Power Steering Pump and PWDA

The first item to attend to was a quick coat of paint on the unfinished passenger parcel shelf, which is now ready to go back in the car

Power steering pump rebuild now, I removed the front pulley and then the 2 bolts from the rear case, and the flanged hose input leaving this

This cover is just retained by a large O ring at the front of the pump and will gently "tap off" from the front housing

Next to come out is the large circular internal clip, removal of this is helped by the hole where the small screwriver is inserted, which allows you to dislodge the clip, which when removed, and the "dish" underneath reveals this. The pump vanes are not spring loaded, but rely upon centrifugal force to force them out against the housing

The pump itself comes apart too,

and all this strips down into these component parts

After a good clean, the rebuild is a simple process of replacing the various O ring seals, lubricating it all with power steering fluid and reassembly, simples really I used a repair kit from LD Parts

Here's the rebuilt pump during painting, nice and shiney!

The PWDA valve (pressure warning differential actuator) looked like this at the start

and comes apart by unscrewing the nylon switch, then the large steel nut. The shuttle valve itself is always stuck, and the best removal method is to heavily tap the pwda valve onto something immoveable, and inertia will cause the shuttle to drop out

here are all the bits

the shuttle, top left just requires a clean and 2 new O rings, the brass body was cleaned by soaking it in vinegar overnight (coca cola works too), and I blacked the steel endpiece with that Frosts kit I used on the rivets

reassemble with some brake fluid, and here's the finished item

If Alan Chatterton requires more bling under his bonnet he can always get this chromed!, although watch out for the shuttle bore.

Thats 5 more hours today bringing the grand total hours worked to 803 hours

Trim Items

Its always the trim and interior you do last, and in my experience you rush it as you are desperate to drive the car. Well at the moment as I wait to hear from the paint shop I have a forced layoff from working on the car directly, so I am concentrating on getting the trim items ready to fit when done, so there's no pressure to rush them and forever put up with bodges!

I have also realised how close I am now to finishing the car, I suspect I won't quite make my May deadline, which is the 2nd anniversary of the date the car first arrived home, but the jobs left to complete aren't many, and if I am correct are as follows:-

1). fabricate exhaust system
2). fit roof lining
3). fit heads and carbs
4). finish brake line to offside front brake caliper, and bleed brakes
5). fully test electrics, and fix things that don't work!
6). fit bumpers
7). finish leadloading to bonnet
8). fit wiper arms and blades
9). fit the rest of the interior trim and seats
10). fit radiator and fan
11). fit power steering pump and alternator

Apart from the final comission and test, and the exhaust system, thats probably only 10 or 11 days work, but a lot will need to wait until the paint rectification is complete, however items like the power steering pump can be stripped and rebuilt in the interim

So back to the trim items.

I wanted to complete the parcel shelves, which as you may remember were in a very sorry state. The driverside was all torn, so I stripped it to the component parts and cut out new pieces of millboard

I used the hole punch to cut the rivet holes for the bifurcated rivets, after using a stanley knife to cut the millboard. The new rivets are shiney steel, so I bought a Frosts metal blacking kit

and after dipping the rivets in the appropriate solutions as instructed I ended up with this

24 nice black rivets. After some struggles aligning everything, and then worse still working out how to clamp the rivets and fix them in place, an almost new driver's shelf

The passenger side one was complete, but squashed! However I reasoned that as it was really just thick cardboard, I could wet the cardborad, make it pliable again, and then hold it flat where required with some weights. This is how it ended up, just needs a coat of paint now

The next job of the day was to strip the chrome items off the rear seats, so they can be sent to a plating shop. So it was off to shed with a few tools and strip this lot off the seats

I suspect that lots going to cost a few pounds

The rear seats are in good condition, but need cleaning, and the black velour has faded a little, I am going to try some fabric dye on this. The backings, that form the load area floor, and indeed the load covers over the spare wheel and tank are in poor condition, the wood has warped, and the carpet is rubbish

So I stripped off the load strips, which are an aluminium channel with a rubber insert, and removed all the boards, it was fun finding the hidden fixings! I was going to recover the seat backs myself, but the carpet set I purchased is poor by the original standards, the carpets do not all have the bound edges that they should have, so after discussions with Aldridge Trimming all the boards, with carpet remnants are going off to be remade, accurately and with similar material to that which Triumph used originally, not some nasty synthetic carpet. They need the lot (as patterns), so there was no point stripping them further.

While they are away I will (gulp) polish and straighten the aluminium strips ready for refitting. They are also going to make the rear wheel arch carpet trims, and supply me some carpet for the footwell backing boards I made, and a few other bits of good carpet that I am missing.

hours worked now 797, 7 today 
costs now £14840, metal blacking kit £40, refitting tyres £50, parts last week £20

Nothing beats the fumes from Contact Adhesive!

I had to go into work early today, and as the Starret hole saw had arrived, and the foam, what better excuse than to leave early and do some theraputic work on the estate.

So I started off drilling all the holes needed in the hardboard, starret hole saw is also visible

One side of the board and the foam was then coated in high temperature contact adhesive, thats a lot of glue and a whole lot of fumes, as I was doing this on the breakfast room table Anne made me shut myself away and open a door to the garden, apparently the fumes were making her cooking taste funny!

Here's the boards with the foam stuck to them and all cut out.

Next job was to position the old vinyl on the boards and glue round the back edges only, when the glue goes off, you tension the vinyl and affix it onto the glue on the hardboard, so all the glue is on the rear face.

And here's all the finished trim panels, nice and flat, original vinyl with good fixing holes. I am going to give them a final finish with the vinyl paint, but I am happy with the result.

The 2 remaining hardboard panels need carpet gluing to them (ah more adhesive fumes) and fitting to the footwells. I have a plan for this, I am going to buy some carpet from a trimmer, and ask him to keep the rest to trim the rest of the car with.

I have to do the estate load area and seat backs now, because these are all warped and twisted too, but these will need 7 or 8mm marine ply.

Hours worked now 790, 4 today, and £14 spent on foam, £6 on hardboard.

Today I have been mostly doing woodwork

My first day back on the car since Stoneleigh (more on that later), I wanted to get on with the interior trim parts, so I started by stripping the vinyl trim from its backing hardboard and giving it a good clean. Washing up liquid and scrubbing brush!

I needed to do this because all the backing board is damaged and warped

I need to source the thin foam that covers the board as removal and reuse is a pig - anyone know where you can buy 3-4mm thick foam?

Anyway several hours later here are all the backing boards remade and tested for fit.

I still need to drill the mounting clip holes, which are 13mm diameter, but I need to get a sarrett hole saw for this, as large conventional twist bit drills just tend to drill a strange shaped hole in hardboard.

When complete I am going to give the vinyl a quick paint with vinyl coat paint, as there are surface marks after the cleaning, and the nos rear hatch board donated by Alan Chatterton (which was brown originally) looks really good after 3 coats of vinyl coat.

I then dug out the parcel shelves, which currently look like this

Getting the rivets out is a pain, and left me with blisters, but I got the driver's side unit stripped down like this

the shelf itself looks OK, so I am only going to replace the upright trim, now that I have some millboard and the templates to make it from.

One of the tyres is still going flat too, so I only managed to fix 3 out of 4!

That was all the work for today.

Back to Stoneleigh, although I had a good show, 3 of my visitors were also involved in painting cars professionally. They pointed out various paint defects to me, and suggested that I get a report from a qualified assessor. This I have now done, and his report is a bit depressing. because as well as the dirt which has surfaced in the paint, there are fish eyes (from silicon contamination), some evidence of micro blistering (from trapped water), and pin holes developing from solvents trapped in the primer layer. There's also shrinkage and various other defects are appearing. To rectify it appears that there's a lot of rework to be undertaken, and several panels need stripping back to bare metal. Needless to say this takes some of the enjoyment out of the project, and is certainly going to cause delays while the rectification is undertaken. Additionally some of the exterior trim needs stripping off . I am not a happy bunny!

Hours worked now 786, 6 hours today.

More work ready for Stoneleigh

At the NEC Colin, Amanda and others on the register stand had a slight problem with the Estate, it required the tyres pumping up every couple of hours!- I did give them new footpump though. Anyway time to sort that out before I have to pump them up at Stoneleigh. I had the tyres removed from the rims today, and have applied two thick coats of Hammerite to the inside of the rims to assist the tyre seal, get the tyres refitted tomorrow.

I hope that fixes it!

Did a few other jobs this afternoon, finished the 2 rear doors too, although I am missing one weatherstrip seal

I also fitted the NOS rear carpet that I won on ebay recently, what a difference to the repro ones, its moulded to fit, and has underfelt padding in places

Fits perfectly. Its also made me decide to get a proper trimmer to finish the carpets and load area carpet trims. The repro stuff is not good. I tried one of the rear wheel arch carpets today, it just about fits where it touches, but its not great.

So, got to fit the rear windows, handbrake cable and its ready.

7 hours worked today total now 787