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Jigsaw

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Ah the logistical delight of car restoration.

Bits of my car are all over the place. The body's at the paint shop 50 miles away in Strathalbyn.

The engine's still up at Chris's awaiting a teardown in a couple of months. The new 5 speed box is there too.

There is a steady stream of parts coming from the UK.

I'm continually dropping off and picking up lots of plating, powder coating and chrome.

The carby bodies are in Sydney being rebushed by Midel.

The tacho is off the see Mike Eck in the US, and the speedo to Nottingham to be rebuilt at Richfields.

There are bits all over the floor in the spare room, on my desks in my study and in ever increasing piles in the shed.

Within a week or so I'll start having complete sets of bits, and then I can start putting it all back together again.

 

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Nearly ready to reassemble IRS

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I'm still plugging along fettling bits of the IRS.

I'm 95% ready to start reassembly. Just need to get a few more bits plated and I can reassemble the driveshafts. I have all of the new parts and all the major bits are plated and powder coated.

Just waiting on the diff to come back from Bob, the diff man.

 

 

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At the body shop

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You might think that I've gone into hibernation over Christmas, but you'd be wrong.

I've sorted all the plating and powder coating, arranged to have a million bits sent around the globe to be fettled, and today Ron and I took a couple of bonnets down to Ross at the body shop.

 

 

When we got there we found Ross has been busy with the tub. Sexy original lead.

 

 

So far she looks pretty good. Apart from a few rust holes in the floor under the seats she is surprisingly rust free.

 

 

 

 

 

New door skins will be needed, as expected.

 

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E Type soup

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Take 20l of diesel. Add most of an E Type, covered in grease. Steep in the hot Aussie sun for a week. Mmmm tasty.

 

 

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EDIS installed

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After one set of plugs/points/leads/cap/rotor, 2 distributors, 3 electronic ignition modules, 4 coils...5 goooooold rings!!! Oops. The combination of ignition problems and the festive season got to me there.

Installation of the EDIS system wasn't exactly a snap; 3 or 4 hours careful work would better describe it.

But turn the key and magic! Even idle, positive pedal and absolutely no pinging!

 

 

 

 

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Pinging begone!

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I never have been one to do things by halves, and after a lot of thought about the timing issue I bought one of Ray Livingstone's EDIS conversions for the E type.

I can't help myself really; I just love things I can fiddle with. I'll install it this weekend.

 

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First steps

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With pretty much everything stripped down, its time for some plating and powder coating.

Will be good if I can get this lot back before Christmas.

 

 

 

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Picked clean

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Only the engine frames to come off and a bit of trim and sound deadener to go.

 

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Timing

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We went for a 60 mile club run on the weekend. the car is a delight to drive now. feels solid on the road, turns in well and lovely feel through the wheel. The miss, presumably due to fuel starvation/leanness has resolved but any more than half throttle produces obvious pinging.

I'm using the distributor that came with the car, which as you recall had Strombergs fitted. I'm wondering if the problem is related to excessive advance.

To give myself more control I've taken the perhaps excessive step of ordering an EDIS system from Ray Livingstone. It will be interesting to see how the car performs once the advance curve is properly controlled.

I'm also awaiting a set of new cams with a D Type grind.

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Green is the new Red

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We started pulling the 3.8 OTS apart this week.

Most of the engine bay was stripped in a day and a half.

 

 

 

 

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