Zel's Fleet Blog - BX, Jag XJ-S, Sinclair C5, Mercedes 208D & 230TE, AC Model 70.

[Zelandeth]

Despite one slightly dodgy foot and a highly elegant duct tape repair, I can report that the awning works nicely. Definitely looks to be original.

I doubt anything we were to upgrade it to will still be here in 28 years...

[daviemck2006]

There is one for sale, on the same chassis with an eldiss body just a few miles from me on a facebook group for £3600, long mot. I cant go for it though, Its too big, no space for it and no money to buy it! Too much money having to be spent on the house just now. This owning a house while not being to work properly takes some doing. I need a cull of two cars if not three, not buying other stuff

[Zelandeth]

Just stopped off at a family's place halfway home, and run the numbers for the outbound journey. Including some pretty hard work on the way there, 23.6mpg.

That's not bad going I reckon for a 2.8 tonne brick that makes a shed look aerodynamic!

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

I'd say that's more than reasonable for the vehicle. Last time I drove a large vehicle, a Sprinter Luton getting on for a couple of decades younger than yours; I reckoned it delivered only 2-5mpg better.

....so yours compares very well to that.

Looks like a lovely campsite, and sometimes, especially if the weather's inclement I'd far prefer something bigger than our 405, but we do get to wake up in some beautiful places.

On this occasion, pictured, I don't think we slept here (Arrochar, beside Loch Lomond), but I have done so in the past. Old pic, hence the mis-matched wheels at the time.

I was thinking for the mileage you mentioned, you were probably either in mid-Scotland or Devon?

[Zelandeth]

Back home now, I'll fill up and see what the figures for the return trip. That number is actually a little low as I didn't manage to get it full to the brim at the fill up before we set out.

We were out at Scarborough. Didn't have a huge number of options given the short notice with which we booked stuff, and a surprising number of places aren't dog friendly.

Glad to report that the van didn't miss a beat, and the check over this evening revealed that there's been zero consumption of either oil or water.

The only real sign of the 450 miles done over the weekend are a slightly louder bassline under load courtesy of the split in the side of the silencer having got rather larger...

Going to have to do something about that soon I think. Will see if I can actually get a quote from somewhere this week...my attempt last week was thwarted by the garage I was aiming for not being there any more.

[RichardW]

Took this one at the Bubble Car Museum near Boston specially for you Zel!!

Note the C5 hiding behind it - where else could you see this combo!

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

...talking of Invacars, I was advised earlier today that a friend of a friend in S Oxon used to have a collection of them.

Its not known at present whether or not he still has them, but let me know if you want me to follow up the lead.

Nice spot Scarborough, one of the few places I know where you can get a 'proper' Twin flavour soft Ice Cream in the UK

[Zelandeth]

Note the C5 hiding behind it - where else could you see this combo!

... Can't think of anywhere aside from my driveway!

That must be a pretty close relation to my parts car I'd think, looking at the plate, KPL139P being my spares car.

Its not known at present whether or not he still has them, but let me know if you want me to follow up the lead.

It can never hurt to find other owners. They're rare enough beasts in the wild that making connections can only be a good thing. Especially if you need some hard to find part, or heaven forbid your car ever gets nicked.


The weekend away did reveal one major shortcoming with the van: a lack of an audio system from this century. It had a really cheap and nasty Sendai CD player fitted at some point, but totally lacked any means of getting audio into it from another source. If the original tape deck had still been there at least I could have just stuffed an adaptor in.

So today I threw in a modern JVC head unit. I've used head units from a lot of makers over the years and have never had a JVC that didn't just do what it said on the tin, even if it might have had slightly less shiny features than some of the competition.

The camera has mangled the colour of the red lighting on the one control, it's actually a deep pure red. That really obvious control is used to answer the phone, which I appreciate as I don't want to be fumbling for a barely labelled button.

This has Bluetooth connectivity, and will handle both phone calls and media via that link. Given most of my music is done through Spotify these days, that's fine by me.

Really surprised by the audio quality. Thanks to the processing power available nowadays, this thing has the ability to let you set up the size of your speakers, where they are, and the type of vehicle you're in. What it's managing to get out of four 28 year old tiny Radiomobile speakers is quite astonishing. One in the cab does buzz a bit so will need replacing. The tricky thing there will be depth I reckon as the original speaker boxes are quite shallow.

In the back in particular though the sound quality is really surprisingly good. Hopefully a couple of new speakers in the cab (and fully securing the panel the nearside one is bolted to) will have that side of things set for a while. Oh...when I replace the aerial anyway, not that I'll be likely to use the radio...but that appears to be the only way to have it set the clock, presumably via RDS.

Also means I now have a USB charging socket on the dash without needing an ugly adaptor sticking out of the cigarette lighter socket.

Oh, ran the numbers for my return trip fuel economy too. 30.2 mpg... I'll definitely take that!

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

So perhaps modern technology isn't such a bad thing if you can get such decent sound quality out of a far from fabulous speaker set up.

30.2mpg is pretty damn impressive!

Will send an email over the next day or two regards potential 'Invacar Man' and see where it goes.

[Zelandeth]

Yesterday evening I topped up the steering box oil, managed to not spill it everywhere. The steering definitely feels better now the box actually has oil in. It hasn't all leaked out overnight either, which is a bonus. Especially being used to how incontinent Lada steering boxes usually are!

Speaking of the Lada...managed to waste the best part of three hours with a gent who appeared to be a genuine perspective buyer this afternoon. Turned out that he like the last one wasn't interested in paying more than a few hundred quid.

I hate dealing with selling stuff to the general public...

[Michel]

I hate dealing with selling stuff to the general public...

It's a nightmare. I have a motorbike and a car to sell, and I simply can't be bothered with the hassle at the moment. I need to do it before winter sets in to finance my new motorbike!

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

I guess this is the reason why outfits like "We Buy Any Car" do so well, but what little I've heard about them has not endeared them to me.

Invacar enquiries have resulted only in it turning out that yours and my contacts are the same, so nothing new to add there.

[Zelandeth]

I guess this is the reason why outfits like "We Buy Any Car" do so well, but what little I've heard about them has not endeared them to me.

Invacar enquiries have resulted only in it turning out that yours and my contacts are the same, so nothing new to add there.

Doesn't surprise me, it's a small world!

Today I picked up a pair of new speakers to replace the buzzy nearside one.

I carefully checked the diagrams on the manufacturer website first to ensure they would fit. Of course once I got home I discovered that they were actually about 5mm too deep. Guess I'll be making some spacers tomorrow then.

They're better than what came out, but the sound is still a bit thin sounding in the cab - not bad, but I know that it could be better - especially given how decent the sound is in the back. Only difference really is speaker placement.

Currently it's asymmetric in the front, which aside from anything else hugs my OCD.

Nearside:

Offside:

Aside from anything else it makes it a real pain to get it balanced right.

Other issue is that the nearside one is attached to the bit of trim that covers the fuse and relay box, which is less than entirely rigid and tends to rattle.

Plan is probably to move the Nearside one to closer match the other side, though it will have to be a bit lower down because of the bonnet release. Having to remove the speaker to get into the relay box is an annoyance I'm willing to deal with for better sounds. Assuming there's not a specific reason they've not already done that.

Best solution in audio terms would probably be to move the pods to the doors, angled towards the driver's face, though I'd rather not hack the door cards given they've made it 28 years nearly unmarked. Likewise putting them overhead - plus routing the cabling for that would involve dismantling a heck of a lot of the cab and trim is never the same after you've pulled it to bits.

The other one that springs to mind would be on the seat base box, facing forward and upward - never tried that before though so no idea what to expect. I also get the feeling that the boxes might tend to be very boomy given they're just steel boxes with naught in but a battery. I'm not faffing about with sound deadening as it's heavy and the last thing this van needs is more weight.

Fact is that I know it's never going to be fantastic, not with a big space like this only using 10cm drivers, but it can be better than it is I reckon and I like my music.

Reckon I'll faff around with it for ages, then wind up coming back to the "move the pods to the doors" solution most likely based on prior experience!

If I were to go down that road, the question becomes whether I should just upgrade to something larger like a 6x9 - though I'd personally rather stick with the existing Radiomobile enclosure if I can as it looks right...modern kit is just going to stick out like a sore thumb...and the Saab was proof that you can get really good sound out of compact drivers these days. Plenty of space for me to stick a little sub somewhere as well. Again...I like my music, and we're likely to make longer journeys in it, so maybe that's a price worth paying. Don't know...

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

I was wondering if a better solution might be to purchase, make or adapt a new triangular shaped mount for that NS Speaker to achieve a vertical angle rearward.

You used to be able to buy something along those lines to achieve the same thing for rear parcel shelf speakers but I doubt they're available or would provide a sufficient angle of tilt.

Also wouldn't favour hacking the Door Cards.

[Michel]

Why not leave all the original kit in place for originality but build a bespoke hidden system that sounds good in the front and can be removed if you ever sell?