Seats

Had the call to say that the front Recaro seats were ready the other day. Little road trip down to sunny Bournemouth to collect them today.
If anyone wants any special trimming work doing, I can thoroughly recommend Brian Cates      zagatoseven@hotmail.com     He has done wonders with my old horrible seats and they look amazing now. We had discussed several options for restoring the original seats, including keeping them looking as per the original photos....... but in the end we both agreed that it looked silly having grey cloth fronts and black vinyl rears. Having collected some NOS Triumph Vinyl seat covers over the years, he used those to create the centre squabs and the rest was done in standard black vinyl......... leather was tempting but what would it match to?
The new headrests were trimmed to match, and then new Recaro badges to finish them off............. amazing.

Here's a reminder of what they looked like, in the bare bones and what I collected today........................ the photo does not do them justice, they really are stunning............ thanks Brian!!

Two posts in one day!?!?

Second post of the day?!?!?  Well, I thought I had finished for the day, but found another couple of hours this afternoon. So, I did what I wanted and pushed the car out of the garage.............. first time in about 12 months its seen daylight I think!!

 You could almost see it blinking in the daylight..........!!

 Once I'd put the servo back together again (got it upside down before!!) I then fitted it along with the pedal box.

 Slight blunder, the new pedal rubbers I have bought appear to be 2 throttle pedals rubbers instead............ new, correct ones ordered now!!

 During the clean up I found the missing piece of trim for below the O/S rear door................ quick polish up and on it goes.......... much better.

Not alot done, but every little helps............................

On it's wheels!

Managed to get a couple of hours in the garage this morning. Got the two front brake lines fitted. They are different to a 2000/2500 as the offside front one comes under the car and is clipped to the front cross-member before it goes to the PWDA valve on the nearside inner wing. The nearside one is just a short run, double clipped to the other one.

 After that, I then torqued up the front suspension, popped the wheels on then admired by how much I had got the tracking out!! Got both wheels now looking like they point in the same direction and then it could come down on its wheels............. first time since last summer it has actually sat on 4 wheels!!

Next job is to push it outside and have a tidy up of the garage and inside the car. I can't find ANYTHING at the moment, so a general clean up is needed. Then I can fit the refurbed pedal box, the servo and master cylinder and then do the brake lines from the M/C to the PWDA valve and the short run to the rear and the brakes will be finished.
I have the centre of the floorplans and the inner sills to Shutz and then underneath will be done and I can start on the trim!
Meanwhile, here is a reminder of the state of the original front Recaro seats....... hmmmmm, tired springs to mind, missing one headrest and one badge and generally had it! So, a couple of weeks ago they went to the trimmers in Bournemouth. Lovely man by the name of Brian Cates, works from home and does classic trim and upholstery. He came up to drop some other trim off in Kidderminster and swung by mine on the way back to collect the seats. I had sourced 2 new headrests, but in black cloth and 2 new Recaro badges. He is going to strip the seats, rebuild them with new foams and then make new covers out of a mixture of black vinyl, black leather and some original Triumph Diamond Vinyl. This will mean the front seats will still be Recaro's but they will now match the rears. He is also going to recover the new headrests to match. They should be ready next weekend hopefully.

 In the meantime he sent me a picture of them stripped down...................oooooo, I hope he knows how to put them back together again!!

Little bits

Busy day spent doing............ not a lot really! Went out shopping this morning to get some more brake pipes made up, run out of hand-cleaner, needed some longer rivets, etc etc............ ended up at the tyre bay getting the tyres put on the front rims ready for the car to come down off the stands.

 Fished the manifolds out of the citric acid bath.............. that stuff is amazing, not a spec of rust or corrosion anywhere, even the insides are clean and sparkly! Got them dried off with a hot air paint gun, got them hot then sprayed with several good coats of silver VHT paint............. looking good!

 Then it was time for a rest! The Audi was looking sorry for itself and needed a good clean. Spent most of this afternoon getting it looking nice again  (don't call me the polisher for nothing!!) Washed, clay bar'd, polished, glass, trim....... all done!

 Seats needed a clean and a feed, back soft and supple again................ not looking bad for 100k?!!

 Managed to clamber over things to get to Libby's original rear bumper too.................

 Now all packaged up ready to be couriered up north to help a fellow Lines Estate owner out who needs a bumper just to make it look right rather than perfect.................

Front suspension finishing

Managed to get a few hours on the Triumph today, starting with re-assembling the nearside front suspension with the new stub axle after my last "incident" with the old one!! It all flew together quite nicely in the end.

 Next it was time to fit the Anti Roll Bar. Bit of head scratching needed to try and work out which way up things should go, but after a while it became obvious...........!

 Bar the brake lines, the front suspension is now done!

 Reassembled the freshly painted servo with new recon kit, then bolted on the new master cylinder.

 Then I remembered that I hadn't done anything with the replacement pedal box. I had to get another one as the original one was an auto and this car is going back to manual. Dug it out of its hiding place, quick wire brush to get rid of some rust,

 ..... then a few good coats of black paint, should be dry by next weekend to bolt on the servo/master cylinder then I can start doing the front brake pipes.

 I then fished the old exhaust manifolds out of its soaking solution....... this stuff it magic!!, bare shiney metal, just ready for some VHT paint. Still some minor surface rust where I had to keep turning them as my bowl wasn't deep enough, but I have some more "special" stuff coming on Monday and I have found a deeper bowel, so another little soak will see them perfect and ready for paint.

Stub axle.... take 2 !

Went to see Ted Taylor yesterday and collected the replacement stub axle. In the end we decided it was pointless trying to swap the stub axle, it made more sense to just clean and paint the other spider..... save putting it under any undue stress. Anyway, thank you Ted...... much appreciated. Spent a pleasant few hours talking Range Rovers, doggies and Triumph's!
So today, I cleaned the unit up and then it had a couple of coats of paint..... then hung up to dry.

 Whilst I was in a painting mood I also cleaned and painted the bonnet catch assembly..............

 ................. and the Servo cover.

 Mike Weaver had very kindly donated some good exhaust manifolds. The ones supplied with the replacement engine were cracked and the threads in most of the stub holes were shot. Mike gave me a good pair (originals off the 4x4 estate as he he having custom headers built). I stripped them down, wire brushed them and inspected them. All the studs are good, so on with the next process. I made up a few gallons of Bilt Hammer Detox rust killer and dropped them in to soak for a few days...........

Fame again!

Got my January 2012 edition of "Triumph World" through yesterday and whilst reading it I found myself in print again!! Simon Goldsworthy (Editor of TW) had contacted me a few months ago as he had an email enquiry from Scott Davison of New Zealand about my car. It was featured back in 2003 when Mike Collins first bought it, and he was wondering what had happened to it. I replied to Simon, and he printed both in the mag! So, if Scott does read this........ Hi Scott, thanks for the interest, get in touch of you want....... easiest way might be to join the Discussion forum on the 2000 Register website and I'm always on there!!

 So, back to Libby. spent an hour stripping down the nearside front hub, to get the spider and stub axle assembly out. It's easy when all the bolts are either clean or new and assembled with copper-slip! So, tomorrow I'm going to see Ted who has a new stub axle for me and the right tools to "persuade" the old one out!!  Still can't quite believe I snapped the end off with a normal nut in a socket!....... must be stronger than I thought!