That will be the last two posts that already existed on my blog, now you will be up to speed on the progress so far! Which means that the posts here will only be as frequent as I get to spent time working on the car!:)
Carburetor and inlet disassembly
Directly after I finished “disassembling” the engine I started on the carburetors. The plan is to clean them up optically as well as technically of course, rebuild them with new carb rebuild kits and yellow zinc plate all the screws, springs and linkages and so on.That’s what we’re dealing with “today”, you can still see all the plugged up holes from the EGR crap:
First I disassembled the “balancing bridge”(?) and the first bit of throttle linkage.
Then disconnected the carburetors from the inlet and removed the coolant lines. One of the heat insulating spacers wouldn’t come off. Does anyone know if the coolant lines are really necessary? Or just if you cold start in really cold weather to get the carburetors up to temperature? Seems odd to preheat the fuel/air mixture. Especially with a heat insulated spacer to avoid it… Or does it actually cool it and I’m all wrong!?:D
After the inlets were off I completely disassembled both SU carbs and the linkage and sorted it into two separated zip loc bags.
Big new parts and some rust "discoveries"
I just got a huuuge package from Belgium.
The rear cage from Safety Devices arrived well packaged! Thanks Frank!:)
Had to roughly put it in, need another hand and a ratched strap to get it into it’s “final” position and mock up all the support braces! Looks already great! Didn’t want to unwrap it yet though, to protect it as long as possible!:)
I really lucked out regarding rust problems on my shell, I always knew though that I should inspect the metal under the hatch closer and wanted to definitely remove it just to be sure! I sadly don’t have a proper before pic, but you can somewhat see that the metal was in great shape on first sight. Looked pretty much like that from side to side.
After I drilled out all the spotwelds (after way to many dulled out drill bits:/) I was able to lift it up and inspect the rust under it:
It’s nothing too major, and will be fixed with a few patches, no need of a completely new piece! But still very happy I went this way!
The only other rust issue I have is under the windshield gasket! Already trimmed it out a bit, but didn’t finish yet. That’s what it looked before!
I hopefully soon find a good price on a middleclass welder, so I can tackle everything that has to be welded on the chassis. Mainly those little rust repairs, sidemarker delete and a bit of engine bay shaving. As well as the rear cage brackets and I plan on reinforcing the sway bar mounts up front and connecting the frame rails.
I actually got myself a welder last week and ordered some supplies already. Think I can start learning to weld on a lot of test material by the end of the week!:)
That's it for now, as I said you're now up to date and the next updates will only come as fast or slow as I get some progress on the car!:)
All the best to you guys!
Fabian