Winter Sucks!
Seriously, I hate winter. I’m a sunshine and warmth kind of person. The thing I like least about winter is that it makes being a retro motorist fairly miserable. Well, it can do. And because I am the worst person at following my own advice I generally end up being one of the miserable ones. So lets take a look at simple things (and some maybe not so simple) which can be done to lift he burden of working on and driving old cars in the shabby weather we are stuck with for the next six or so months…
Crappy lights suck. Its dark all the time and many of our cars will be saddled with sealed beam units which give a similar light to a candle in a jam jar. Not to mention the tail lights which emit a vague red glow which can be seen from as far away as, oh, 5 feet? Halogen conversions make sense but cost money to buy in kits. I have found that BMWs are a fine source of 5.25” circular lights which will upgrade Mk3 Cortinas, Capris, and presumably anything else with those size of lights. If you are a bit of an originality freak then you can get a 75W sealed beam light for the centre (high beam only) lights, these were factory fit on the P6 Rover 3500S but are getting harder to find now. At the rear Pop Browns sell standard fitting bulbs for most stop & tail lights which are extra bright. Other people sell LED based bulbs with standard bayonets which emit more (and clearer) light than the stock bulbs. I also thought about raiding the brighter bulbs from one of those tail light tinting kits maybe?
Of course no lighting upgrade is going to be any good if the wiring is tosh. As a minimum good earths and clean contacts will ensure lights work as well as they were originally spec’d to. However by bypassing the old and creaky loom and running your headlights etc direct from the battery and using a relay switched off the original loom to handle the switching only you can often improve the car’s light output by a significant margin while using the stock bulbs. Liberate the wiring from a fog light kit or similar for this.
You can have the best lights, wiring, etc. but if the electrical system isn’t supplying the juice then all you will end up with is a flat battery. In winter when we tend to be using the lights, wipers, heater, HRW, etc. far more the charging system and the battery take more of a beating. Simple stuff like fitting a new fan belt and checking its correctly tensioned can increase alternator output by reducing slippage (you don’t always hear slipping belts). Check the alternator output and consider changing clunky old dynamos for a more modern alternator. Older weaker alternators and “one wire” hook-ups could best be replaced by a modern current sensing alternator and/or one of greater power. Often you can find a similar but higher output alternator on a similar make car of a higher spec to yours, e.g. if I had an early Pinto engine Cortina I’d start looking in a late model 2.0 Granada with all the toys… Also diesel versions often get spec’d with bigger alternators and batteries. If you are feeling proper spendy then the aftermarket audio market run high output alternators to charge the huge ICE system’s multi-battery set ups. Ain’t no chance of a flat battery in a normal car with one of them….
Obviously you should check the battery is still OK (topped up with electrolyte, no sign of warped plates, holds charge, clean terminals, etc.)
You can also buy solar or mains trickle chargers which will keep the battery topped up when the car is not in use should you really need some help!
Creaky worn out starter motors will be under their greatest strain in cold weather, more cranking and thicker cold oil will take their toll. Check and clean connections (especially earths) and check the electrical condition of the starter. I have improved the performance of an elderly starter by cutting back the plastic insulation when the stator had worn right down. Not a long term fix but it helped out for a while. On a disposable winter hack / daily it might be the difference between buying a new starter or the old one seeing you through until you scrap the car.
Don’t forget the main engine to chassis earth.
The thing which really gets my dander up in the winter is the continual steaming/misting up of the windows. Some cars I have owned (and 1960s Vauxhalls seem to be the worst for this) have been so bad that I might as well have painted all the glass white in October and had done with it! Steamy windows, except the Tina Turner type, are generally caused by leaks and condensation which are caused by damp air ingression, so pretty much “leaks again” on that one. If you are feeling spendy then replacing all the screen and door rubbers and window felts will help prevent misting as well as drafts. However on many older cars these rubbers are no longer available off the shelf and on most they will add up to a tidy sum to change them all out anyway. A lower cost alternative would be to skilfully apply silicone or similar sealer to seal at least the front and rear screens. Even if there are no obvious leaks a well sealed screen is less liable to misting. Door seals can be “plumped up” to make a good seal again by inserting old bicycle tyre inner tubes between them and the flange they attach to. Window felts or rubbers are usually dead when they wear out but you may be able to salvage something suitable off a later model car in the breakers yard with some ingenuity.
Sealing out these leaks and drafts will also help your heating. More on heating later…
The final thought on demisting is the add-on kit you can get to help out here. Small 12V heated fans can assist a weak heater to speed up defogging screens, and several suppliers sell heated rear window kits to suit classic cars. www.frost.co.uk or eBay are two sources. Back in the day (50s and 60s) non-electric defogging panels were sold, these are basically a kind of low tech double glazing for car rear windows. If you get one which hasn’t gone yellow with age, and still sticks in the rear screen OK they do work remarkably well and are a very nice period accessory for older cars.
I have never got on with Rain-X or similar products.
Some misting is caused by leaks due to rusty holes letting in water. You know what the answer is there, and its not a quick fix. This is why Duck Tape was invented.
Heating has to be one of the things which our significant others complain about the most in our cars. Or rather, the lack of heating. There are two basic faults once you take out drafts and leaks. First is the heat exchange being of low efficiency. Basically this means a blocked up or silted up heater matrix (or core). Sometimes you can remove and reverse flush these, or even use an ultrasonic cleaner if you have access to one, but often replacement is the only cure. If the hose leading to the heater is hot, but the air coming from it is not, then the matrix is usually at fault. The other big thing with poor heating is the fact that the engine is not getting the coolant hot enough. It sounds counter intuitive that we’d want to make our cars motors run hot, but if its not getting properly up to temperature in winter more harm can be done than just having a chilly missus. Check the cooling system operates correctly, if there is a choice of winter and summer thermostats use the correct one, set any electric fans or other thermostats a few degrees warmer. In the old days radiator muffs were a common accessory and aren’t a bad idea if your car does run cool still. You can pick them up on eBay or at autojumbles for most common cars up to the early 1970s. It shouldn’t be beyond the wit of the average retro rider to fabricate one. When I was a lad it was common to see cars with baking foil over their radiator grilles in the winter… OLD SKOOL.
An electric fan rather than a mechanical one will help the car warm up quicker in winter and can liberate a few extra BHP.
If your car runs on LPG then the heat output can be reduced as the heat from the heater hose is used to vaporise the LPG. If this seriously cuts heat output then you can use a Y pipe in the hose to split the hot water flow and have one branch go to the heater matrix and the other go to the evaporator.
A final thought on heating is to ensure that any grommets or bungs you knocked out of the bulkhead etc when running wires for stereos, auxiliary instrumentation, etc. during the summer are blocked off properly as cold air will come in through them in winter and hot air in summer! You will also reduce cabin wind and mechanical noise doing this. Old and perished ones can be replaced cheaply with kits from most kit car and classic suppliers. Split or missing shifter boots or handbrake gaiters can also let in a lot of cold air in some cars.
Additional heating assistance can come in the form of a product like the Kenlowe Hot Start which uses an emersion heater in the coolant which is wired to the mains. This means that when you start your car in the morning you get instant heat from the heater. Nice and toasty. It also eases cold starting issues in winter. The Kenlowe kit is expensive but you could use a DIY solution or import a similar kit from the USA, Canada or Europe where they are more common and cheaper.
Closely related to misting up is seeing out… In the winter all manner of sludge get thrown up and rained down and in no time a “pro detailed” looking car can look like its just come off the dirt track at the Hayride. Obvious stuff is to use a decent quality detergent in your screen wash. Consider changing to electric squirters if you still have wimpy bellows type and anyone driving on vacuum operated wipers in the winter is either a hero or an idiot. Or maybe both. I have seen kits on sale before which use warm water from the heater hose to heat either the water reservoir or the pipes which feed the squirters in order to prevent the squirters from freezing up and also because warm water won’t freeze on the screen so easy and will cut the road grease easier. I haven’t seen such a kit on sale in a few years but doubtless you could fabricate something.
Many older cars have very small washer reservoirs and it may be a good idea to fit one from a modern car which is larger.
Old school tricks like using newspaper to clean the windows for a streak free finish are getting harder as many newspapers are printed with solvent-free inks now. You may want to invest in a quality glass cleaner like Autoglym Fast Glass which is non-smearing.
Now is a good time to replace your wiper blades.
A good service now, before the weather gets too nasty is a good call. I know I seriously won’t fancy it and always try making it through till spring before doing routine service work so I guess you’re the same. Unless you enjoy being on your back under a car changing oil in the snow. While you are at it check your tyres. Winter is a time for plenty of tread. Summer Sports tyres are not ideal…
OK guys, any additional suggestions from you guys?
Part 2 of “Winter Sucks!” Is coming shortly and is all about working on your car in winter and making that a more pleasant experience…
Seriously, I hate winter. I’m a sunshine and warmth kind of person. The thing I like least about winter is that it makes being a retro motorist fairly miserable. Well, it can do. And because I am the worst person at following my own advice I generally end up being one of the miserable ones. So lets take a look at simple things (and some maybe not so simple) which can be done to lift he burden of working on and driving old cars in the shabby weather we are stuck with for the next six or so months…
Crappy lights suck. Its dark all the time and many of our cars will be saddled with sealed beam units which give a similar light to a candle in a jam jar. Not to mention the tail lights which emit a vague red glow which can be seen from as far away as, oh, 5 feet? Halogen conversions make sense but cost money to buy in kits. I have found that BMWs are a fine source of 5.25” circular lights which will upgrade Mk3 Cortinas, Capris, and presumably anything else with those size of lights. If you are a bit of an originality freak then you can get a 75W sealed beam light for the centre (high beam only) lights, these were factory fit on the P6 Rover 3500S but are getting harder to find now. At the rear Pop Browns sell standard fitting bulbs for most stop & tail lights which are extra bright. Other people sell LED based bulbs with standard bayonets which emit more (and clearer) light than the stock bulbs. I also thought about raiding the brighter bulbs from one of those tail light tinting kits maybe?
Of course no lighting upgrade is going to be any good if the wiring is tosh. As a minimum good earths and clean contacts will ensure lights work as well as they were originally spec’d to. However by bypassing the old and creaky loom and running your headlights etc direct from the battery and using a relay switched off the original loom to handle the switching only you can often improve the car’s light output by a significant margin while using the stock bulbs. Liberate the wiring from a fog light kit or similar for this.
You can have the best lights, wiring, etc. but if the electrical system isn’t supplying the juice then all you will end up with is a flat battery. In winter when we tend to be using the lights, wipers, heater, HRW, etc. far more the charging system and the battery take more of a beating. Simple stuff like fitting a new fan belt and checking its correctly tensioned can increase alternator output by reducing slippage (you don’t always hear slipping belts). Check the alternator output and consider changing clunky old dynamos for a more modern alternator. Older weaker alternators and “one wire” hook-ups could best be replaced by a modern current sensing alternator and/or one of greater power. Often you can find a similar but higher output alternator on a similar make car of a higher spec to yours, e.g. if I had an early Pinto engine Cortina I’d start looking in a late model 2.0 Granada with all the toys… Also diesel versions often get spec’d with bigger alternators and batteries. If you are feeling proper spendy then the aftermarket audio market run high output alternators to charge the huge ICE system’s multi-battery set ups. Ain’t no chance of a flat battery in a normal car with one of them….
Obviously you should check the battery is still OK (topped up with electrolyte, no sign of warped plates, holds charge, clean terminals, etc.)
You can also buy solar or mains trickle chargers which will keep the battery topped up when the car is not in use should you really need some help!
Creaky worn out starter motors will be under their greatest strain in cold weather, more cranking and thicker cold oil will take their toll. Check and clean connections (especially earths) and check the electrical condition of the starter. I have improved the performance of an elderly starter by cutting back the plastic insulation when the stator had worn right down. Not a long term fix but it helped out for a while. On a disposable winter hack / daily it might be the difference between buying a new starter or the old one seeing you through until you scrap the car.
Don’t forget the main engine to chassis earth.
The thing which really gets my dander up in the winter is the continual steaming/misting up of the windows. Some cars I have owned (and 1960s Vauxhalls seem to be the worst for this) have been so bad that I might as well have painted all the glass white in October and had done with it! Steamy windows, except the Tina Turner type, are generally caused by leaks and condensation which are caused by damp air ingression, so pretty much “leaks again” on that one. If you are feeling spendy then replacing all the screen and door rubbers and window felts will help prevent misting as well as drafts. However on many older cars these rubbers are no longer available off the shelf and on most they will add up to a tidy sum to change them all out anyway. A lower cost alternative would be to skilfully apply silicone or similar sealer to seal at least the front and rear screens. Even if there are no obvious leaks a well sealed screen is less liable to misting. Door seals can be “plumped up” to make a good seal again by inserting old bicycle tyre inner tubes between them and the flange they attach to. Window felts or rubbers are usually dead when they wear out but you may be able to salvage something suitable off a later model car in the breakers yard with some ingenuity.
Sealing out these leaks and drafts will also help your heating. More on heating later…
The final thought on demisting is the add-on kit you can get to help out here. Small 12V heated fans can assist a weak heater to speed up defogging screens, and several suppliers sell heated rear window kits to suit classic cars. www.frost.co.uk or eBay are two sources. Back in the day (50s and 60s) non-electric defogging panels were sold, these are basically a kind of low tech double glazing for car rear windows. If you get one which hasn’t gone yellow with age, and still sticks in the rear screen OK they do work remarkably well and are a very nice period accessory for older cars.
I have never got on with Rain-X or similar products.
Some misting is caused by leaks due to rusty holes letting in water. You know what the answer is there, and its not a quick fix. This is why Duck Tape was invented.
Heating has to be one of the things which our significant others complain about the most in our cars. Or rather, the lack of heating. There are two basic faults once you take out drafts and leaks. First is the heat exchange being of low efficiency. Basically this means a blocked up or silted up heater matrix (or core). Sometimes you can remove and reverse flush these, or even use an ultrasonic cleaner if you have access to one, but often replacement is the only cure. If the hose leading to the heater is hot, but the air coming from it is not, then the matrix is usually at fault. The other big thing with poor heating is the fact that the engine is not getting the coolant hot enough. It sounds counter intuitive that we’d want to make our cars motors run hot, but if its not getting properly up to temperature in winter more harm can be done than just having a chilly missus. Check the cooling system operates correctly, if there is a choice of winter and summer thermostats use the correct one, set any electric fans or other thermostats a few degrees warmer. In the old days radiator muffs were a common accessory and aren’t a bad idea if your car does run cool still. You can pick them up on eBay or at autojumbles for most common cars up to the early 1970s. It shouldn’t be beyond the wit of the average retro rider to fabricate one. When I was a lad it was common to see cars with baking foil over their radiator grilles in the winter… OLD SKOOL.
An electric fan rather than a mechanical one will help the car warm up quicker in winter and can liberate a few extra BHP.
If your car runs on LPG then the heat output can be reduced as the heat from the heater hose is used to vaporise the LPG. If this seriously cuts heat output then you can use a Y pipe in the hose to split the hot water flow and have one branch go to the heater matrix and the other go to the evaporator.
A final thought on heating is to ensure that any grommets or bungs you knocked out of the bulkhead etc when running wires for stereos, auxiliary instrumentation, etc. during the summer are blocked off properly as cold air will come in through them in winter and hot air in summer! You will also reduce cabin wind and mechanical noise doing this. Old and perished ones can be replaced cheaply with kits from most kit car and classic suppliers. Split or missing shifter boots or handbrake gaiters can also let in a lot of cold air in some cars.
Additional heating assistance can come in the form of a product like the Kenlowe Hot Start which uses an emersion heater in the coolant which is wired to the mains. This means that when you start your car in the morning you get instant heat from the heater. Nice and toasty. It also eases cold starting issues in winter. The Kenlowe kit is expensive but you could use a DIY solution or import a similar kit from the USA, Canada or Europe where they are more common and cheaper.
Closely related to misting up is seeing out… In the winter all manner of sludge get thrown up and rained down and in no time a “pro detailed” looking car can look like its just come off the dirt track at the Hayride. Obvious stuff is to use a decent quality detergent in your screen wash. Consider changing to electric squirters if you still have wimpy bellows type and anyone driving on vacuum operated wipers in the winter is either a hero or an idiot. Or maybe both. I have seen kits on sale before which use warm water from the heater hose to heat either the water reservoir or the pipes which feed the squirters in order to prevent the squirters from freezing up and also because warm water won’t freeze on the screen so easy and will cut the road grease easier. I haven’t seen such a kit on sale in a few years but doubtless you could fabricate something.
Many older cars have very small washer reservoirs and it may be a good idea to fit one from a modern car which is larger.
Old school tricks like using newspaper to clean the windows for a streak free finish are getting harder as many newspapers are printed with solvent-free inks now. You may want to invest in a quality glass cleaner like Autoglym Fast Glass which is non-smearing.
Now is a good time to replace your wiper blades.
A good service now, before the weather gets too nasty is a good call. I know I seriously won’t fancy it and always try making it through till spring before doing routine service work so I guess you’re the same. Unless you enjoy being on your back under a car changing oil in the snow. While you are at it check your tyres. Winter is a time for plenty of tread. Summer Sports tyres are not ideal…
OK guys, any additional suggestions from you guys?
Part 2 of “Winter Sucks!” Is coming shortly and is all about working on your car in winter and making that a more pleasant experience…