1980 Austin Princess mild custom - 1951 Lanchester LD10

Great success. Very nice cine footage 😊

The mojo, it has returned, because today I drove the Princess up and down a nearby private track and did a few emergency stops to wake the brakes up, which seems to have done the trick. Since the BX is immobilised currently and likely to remain so for another week, I wanted to be able to shunt the Princess about and work on it a little easier, so I swapped them around... and pulled the front bumper off the BX on one side when it rolled off the ramps but shhh that's our little secret and it's all back together now so it's like nothing happened (except for breaking a clip on the indicator shhhh). Topped the coolant up in the Princess after a bit more air was evacuated, only needed a cup or two really, checked all the lights are operating which they are, though the indicators had a good long think about it before they wanted to join in, and left the car to idle for a while. I still haven't done the fine tune yet, I'm waiting on a digital tachometer tool to arrive so I actually know what the rpm is. The car smells like its running a little rich, and it's hunting a little at idle too which is likely down to the tune and the old fuel. Happily, once you actually drive the car the hunting goes away and its quite responsive. The other irritation is that it's a bit tappy, this is quietening down the more the car is run so I'm guessing it's just because everything is new and is bedding in, as the car warms up the tappiness does reduce and it's not Talbot levels of engine castanets so I'm not that concerned.

First job after car shunting was to fit the speakers up front. These are originally rivetted in place, I'm using self-tapping screws because it's what I have. They're only screwed into metal clips in the door card, the screws don't go into the door frame. I've only fitted these to cover the holes in the door card, there's no sound system fitted so the speakers are purely decorative at this point. My camera seems to think the door cards are dark magenta now too.


With the Princess in a more open space I could get some better pictures of that spoiler so you can see what I can see and why it works best at the bottom of the boot. I will be painting it beige rather than leaving it black, it should work better that way.








I also dug out the Lotus alloys. They need refurbishing so I have a lot of sanding in my future. Best of all the Lotus alloys drop straight on, I've got a full set of the proper original Lotus tapered-sleeve wheel bolts so there's no worries over spigot rings and that sort of thing. The only real difference on fitment is the offset since the Lotus is rear wheel drive where the Princess is front wheel drive but last time I had them fitted I didn't find I was destroying wheel bearings so I don't reckon it's an issue.


Pretty sure I'm down to just cosmetic work now, of which there's a fair bit. Other half really wants the car properly resprayed, though was a little horrified when they found out how expensive that is until they learned just how labour intensive it is if you want a nice job. Ahead of the respray I want the displacers regassed (which I've been saying for years now) and there's a few little bits to address like the rear driver's door that hasn't had the final shaping on the lower trailing corner and the extra holes in the doors from previous mirrors. No really major jobs remain at least, aside from the paint, so it should be easy enough to chip away and get through it all.

Have you checked the indicators are less than 400mm from the outermost edge of the body? *possible MOT fail if not.
You can get round this by adding in the tiny ones I linked to in between the headlamps as well (so running 2 per side at front).

*depends if the MOT guy is picky or not.

blackpopracing: I hadn't checked so I just did and it's 400mm to the outer edge of the orange lens. I suppose technically that makes them too far in board, but only by the length of the stalk that supports them. I can probably dismantle the units and shorten the stalk to fix that if I have to.

glenanderson: Other half was just mentioning Lepsons today when someone was showing off the new wheels they'd just had done and comparing them to the mess they were before the work so they're filed under 'expensive but worth it'.

Had a go at installing the pump today and found out quite quickly that I couldn't do it. For one thing, I don't have a dial indicator so I need to get one of those to set up the pump in relation to the engine so that the timing is correct. However, that shouldn't stop me installing the pump itself, that should be a nice straight forward job. The most difficult bit is getting the woodruff key slots lined up. There's a slot in the pulley, like so. Note one of the mounting studs is removed here, I'll come to that in a moment.


There's another slot on the pump shaft that goes through the pulley and bolts from the other side.


However, the two slots are misaligned quite a lot. I didn't set the engine to TDC when I removed the pump because that wasn't in the instructions. Rather, the engine was rotated to the point that the bolts could be put through the pulley and into the pump mounted plate which means you don't have to remove the timing belt, etc. and, in theory, makes for a quicker job if you're just dropping the old pump back on. The problem here, is that I'm dropping what is effectively a new pump on and that's why there's this alignment issue.


I got one of the pump mounting studs out fairly easily, the other two don't want to budge. My thought there was to line up the pump with the pulley without the studs and then rotate the pump to the correct position while the pulley was still locked which, in theory, should allow everything to line up nicely and I can then order the tool I need and be done. However, because I can't get those two studs out with the tools at my disposal, this option is a no go. Also, I can't figure out how to rotate the pump off the car to make the key slot line up, and I daren't force anything since I've only just forked out a considerable sum to get it made nice again.

Either way it's faff to fix. I either need to get the tools to remove those two mounting studs so I can fit the pump in the wrong orientation and then rotate it to the correct orientation, or I can remove the timing belt and pump pulley, fit the pump and then fit the pulley to the pump, after which I'd have to make sure the timing was correct, etc. Third option is to save up some more cash and just get someone else to do it which honestly, is my preference at this point. I'm fed up of working on engines, I don't understand how anyone derives any joy from any of it.

Or rotate the engine?

To be brutally honest, I genuinely think that you should get someone else to do it, rather than slogging on with it on your own.

I hate deisels - did I mention that before

Setting up the pump is a bit tricky - even with a dial indicator. I did it with the engine out (I was rebuilding it) as the dial indicator went under the pump (Peugeot) so I think like Glen, you may be better with a mobile mechanic.

well, I ordered some more tools for doing the BX job so until those arrive, I switched back to the Princess to see if I could get it to be a little happier. First tool to arrive was the new timing light. This really only confirmed what I already hoped I knew, which is that the timing was where it should be. It's a useful tool to have in my arsenal, just not one I'm likely to use very often.



When the car had ben running for a while I had noticed some moisture at the head gasket seam and retorqued the head bolts which has prevented a comeback of this. I did expect to have to retorque the head bolts after the engine had been run up to temperature a few times since it's always needed that in the past and only a couple needed any attention. I'll check them again periodically once the car is in regular use.





Next thing was a cheap remote digital tachometer. There is a specific way of setting up a sensor and whatnot in the manual, this is cheaper and easier. The first mistake I made was listening to the wrong advice and putting the reflective tape on the belt, this gave me an rpm reading of about 50% of what I was expecting judging by the engine noise.



Some better advice came along and I put the tape on the crankshaft pulley instead. This confirmed what my ears were telling me. First attempt to get things set up today saw the car running incredibly rich for no discernible reason, I suspect it was a sticky component in the carb or something of that sort because no adjustments made any difference. I came back to it later when it had all cooled down and while the car is now running a little richer than I'd like, it's within tolerable levels for a car of this age now rather than stinking the place up like a 1960s banger.

The book calls for 750rpm at regular idle, this car has never managed that in my ownership, no matter who has tried to set it up, so when I got it to the 800rpm it likes (or thereabouts, the tachometer is not particularly precise) it was deemed good enough. The carb had been returned to the book baseline and needed a tiny tweak of the mixture screw to make things settle nicely and then I just let the car idle for a bit.

I now feel confident that I can take the car to the fuel station for some fresh petrol which will no doubt improve the running and iron out the remaining niggles. Before I do that I need to get the car taxed and some fresh insurance on it, and swap my good wheels and tyres on. It starts willingly every time so it can't be that bad.

There's a bit of a fruity note to the exhaust that seems to be coming from around the backbox area and while I can't find a leak, I wonder if there's one about to start. The brakes still feel good, just not as good as when it was put away. The brakes aren't spongey or hard, they're just not as strong as I remembered, though my memory could be tinted slightly by the time I've spent in the BX with its ludicrous stoppers.

I've got a few insurers to try out for a quote and will give classiclineuk a go because hey, I'm a club member, so why not? The Princess is rarely expensive to insure, even with the cosmetic mods it has declared.