What have you done today with your Austin Seven

[Ruairidh Dunford]

I have a method of repairing this without taking the engine out - I will call you later.

[jansens]

Simon a 3syncro box there are 12 balls/springs a 2syncro box uses 6, also replace the hyatt roller bearing on the mainshaft spigot with an
         inter bush as the hyatt roller bearing causes ridge line wear on mainshaft spigot and inner bore of 1st motion gear.

 Terry.

Thanks Terry, forgot to say it's a 2 sync one. Roller bearing is being replaced with a bush as you mention. I can order all those today from our spares.

Simon

[Dave Mann]

Completed refurbishing a cylinder block, after scrabbling about under various cars and speaking to David Cochrane worked out the various propshaft lengths.

[charlie carpenter]

My big 7 shocks have seized  as I have not used for it a couple of years. Stripped them off and going to  Ruairidh's to sand blast them tomorrow. 

[David Cochrane]

A pleasant run out to a Bonfire & Fireworks party with Austin 7, Riley & VSCC friends. Fairly cold night but the RP went well, especially after I had stopped to advance the ignition a bit (still trying to get used to not being able to fiddle with the ignition timing while driving, after fitting a DK4 distributor). The LED sidelight bulbs in the headlamps are so bright that it's safe to drive in well-lit built-up areas with the headlights off.

[Steve Jones]

Grandson Dan finally made it here last night and today we finished preparing the Trials Car for him to use on the Lakes next weekend and the Cotswold the weekend after. After all the usual things he fitted his Lambda Sensor to the exhaust and off we went to find a straight, rising, bit of road to try it out on. Result, very weak mid and high range. Doing his magic with the needle we progressively got the reading to the desired 0.89 pretty much all the way through the rev range. The difference in the car was amazing. It's always gone pretty well but it's so, so much better now. An hour and a half very well spent. Once back home Dan's mate/bouncer arrived and whisked the car away in his Sprinter for it's trialling holiday. Will I ever see it again??

What to do then? The new rear axle for the Ulster's ready and waiting so we put the car up on the stands and set too. My target was to get the axles swapped over before Christmas. With two of us working on it, apart from re-connecting the brake cables and the dampers (and remembering to put some oil in it) it's done already. Might get a chance to try it up the road tomorrow or Monday.

All together, a very productive day

Steve

[Reckless Rat]

Yesterday I had a quick run out in the RP to fill the tank at our local supermarket and then gave the car a rub down and tidy up ready for a trip out this morning to the race circuit in Alès called the "Pôle Mecanique". The first Sunday of the month there is a classic car get together and with fine weather I decided to take the RP. I went along with my neighbour who has a very nice 1931 Ford Model 'A' Roadster (two seater with dickie) which he imported from the states a long while ago. Performances of the two cars are roughly identical despite a huge difference in engine/car size - the Ford has a 3.285 Litre 40bhp engine, which is quite a bit thirstier than the RP (20mpg or less), and it weighs over a tonne. The Ford has a slight advantage over the RP on hills, because it had oodles of torque due to the big engine. If I have to drop down to 3rd I'm then stuck at 25-30mph max because with the crash box I can't get back up into top until I get over the crest. Whatever. A nice day out. Lots of interesting cars to see. Only one other Austin - a LHD Healey 3000 MkIII and very nice it was too.





There was also this Simca Aronde, which belongs to a friend of mine (he has two Ferraris and a Renault Alpine as well) - the car belonged to his father, who bought it new.



And a very nice and probably very rare Hotchkiss :



Left for home just before noon for a slap up binge at Mrs Rekker's Pie Shoppe.

[Alan]

See you in the pub. Saturday lunch then Steve. Sounds like you’ll have nothing else to do.

[Steve Jones]

I'm CoC at Drumhouse all day, Alan, so that's where I'll be. Hope I see you at some point. Don't be too hard on Dan if you scrutineer his (my) car!!!

This afternoon, connected the last bits up, put oil in axle and tried it up the village. Three forward gears and one reverse which is always a positive with banjo axles!!! Very smooth, no noise on drive or overrun and even with a cold engine the car felt more punchy which was the aim. As long as the oil stays where it should, so far, so good.

Come on Damien, you need to get yours to the same place before the weather gets too cold.

Steve

[Martin Prior]

Today was a an increasingly rare opportunity to work on one of my own projects, rather than a customer's.

The chassis of The Thing from the Cesspit is now on the table (beats the Hell out of grovelling around on the workshop floor!) and is finally being reassembled.  Hopefully, it'll be united with last year's "Frankenstein" engine before long and will then have the ruinous remains of the body fitted.

The total budget for the whole build of an RP high-roof van from scrap is £1000 and we should have the mechanical side completed for half of that.

I'm very tempted to put it on the road "as is" next year, with a view to carrying out the conversion into an RP high-roof van the following winter.