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

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

Completely 'With You' there on the Brake Testing Zel and see how something at least better in the tyre department might be a necessity.

A mention, with regard to Drums; that having corrected the mal-adjusted Load Sensing Valve on my motor recently (in semi-loaded brake mode for about 3 weeks.... long story); the stoppers are awesome ! Its been said before, but there really is nothing like use to get Drums biting properly.

and talking of eager "smoothest, most eager etc", I promised myself having replaced the Tacho on my motor that I wouldn't drive it harder for being able to see the engine revs after about 6 years without that facility.... well that's a promise I soon broke, and it drives all the better for it. Hope you find similarly with the Invacar, ....will be a bizarre sight, seeing that thrashed around the block!

...talking of which, how do you thrash a CVT?

[Zelandeth]

...talking of which, how do you thrash a CVT?

Simply put, put your foot down!

The governor in the CVT system here is very simple, but it's as clever as it is simple. The pulley attached to the engine has a spring loaded weight which causes the gap between the two halves of that pulley to close up as the rotational speed increases. This causes the belt to ride further up, essentially increasing the diameter of that pulley. However the other factor in there is the actual load on the belt - if the car is pulling away, climbing a hill etc the additional load on the belt will "pull" it deeper into the space between the pulley halves, decreasing the diameter and essentially dropping a gear.

So if you apply full throttle, it should let the engine rev freely up to the limit set by the governor in the CVT (about 4500rpm in this case if I remember rightly).

The whole system drops into a "fixed ratio overdrive" to quote the manual at approximately 45mph.

Today's first task was to fit the air filter which arrived yesterday. I think it's fair to say that the one that came out was "due for replacement" in this case!

Much better.

The rest of today's jobs came under the general heading of "unexciting but important" I think.

The redundant seat belt buckle and pretensioner were removed from the driver's seat (anyone need a spare for an S2 Xantia?) which meant that the seatbelt could actually reach to the correct attachment point without that getting in the way. It also meant that it was time to get rid of the mangled, rusted remains of the original seat belt attachement point...which I was somewhat staggered to get to unbolt without too much of a fight.

Obviously the only place that was going was the bin.

This was replaced with a nice new old stock eye bolt for the earlier style seatbelt I've got.

The belt then clipped nicely in place, without any bits of Citroen getting in the way (which it turns out also has made getting in and out a lot easier as I don't have to carefully avoid sitting on the seatbelt buckle any more).

I figured that having done this it made sense to sort the seat out properly as well (it wobbled). The issue I had was that the U-clamps I'd used to clamp it to the original seat frame were slightly too big so couldn't be tightened down far enough as I ran out of threads. I was originally going to get some more clamps before having the bright idea of just using a bunch of washers as spacers to take up the 1/8" or so extra I needed. Job done...Seat is now far more secure than the original one in the car ever was. This done I was then able to rettach the trim which helps keep the somewhat ugly mounting hardware out of sight.

Only other item of note done today was that I found the correct size of screw so was able to reattach the offside interior door release which can also be seen in the above photo.

I did think about attacking the brakes, but I really need the car out of the garage for that so I can access all sides. So that will be one for another day in the near future.

Reckon I'll just go and get the tyres ordered. It's not going to be massively long before I start thinking about a trip beyond the end of the driveway and they're not massively expensive anyhow. It will be these Camac BN313s that I'll be using as they're sensibly priced and should look right at home.

[van ordinaire]

Might well have an 1/8 Whit. spanner - but it'll be down in Deb'n.

If you can wait, I'll see what I can find next w/e.

When it's all done I found the perfect "next project" for you today - an Ape tractor unit & dropside semi-trailer!

Seems like an aweful price for toytown tyres, but if you will deal with Vintage Tyres . . .

[Zelandeth]

The price of those tyres doesn't seem that unreasonable to me - F1 were asking £60 odd, and I'm pretty sure they were trailer tyres, only one other local place had 145 R10s listed and they wanted - wait for it - £85 each!

Sometimes you have to take what look superficially like a few steps backward to move forward.

You know that thing I did bolting the seat in place yesterday? Yep, went and pulled it out again today.

To be fair I knew I was going to be doing that, I've got a list of things on the whiteboard which basically come under the heading of "stuff I bodged when I was wanting to just get the car going" and "stuff I couldn't get at earlier."

The transmission access hatch needed to come off. Of course there was the obligatory *one* screw that wouldn't come out. There's always one.

Out with the drill again. Then half an hour of very, very carefully peeling the gasket off as it was well and truly stuck to the bulkhead.

So there were a few things I wanted this off for.

Firstly, the offside engine mount. I'd only managed to get one bolt into it when the engine went in, and the nut wouldn't do up fully because the bolt was partly cross threaded. Access was awkward from the back of the car, but a doddle when approaching from inside the car. Note to self: next time you need to change one, do it from that side.

While I was back there I rerouted the throttle cable properly through the eye on the gearbox which has helped stop it sticking. Also took the opportunity to adjust the gear selector which is far easier with the seat out the way.

While rummaging around I found two battery clamps, so have replaced the missing one.

I've also been pondering my seat attachment setup and reckon that I can improve on my original solution...which worked but was exceedingly inelegant. I can do better.

Other reason I wanted that cover off was to get better access for routing the rear axle brake lines. Once that's done everything will be getting buttoned back up.

[Zelandeth]

One other reason I needed access to the engine bay from that side was to make a simple common sense addition to any car of this sort of age - a battery cutoff switch.

Given the minimalist approach to fuse protection in this thing it was pretty essential I thought and will save me having to physically remove a battery terminal every day before trusting it not to burst into flames in the garage overnight.

[van ordinaire]

Should've known 10" tyres would be expensive now - but that's approaching mid-price territory for C15 tyres.

[Zelandeth]

At least they're still relatively readily available - the fact they used Mini wheels being a blessing I guess.

The 12" ones would want a far more obscure size tyre as I recall.

I think technically this being a 1973 car should probably be on 12" wheels - but in the interests of tyre availability, having higher profile so more squidgy tyres - and appearance, I'm sticking with the 10s. The 12s look oddly out of proportion to the car to my eyes whereas the tens are just right.

Speaking of "looking right" I'd love to stick a set of Dunlop SP Aquajets on there...but at £100 each...nope! Not happening!

The Activa is definitely going to be wanting tyres in the next few months. Fronts are pretty much done now, and while the rears still have reasonable tread left, they're starting to perish so are life expired anyhow. Not expecting change out of £300 - but I do tend to *ahem* enjoy it's handling abilities, so not worth spoiling it with cheap tyres.

[van ordinaire]

From memory there is only 1 12" tyre [that'd be for the 11/1300, Imp, HA & HB Viva, Mk1 Escorts (<1600cc - possibly 1300)] but, yes, I can see they'd look pretty weird on an Invacar.

Given that the received wisdom is that C15's benefit from (reasonable) quality tyres (not tested yet, as not long after all the causes of an insatiable appetite for fronts were eliminated I obtained 2 pairs for £18 - fitted!) I'm quite surprised how well behaved the Xantia is on the Chinese items it came with, BUT - assuming I'm keeping it - won't be sorry when their times is up, so will be interested if there is any consensus as to what are best (allowing for Michelins being far too expensive anywhere outside America).

[Pug_XUD_KeenAmateur]

I think (without looking back at length) that it was you who mentioned Titanium Drill Bits Zel.

Good aren't they! Thanks for that, made a little DIY job a whole lot easier

[Zelandeth]

Cobalt ones I was pointed at - but Titanium similarly being a very hard metal would probably be up in the same region of desirability for making drill bits with. I remember discovering many moons ago that it's an absolute swine of a material to try to machine anyway...

Today I've been trying to work out what battery I need for the Invacar. It's currently got an 038 in (read: nicked from the C5) but that's too long to be secured by the battery clamps.

The hard limits are the distance between the two posts which the clamps fit into at 210mm (8 1/4") and the width at 140mm (5 1/2") as the brackets wrap around the end of the battery.

Looking through my extremely dog eared battery cross reference table, it looks like the 054/5 size is the best match at 187mm (7 1/3") long by 127mm (5") wide and 220mm (8 2/3") tall. Height is irrelevant as there's bags of room above.

Longer term I'll be looking at moving the battery up front to provide some additional front wheel ballast, but that's at least months if not years away yet!

[bobins]

Actually being serious for once, but would a ride-on mower battery be the right size ? Something like a U1-R or 015/038 ?

[Zelandeth]

015/038 is too long at 265mm sadly, U1-R isn't on my crusty old datasheet so I'll need to look it up...

At a glance that looks like a decent bet actually at 194 by 126mm. I was tending to expect the batteries associated with stuff to be way lower in capacity than normal car batteries, but 30Ah is exactly the same...so apparently not.

Edit:

Have been doing some further digging and it looks - depending on where the measurements are taken from a 063 (S4 001 in current Bosch talk), so I think I'm just going to wander into Costco tomorrow and take some actual measurements. It seems that for all the type numbers should be standards - there's a huge variance from maker to maker looking at data sheets.

So tape measure and bracket in hands I'm just going to go take a look and see if they've got one that fits. Hoping so as it will probably be cheaper than even a U1 will be elsewhere.

All being well the fuel tank should be done next week so getting stuff like this ticked off is getting more important!

[Zelandeth]

So today I had a rummage around at a few places locally which stock car batteries.

A 063 would do just fine if the measurements were to the extremeties of the mounting flanges at the base...sadly they're not, they're the body size. Result: It's way too big. Likewise I couldn't find anything which was capable of fitting both the length and width...I could have either one, but not both.

Eventually wound up just going for a U1-R for a few reasons.

It looks like it's pretty much the same size as the original - save for the original one having a flange around the base which the U1 lacks.

Electrical specs are identical to what's listed in the manuals so that should do just fine. Weight is a big bonus as well, as the U1-R I've picked up weighs in at just under 8kg. The 038 I've been using up until now is around 12kg. Given that we're talking about a car with just under 20bhp, every gram counts.

I'll need to make up some spacers to go between the battery and the brackets, but that shouldn't be a problem. As this lacks a mounting flange around the base I'll probably use some scrap metal to make a strap to go over the top as well.

[Zelandeth]

Not had a particularly productive day.

While digging around I discovered that the hose routing air to the cabin outlet was actually hanging off and the last inch or so had disintegrated. Thankfully there was just enough left to trim it back to sound hose and reattach it.

Next step was trying to get rid of the crud in the various hoses in the interests of not getting crud in the eye halfway down the A509.

Sealed the inlet side of the system off...

...Then switch both the heater and demister on, and attach a vacuum cleaner.

This setup resulted in air being drawn in through the demister vent, then via the control box and out through the cabin heater outlet. Once this was set up I turned the vacuum on and then basically went and battered all the ducts with the handle of a screwdriver until I could no longer hear stuff rattling down the hose, and declared it done at that point.

This is basically the point at which progress stalled as I decided to change the fan belts. Which was fine until I got back from the motor factors and it immediately became apparent that the two belts they had given me were in fact not identical.

Got back there to discover they didn't have a second longer one in stock, so will have to go back tomorrow. Blarg. By this point I'd wasted an hour on that and immobiliser the car as the starter motor was no longer attached to the engine essentially.

I did get more planning done on the seat securing plan. Not least taking some measurements and getting these picked up.

Basically these will be bolted to the seat frame by two bolts each, and the seat rails will then be bolted to these brackets. Aside from being rigidly attached to the frame, this setup will leave both the longitudinal and height adjustment to still work normally.

[van ordinaire]

VERY elegant!

Can only assume you were served in the factors by their Saturday boy - whose previous retail experience had been in a shoe shop! Infuriating - have every sympathy.