Some progress at last!

So as I have spent the last three months getting every bit of Overtime I can, I have started doing a few jobs that dont cost much first of all, but are vital in insuring that I have enough cleaned up and restored parts ready for re-assembly, now rather than document individual entries from the last couple of months I'll condense them for more interesting viewing into one post.
First of all, I've been returning to the clean down of the engine, the steering rack and prop shaft. These are all a bit grubby so out came the tin of Gunk and I applied this generously to the parts that needed it, rinse off with a pressure washer and then one more coat of gunk to make sure.
The steering rack was really grubby, its position on the chassis means it collects dirt from road going, and any fluids that have leaked from the engine lump itself (Grease/oil etc). I also had to remove the bushes from the each end of the rack as these are starting to perish they are held on with twisted retaining wire rather crude looking but took me long enough to get the damn things off!

Prop shaft 'Pre-degreasing'

The Steering Rack was coated in gunk and wire brushed to the point that oil and grease was dropping off the item, Again the process above has been repeated and a rinse off done.

Wire brushed and degreased steering rack looking great!

Following the clean down of the steering column, I broke out the Hammerite rust protector paint and applied a reasonable coating once the moving parts and bits that need to remain as are were covered. the central part of the rack is a solid tube that can be painted, care must be taken as looking round the tube there is a small hole almost like a breather hole where grease might go into lubricate the joint, ensure this is well masked off to avoid spraying paint into it that will eventually dry and potentially block the hole entirely. I made a bit of an error here as it was really cold in the garage and this was affecting the rate at which the paint would dry, also the coverage looked a bit patchy so thankfully this was only a light coat.

Once this was done I turned my attention to the prop shaft which had been degreased and rinsed a couple of times, this was also now ready for coat number one. Again using the satin smoothrite spray paint I set to work. I actually suspended this from the rafters of the shed as it gave me an unrestricted area to spray round.

I have now after all the fun and games of these parts arranged the transport of the chassis to be altered, the front end to be re built to the original specification as the modification made before is neither exact nor is it pretty!

Here are some piccies of the chassis out in the cold light of day for the first time in a couple of years.

An eventful and busy couple of weeks will follow as I have some time off booked, to add the bracing to the chassis that will stiffen it up firstly, and then allow a tidier appearance to the front end that will mean I can send it away for the all important shot blast, galvanise and powdercoat that will protect the chassis for many more years and add value in the long term. I dont really want to have to strip this car down again very soon!

Purchasing Bits

Well, since it has been a while since I last updated this blog I thought I would share some of the latest developments in my world.

Recently had a chance to visit the Shepton Mallet Classic Restoration show, which was good even though we'd had a hell of a snow shower in that region. Whilst at the show I had managed to secure a fairly long section of Dark grey carpet to match the leather interior of the car in my mission to cut down on the sheer number of colours in use inside the car. White/Grey/Black and blue and red.

Also purchased som new Light covers and some Smiths Gauges to replace the ones that are not in a good state at all currently.

Since this show I have also visited the NEC Classics show and was given a new pair of Bonnet inserts in Marine Ply so that I can replace the ones I have that are rotting through.

I have also been in contact with another forum member who was able to supply me with brand new Laser Cut Radiator brackets which will be fitted to the front of the chassis at the same time that we re-model the A-frames at the front which the bonnet will eventually be mounted to.

Basically things will start mving again very Quickly over the next few months as Im now doing massive amounts of overtime to pour money into this project in order to get her finished for the spring of 2013 or by late this year so that I get enough time to get everything right before the highly anticipated Luxembourg trip in 2014 (Which I want to be a smooth reliable affair with this car!)

Final chassis stripdown/ Engine Clean

This week I had some quality time with the car again! weather was perfect for it too. I   had one or two final things to strip from the chassis, these were the Fuel line cable, the rear Brake line hoses that run along the centre of the chassis to the front of the car, and removal of the fuel pump which was still attached to the front of the fuel line (I had run out of time for all these when I last worked on it last October/November. The Brake cabling is eventually going to be all braided hosing (Looks nice and to comply with modern safety requirements) so what is there currently can be stripped and just used as a sizing guide. (Excuse the milk carton 'Rat/Mouse Bait' container, we do have little critters running around here at times)

View of cabling running along the 'Gearbox tunnel' rails

I used some snips to cut through the cable ties these arent a problem to replace same applies for re-assembly really.

Remaining hoses at the rear and the sticky/cable ties holding these final items in place.

After all these items were taken off I was left with a completely bare chassis which now only requires a bit of cutting and re-welding on the front end, and then it is ready to be trailered away for shotblast/Galvanise/Powder coat in Gloss Black.

Focus then moves to the Engine, it is a very grubby looking beast at the moment and as this is another of those little jobs that requires only the purchase of some de-greaser I cracked on without hesitation.

Using a stiff paint brush, (With all items in place) I dabbed on the GUNK Degreasant (Pictured Below costs about £4.99 for this size of tin, there is also a spraycan version) to as many parts of the engine as possible, (Rocker covers, manifold cover, timing cover, Block etc.) SAFETY GOGGLES AND GLOVES/MASK essential Here.

You can see the grease and oil already starting to run down the front of timing cover

Above is a first picture showing the early stages of application, now as most of the outlets/inlets to the engine are covered by the manifolds carb, covers, it is fairly safe to pressure wash the engine as this will give away any areas of grease that are still in place, just apply More Gunk to the affected areas and rinse off I sprayed carefully using a Turbo Lance on a pressure washer, it sprays in an oscillating high powered action that has conveniently removed the flaky paint from the Rocker Covers and the Block itself (In Red) This will be rubbed down and re-sprayed in a High Temperature colour yet to be determined, There are further piccies below that show the progress.

Immaculate shiny Bell Housing required minimal cleaning.

Grubby Greasy Timing Cover.

Engine During GUNK application

Initial Spray Down showing a vastly more clean manifold cover and loose paint blasted off the Black Rocker covers.

The plan for the Black Rocker Covers is to have them blasted and Chromed so that I have a nice shiny engine, possible engraving on these covers with the Marcos Badge?

That was all I had time to cover this weekend, hoping for more summer visits to do some more work but really at this stage, the major work is to get the chassis prepped for treatment which is going to be exciting, whilst I also look for a new home for the Marcos in order to be closer to where I live so I can just 'pop out' to work on it as opposed to driving for an hour and a half each way.

More Soon.

Gazza

03-07-2012
Hello!
Not a great deal to report unfortunately, which is sadly due to lack of funding at  this moment in time I have pretty much stalled on the restoration, I'm doing a few small jobs that dont require a great deal of cash eg cleaning up the major parts of the Engine and cleaning down the Gear Box.
Very shortly I may start degreasing the tunnel section of the bodywork so that I can have this already for when heat resistant material is put down on the areas where heat is likely to affect the bodywork.
Weather has not been especially good either, but have gotten into my dads Garage as he has recently purchased a reserve Essex V6 unit to work on as a side project, this particular unit used to be from a Gilbern Invader and has a number of modifications that give a few additional features the layout hasnt changed much either. Im also looking to house the vehicle Closer to me shortly so that I can get access to work more easily on it and when I have some spare time to do so /evenings etc.

22-10-2011

Well! After many internet problems Im back on posting again! and this weekends work is what I have waited a whole year and a bit for....the engine removal which marks the end of the disassembly of the car. as apart from a few cables this is the last thing to come off the car before the cutting, welding  (modification of the chassis) commences before I send her away to be blasted, Galvanised, and then Powder coated a lovely shiny colour!

Mark (who helped me acquire the car in the first place) was bringing an engine down that My stepfather had bought, and at the same time we arranged to remove my engine too as the hoist was being used. Given certain changes to the way Im now having to manage this restoration, cutting out a few hiring actions will be benneficial to the budget.

Firstly, I had to secure the Gearbox with a plank to ensure that when the mountings underneath were undone, the gear box didn't drop downwards and hit the floor.

Rearward shot showing the plank i used to keep the gearbox where it was.

The first item to be tackled at the front end was the removal of the bar at the front that I had trouble with on my last visit. This didnt take long to remove.

Removal of the Rollbar.

Once this part was removed (see above) we started to loosen all the mountings to the engine. there were a few issues with the bolts, so Mark took the top of the botl out due to access being limited through the underneath to get enough ppurchase on it. Meanwhile, I had taken out the tray that the gearbox is mounted to.

Initial strapping up of the engine

At this point a couple of nice old gnarled bits of wood were great for a bit of leverage to the engine. the hoist was strapped to the engine and shortly we were able to lift this out of the bay.

We very quickly found out that the oil that could have leaked when I took the prop shaft out, that didnt, started to run out quite rapidly at this time! the elevation was bound to bring this out, the oil though was immaculate, as if it had just been put in. Im pretty sure this Engine/Gearbox may have been rebuilt at some stage, I will run some tests with it with some knowledgable bods, and see as this will not only save time, it will save me a great deal of money! The gear box being as clean as it is may indicate this to be true.

Engine out, bit of leakage but can't be helped!

 

 

From here I discussed the modifications that Im going to make to the chassis before I send it away for work, this includes tidying up and modifying the front end of the chassis, and strengthening and bracing in the rear of the chassis just under where the fuel tank sits.

bracing will be added here, from above the bump stop on the edge rails (both sides) and be run to the verticals behind the seats. fillets will be added to the base rail to one of the uprights.

There were further mods discussed, these were the filling in of the holes in the wheel arch that allow water and other stuff to get into the fuel tank area, which must be fibreglassed in as thisll make the boot wet too! and possibly rust the fuel tank.

This are is in the wheel arch this hole leads to the fuel tank area.

This is the tunnel across the top rear of the fuel tan k that water could currently get into these curved tops need to be filled.

Well, this was a good hour and a bits work done, so next time, I hope to have bits cut that I can have welded to the chassis on my next visit (not sure when this will be though!)  so keep tuned! :)

Weekend 28 - 29 Aug 2011

Monday 29th August.
I continued to dismantle the remaining attachments to the bodywork so that I can have a completely disassembled car by the end of the year.
The previous day I had spent removing the rear suspension and brake assemblies. My dad had been available to help with this so we removed quite a lot of items.

Coil springs disconnected from the Rear Axle.

Removal of rear struts and bolts connecting axle to brake pipes.

I started the rear by undoing all the main bolts that held the struts, te rear coil springs etc together to get the axle free, I removed the half shafts from either end of the rear axle, once the drums had been removed.

Eventually we were able to take out the axle from the side of the car that had the most clearance once all the assemblies had been removed.

Axle removed, brake assemblies in place to the centre bottom of the image

The 'Removed axle' in need of some 'Refurbishment'

Once the rear axle and suspension etc were removed I went to the front of the car to start removing the drums and brake assemblies there also.

Full chassis shot with rear axle and drums removed.

The first job was to remove the track rod ends from the hub assembly, It is important at this point to ensure that when turning the track rod ends off that the turns are counted as this will assist resetting the geometry of the front end when re-assembling the car. mine were r18 and a half turns on the drivers side and 20 turns on the passenger side. ( I think!)

Once these were removed, I set about taking the hubs off the wishbones.

Track rod ends disassembled from the hub and the roll bar.

Removal of the Brake Calipers from the Hubs.

To be able to remove the hubs entirely from the mountings, there is capping on each of the front wheels, behind which a strip of 'Hairpin' clipping is passed through a hole to hold the bearings in place. this is heavily greased and has to be pulled out with a pair of pliers as the photos below show.

If you remove this, do not lose that pin!! its easily done!

Loosening the  wishbones around to the top and bottom of the shocks and springs.

I had removed the bearing and hubs at this point, so I was ready to start taking the wish bones off the front also, this would allow for removal of the leaky shocks I had.

Loosening the bolts for the Shocks.

 I must admit  I had some difficulty removing the bottom suspension strut, as the bolt was well rusted! using a combination of socket set and the break bar, I was able to get these off.

Undoing the base the front shocks.

Front end minus the wishbones and all hubs.

With all the front end now removed, (the roll bar at the front wouldnt come out so I had to leave this on until next time). I had quite a collection of parts that I could send away  to be treated and re powdercoated.

All the front and rear end parts ready for powder coating fuel tank is in the back ground.

same shot as earlier after steering removal.

That was about all I had time for that day. So the next post I should be updating will be the removal of the engine and gear box and finally calling completion on the strip down.

Weekend 28 - 29 Aug 2011

So it has been quite some time since we lifted body from chassis in my little shed! Looking at the car from the last set of photos, there doesn't appear to be that much left to do. but set to it I did. starting with the removal of the wheels, even more space in there now!

As the wheels were removed, I could get access to the hubs so that the rest of the axle, half shafts etc can be slid out of the chassis sections at the back.

The drivers side rear hub was easy to take off, a few taps to the rim and it came away from the rest of the hub, the pasenger side rear wheel hub was a different story, a screw was hidden in the hub which was present on the other wheel I unscrewed this and continued on.

I turned my attention to the prop shaft, this has to be dis-connected from the rear of the gearbox to the rear axle, which was achieved by taking off the 4 bolts that hold the two faces together see pictured.

Prop shaft at the 'Rear Axle end'

The prop shaft merely slides out of the rear of the gear box unit.

Once all four bolts were removed from the two faces of the prop shaft connection, it could then be slid out from the Gear box end, (caution here, as oil can start to spray out! have a bucket or similar item on standby!) This type of Gear box has a 2 litre capacity for Oil (from the research I looked into).

After this I removed the retaining struts for the suspension and took the shocks and coil springs off

The struts as removed from the rear of the car, the bushes inside these appear to be wasted so these will definately need replacement bushes when I have had the struts treated and re- powdercoated an 'acceptable' colour.
It's also really important to put the bolts back into the holes when the struts are removed so that these can be referred to for cleaning up or replacement outright, there's nothing worse than having to figure out what size bolts you need at an autojumble or parts order service. and some of them are rare too!

I'll upload the remainder of the shots over the weekend (most likely) showing the 'Monday work'. on the front end of the car.