23rd July 1996

The head gasket was actually OK and the water has stopped disappearing. Since the last time I updated this page, the car has been out on the road. The new gearbox seems to work very well and the car is looking almost complete. All that it requires now is a coat of paint. But that will have to wait until I win the lottery (or something!). 

23rd August 1996

At long last the car is all but finished. All that remains now is the MOT.
Sprayed, polished and polished again, it actually looks really good. Some of the panels still look 25 years old, but for the most, it still looks OK.

12th February 1997

Would you believe it, it passed! First time and after over a year of being striped, scrapped, hammered, welded and worked on, it passed its MOT and is at long last street legal. (Although I think the exhaust is still a bit noisy).

1st August 1997

Rejoice, went out to Cox and Buckles in Richmond, and bought a load of tuning bits. Another Weber 40DCOE, manifold for twin carbs and an oil cooler. When I got home, I fitted all the bits and WOW what a beast. The acceleration pins you to the back of the chair and the car powers from 0 to 60 in about 7 seconds. (Not bad for a 26 year old 1300!)

The vehicle logbook has been changed to "25 year tax exempt", and I have a free road fund license. Cool, this means I can have a beast on the road for only £72.00 a year (insurance.)

8th August 1997

Still having problems, the first time out on a long run the car over heated and the engine died! After suffering the embarrassment of waiting to be toed off the motorway, I spent an hour on the side of the road trying to find out what was wrong. Nothing, completely ZIP. It has used no water, there was plenty of petrol and a spark. Once cool the engine started and I finished my journey.

After doing some research, it looks like the straight through exhaust could be causing the problem. If you have no back-pressure the engine runs too lean and thus overheats. The more it overheats, the more the petrol vaporises and there you have it NO POWER. It is a spiraling circle of doom. The hotter the engine gets the worse the mixture gets until nothing. Anyway it is now in a garage after braking down again. Maybe they can fix it.

13th August 1997

I have been given a sports system back box for the exhaust, which now fitted makes the car sound very quiet. But at least this may cure some of the problems I have been having. I have traced one problem to the voltage stabiliser behind the dash, which has caused all the instruments to read too high. Hopefully now I can drive it without thinking it is about to pack up and without the police giving me dirty looks because of the noise it makes.

10th March 1998

The car hasn't been used too much because of bad weather etc. and it is time to spend a bit more cash on it. I have decided to change the Master Cylinder to a solid aluminium one. This I bought from a scrap yard for £3.00, I took it home and polished it up with Brasso, and now it looks like new. Also, the voltage regulator hasn't been working well so I have ordered a new on of those plus a new sender unit for the fuel tank. At lease when that is installed, I will be able to see how much fuel is in it! Purely cosmetic, but why the hell not!

27th September 1998

Finally got the funds together to splash out on a few more bits for the car. I sold my Godin guitar, bought a saxophone, Triumph Tune Sports Exhaust, new jets for the 40 DCOEs, rocker oil feed pipe and ordered a Stage Three cylinder head with bronze valve guides (All in all about £900.00 worth, its a good job I have an understanding wife!).

1st October 1998

The exhaust and jets were delivered today, so I spent the evening fitting them. Both carbs had different sized jets in, so I can only assume that the car should run better now.

The exhaust was not that easy to fit, and although looks the business and sounds pretty cool, it is far too close to the prop shaft for comfort. On deceleration, it bangs on the UJ by the differential. Never mind, just means I will have to spend more time groveling on the floor another evening!

2nd October 1998

I spent a great deal of time searching the net for information on how to tune Weber DCOEs. I found one page which was quite good, and it seemed to be quite easy to follow. Not having any tuning gear at home, I will have to rely on instinct.

Click here for the Weber tuning instructions. If anyone has anything better, please let me know!

Tuning done, and what a difference. acceleration is much smoother and has the effect of pinning you in the back of the chair up to about 6500 rpm. The tone of the new exhaust is a bit disappointing, it sounds so quiet. I can't wait until the new head is ready. (Only another 4 weeks)

3rd October 1998

Today I decided to take advantage of some good weather and clean the car, at the same time I thought I would take some more pictures for the web site.

Click on the thumbnails for a better look.

A couple of pictures of inside the car, the carpets were taken out because they got damp
To finish the trunk off, I used some spare carpet from the house, cut it to shape and fitted it round the spare tyre and lined the floor.
A couple of views of the new exhaust
The twin 40 DCOEs (I love these things!)
The oil cooler
The union that feeds oil directly to the rocker shaft
The commission plate
Finally a nice picture of the back of it.