly easier and faster than fiddly nuts and bolts.

I have the "faulty" unit on the bench rigged up, and it seems to be working correctly, which to me is really fu**ing irritating to say the least.

However, what is most important is that the replacement unit in the car works correctly every time, as it should, so that result as left me a happy bunny.


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Good question Barry!

As you may know, I am building the car out in my front garden, albeit in a tent for protection, but with the weather like it is at present, I am finding it hard to gather enough enthusiasm to work out in the cold for long periods.

Hopefully when the weather improves, so will my work-rate.

What I need is stronger motivation!!

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