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Ruddy heck, that is quite an impressive haul of gubbins you've got there...!!! It is a shame you couldn't get the other bits that you wanted but you really do seem to have got the most important bits as well as some other choice pieces too...!
I am sure that having all this will pay dividends in the future and that can only be a good thing for both yourself and your trusty Princess collection.
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***GARAGE CURRENTLY EMPTY***
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These are now by far and away my favourite threads on here. Love reading this one, and of course now the other.
Fine work on the haul, that's how it should be done! Id like to see this in the flesh one day.
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jonw: I understand the appeal of them, I really do, but at the moment they're not for me. Maybe in the future I'll have one. grifterkid: me too! It's not an opportunity I expect to appear again any time soon so I grabbed it with both hands. captainwow: thank you  You may well see the car in person one day, for some reason I was thinking Evesham is in Kent but apparently it's near Birmingham so you're not a millionsquillion miles away from me here in North Derbyshire. -- The weather is appalling here today so my plan of spending a few hours stripping down the axle ready for fitting it to the car were thwarted. I got as far as freeing off the union for the hydragas pipes to the rear spheres. Pretty much every other nut has a good inch or so of paint on it so they're a bit stubborn and it's difficult to work on this sort of thing when the sky is trying to drown you. Overall, the axle does look pretty sound with plenty of paint keeping the vast majority of any rust build up at bay. The perishable rubber components are in pretty good health. The stubs of the rebound straps actually help with moving the axle around so I'll leave those attached, that's the actual reason, it has nothing to do with the fact that I can't budge the nuts that hold the rebounds strap brackets on because they're welded on with paint. The spheres are nice and dry and while there is some surface corrosion, it doesn't appear to be anything more than that so I'm hoping they'll clean up well and be servicable.  With the pipes off I can see that one of the braided sections has split. Interestingly, it's split near the sphere so it is possible that the hose on the HL has split too and that's what's caused the loss of fluid and pressure. I'm hoping that is the actual fault and not a blown sphere but obviously I shan't know until I have the HL up in the air again to inspect. Looks like I've got a bonus length of undamaged metal hydragas piping and one servicable braided hose off the replacement axle so far, so that's an okay start. I've also got a set of 8 good chromed wheel nuts that will clean up well, just a shame they're the wrong fitting for the Lotus alloys I have waiting in the wings still. I'll likely clean up and keep all the various unions on these pipes as I can imagine them being a useful part to have in the stash.  Weather got a bit serious so I busied myself cleaning the worst of the muck off the interior parts and sorting out which stuff to put in/on which car to reduce the amount of storage space it was all taking up. The boot carpeting cleaned up remarkably well and is a combination of original and owner pieces. Unusually, the non-original bits of carpet are actually cut to shape very well so should provide useful patterns and still be usable in the cars. Dropped one of the spare courtesy light lenses in the HLS and the majority of the boot carpetting since it'll finish it off well. The tatty but complete carpet trim for the bit between the rear lights has gone in the HL along with the spare wheel cover but I've not fitted them yet, they're both trim items that are tricky to find as nobody seems to keep them. Spare rear light covers went in the HLS too, but I've misplaced the screws to fix them in properly. Disappointingly, the toolkit was missing from the spares car I visited, I had hoped to get another jack ratchet handle and possibly another jack. I have this desire to own four factory Princess jacks because I'm sure it'll serve some practical use at some point. The only other thing I got fitted were the rim embellishers. I've got 7 embellishers between the two cars and some are very good while some have holes in them. The best four got put on the HL so they take up no space but it did highlight that I should really get different weights fitted to the wheels to make them look their best. I like the embellishers, they smarten up the wheels considerably.  I know what you're thinking...  It really does look comical when you come onto the street, as I mentioned before, jacking the car up to inspect the actual fault resulted in a loss of fluid and a proper lean. It amuses me because of the thought of a Princess on hydraulics, but it also makes me sad because my car is so obviously broken looking.  I'm told the weather is set to get even worse over the next few days so I'll likely not get much done on this axle refurb for a while which is really quite annoying as the longer it takes the longer I'm grounded.
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Last Edit: Oct 3, 2013 16:43:10 GMT by Deleted
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120y
Part of things
Posts: 423 
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That car is a credit to you and I think its brilliant you have saved another one, I really do think these cars still don't get the attention they deserve. I was reading on the owners club website that its possible to fit a turbo charger to the princess, the gentleman said he would recommend suspension modifications as the princess as it stands could be scary if driven fast. I could just imagine the 2.2 engine with a turbo, talk about a sleeper car |
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1996 Renault Clio MK1 1.4 RT Auto
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camper damper
Part of things
Another car bites the dust
Posts: 606
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Sorry to here about the spheres going but at lease you got a hole axle and other bits cheap
Keep up the good work
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Better bring the other side down to even things out  It looks fantastic with the wheels in the arches |
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Whats the gearbox arrangement in these. Is it gear in sump like its smaller stablemates?
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It is indeed an in-sump gearbox and only a four speed, they never made a five speed Princess but they really should have for that little bit extra refinement on the motorway. Four speed is enough for me, I find the car not-too-annoying in the outside lane of the motorway when it comes to engine noise. -- Axles are heavy. I don't know why this keeps surprising me as a thing. In an effort to make the axle easier to move and refurbish I made a concerted effort to strip it down today and found a couple of good reasons beyond prettifying it to do so. One side was in pretty good order with a decent amount of grease packed into the bearing and the hub nut tightened suitably. The condition of the drum internals this side was also pretty good. The other side, which looked like it had a replacement outer drum as it wasn't painted red like everything else, had no grease packed around the bearing as it should and the hub nut was massively over tightened. On opening the hub on this side it looked like one brake shoe had been replaced but the other hadn't due to one being much more worn than the other and there looked to be a fairly new cylinder. Because I wasn't sure if the hubs were handed, I made sure to take a couple of reference shots. The metal brake pipes were retained and the unions taped once everything was removed so I didn't get any mess into them. Corrosion is actually very minimal thanks probably to the copious layers of paint that have been applied since '77.  This is the properly maintained hub with even brake shoe wear and a dusty but tidy appearance to everything inside.  I was expecting the nuts and bolts to be fairly stubborn, but either I'm getting better at this or they weren't too bad as the hubs came off in relatively short order, reducing the weight of the axle by about half and making it a lot easier to lug about. I did eventually find a spot that needs welding but given how thick the metal is I expect I can do this with the stick welder I've got to good effect. I managed to shear one of the bolts on this bracket even though everything is well marinaded. I wasn't initially going to remove the arms from the axle but it will make refurbishing everything easier and will mean that there'll be minimum chance of rust returning.  The other side is nice and solid, I gave everything a good stab with the screwdriver.  Once I find the wire brush that's gone walkies I can crack on with refurbishing the bits I've removed while the nuts and bolts on the axle marinate in storage since it's now lightweight enough to actually move to a place that's not outdoors. Providing weather is suitable and I have enough free time, I'll have another go at dismantling the rest of the axle. |
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Ahhh the old collapsed suspension malarky .... my dads Princess went on the A34 coming back from Bournemouth to Aylesbury ..... yet another holiday finishing on the back of an RAC truck ......
It was the passenger side front that went on his ..b he got one from a scrappie and I fitted it .. it took a couple of hours.
Good lad for keeping on going with it.
iirc I don't think the hubs are handed. I'd just strip the lot down and rebuild/repair/repaint as you put it all back together.
At least you'll know its all good, plus you'll know how it all fits together if you ever get an issue with them when its on the rd .
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That's the plan, but I'm being thwarted by seized bolts and a lack of power tools at the moment. We'll get there eventually.
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Just a matter of idle curiosity is the Princess totally marooned when that happens or is it one of those self-destructive acts to pootle about with a limp like that?
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You can drive them.... but not to far or too fast ........
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I can drive it at a top speed of 20mph safely, but shouldn't do so for more than a few miles. Means you can limp it to a garage. The ride is bizarre though, it's softly sprung one side and rock hard the other so I wouldn't want to drive it more than on and off the drive which is all I've done since the suspected sphere failure. I imagine it'll pull to the left A LOT too so driving down the road will be a battle as it stands.
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Oct 10, 2013 18:20:20 GMT
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Finally, after a temporary weather induced rage quit on my part, I got the axle stripped down to managable chunks ready to be refurbished. The 8 bolts that hold the end brackets onto the cross tube were all seized up so badly that I just resorted to attacking them with the angle grinder which made very short work of them. Fitting new nuts and bolts admittedly adds a little expense and time to the refurb but that's not necessarily a bad thing if I want this to last. I found another hole on the other side of the bracket that had the bigger hole. This will obviously need repairing and I'm considering dropping off the stripped cross tube with a company that can repair and repaint or powder coat it so it's as good as it can be.  Here you can see why I stood no chance getting those bolts out. These washers have a pair of threaded holes in them that are completely rusted up, the fact I got one bolt out was pretty amazing really when I saw how bad these are. There is some evidence that these were originally spot welded to the cross tube bracket, but none of them were still attached. I'm not sure what my solution here is going to be yet.  I mustn't forget to reinstate washers like this when I do rebuild this bit, wasn't a chance of them surviving when I chopped the heads off the bolts.  First real problem I found was the difference between the mounting brackets. These brackets fit to the ends of the cross tubes and I think they bolt to the underside of the car. They should, as far as I know, be a matching pair but one has half the bracket missing which is probably still attached to the breaker. Not sure how I missed this, but I did. It looks like a very simple bracket so I could probably get a new one made up to match, but how would I then go about bonding it to the rubber mount?  Getting those brackets off is pretty important as it allows you to remove the arms from the cross tube. I haven't attempting to strip the arms down further than they are. I'm concerned that if I damage the bushes in the arms I won't be able to get replacements and rebuild everything, though I'm aware that it's the best way to get rid of all the corrosion and make sure everything goes back together like new.  The only other issue with the HL is that the petrol tank seems to have a minor leak so I need to drop that and find out what's going on. I had hoped it was condensation or something from the car being stood, but water doesn't dissolve underseal and leave little spots of it under the car like petrol does. I'll drop the tank when I drop the axle and do both together. At this rate it's going to be easier to get the HLS on the road, I can see this job with the HL dragging on a bit. |
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Oct 11, 2013 14:28:41 GMT
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hmm so effectively the only thing holding (one bit of) the beam to the car is the mechanical strength of that bonded rubber ? i can see the point of it, but i wouldnt be happy unless it was modified to solid metal, even if it meant increase in vibration through the car the captive plates instantly reminded me of front bumper mountings from the BL brethren land rover ninety.... www.lrseries.com/shop/product/listing/2483/ALQ710020-TAPPING-BLOCK.htmlwould be a bit of a fluke if the hole centres were the same though. maybe some 6mm strips of steel, drilled, with nuts welded on the rear would be an ok solution? the only reason the captive plate would be spot welded is to aid assembly, not having access to the rear to hold it. |
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Last Edit: Oct 11, 2013 14:30:56 GMT by darrenh
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Oct 11, 2013 18:42:38 GMT
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The bonded rubber is sandwiched between two plates that form the bracket and the two halves of the plate are held by a special metal conical washer on the bracket side and a substantial ordinary metal washer on the other end of the rod that bolts through the bracket, radius arm and sphere bracket. So there's more than just the rubber holding everything together, thankfully, and it's nicely engineered to be quite simple but also quite effective. I'm going to have to knock the rods out, I thought I could get away without doing so but in reality they do need removing so I can make sure everything is properly lubricated and as much corrosion as possible is removed.
I'll get a scan of the exploded diagram from the manual, it'll explain better how it all goes together I think.
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This thread has got me thinking. As have many others over the course of the year, but this is the one that's been the tipping point of this idea for me for some reason.  As you know, the paint on the Princess is shot. Thanks to a botched restoration in the past and the various knocks and scrapes the car is looking decidedly shabby now and while I still have my plan of the shiny purple seventies style wonder barge, I thought it might be good to have a bit of fun in the meantime. I'm going to be working around the car a panel at a time doing the various repairs that are needed, so why not do some extra panel work while I'm at it? I have a few ideas and a good amount of transferable skills and while I don't plan to go full on Boso-Princess I'd certainly like to lift a few ideas from that and lowrider paintjobs, simplified somewhat and the colours altered to suit the Princess. I reckon I'll use the bonnet as my test canvas as it's probably the best panel on the car and spread out from there, derusting, welding and painting as I go. If it looks appalling, I can always just put a single flat coat of paint on to cover it all up again. |
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Wow, that is a bold move...! I cannot wait to see how this next step unfolds...
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***GARAGE CURRENTLY EMPTY***
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Oct 15, 2013 10:15:21 GMT
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I like the sound of this...
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Oct 15, 2013 12:14:36 GMT
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Where's the 'popcorn' smiley then? |
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You may well see the car in person one day, for some reason I was thinking Evesham is in Kent but apparently it's near Birmingham so you're not a millionsquillion miles away from me here in North Derbyshire.
It looks fantastic with the wheels in the arches
