Living in Wales and near constant lockdown I've enjoyed reading the threads here so thought I'd do a little write up again. My car mojo has been pretty low, with nowhere to go and the most ridiculous MOT tester. I think I've got the issues sorted and I'm booking the MOT tomorrow morning!
I took the car to a local garage which also specialises in old Jags, thinking they would be reasonable with a 30 year old imported car. With lockdown in full effect and Cardiff a different area even if just 5 miles away, I thought I could just take it down the road instead. Wrong!
Whilst there were some things I needed to sort, such as a broken handbrake cable connector, they were more interested in deriding the car and picking up anything they could. Shame as I would have taken my daily Volvo and the girlfriends Mini there otherwise, not to mention the Corvette.
The rear indicators are in the reverse lamp housings so that the 4 red tail lights can remain. Being an equal distance from the centre of the car, they've never been questioned before. After I pointed this out the tester got his back up, called someone over and declared them “not orange enough”. It's an orange bulb in a clear housing, not exactly an unusual combination? They further picked up on the side markers not being visible from the back of the car and the seats being dangerously insecure, when infact they tilt a bit so you can reach the release lever, just like they came out of the factory. A small crack in the steering shaft rag joint was another serious fail, which had eluded any previous MOT inspection.
My one genuine worry was emissions, and they did allow a quick tweak of the distributor to drop the CO and pass. However I wasn't happy with it running rich at idle and so that was something to sort out.
Having “recovered” the car back home having spent £50 to get very grumpy I set about sorting out the small items.
I painted the reverse lamp housings yellow, hoping to make the indicators more orange, and it looks alright against the plate anyway.
I couldn't find one of these rubber pieces anywhere but after some measuring, a similar item from a Ford Sierra would be a close fit.
The pinch bolt holding the shaft to the rack was a little tight and my trolley jack handle doubled up as a suitable bar.
The third brake light only had one bulb working, not a fail but an irritation. Luckily at a car show someone gave me some C4 oddments in exchange for cold Cider and I was able to swap the innards over from another. The bulb had melted to the housing and cooked the board.
New headlight adjusters since the others were siezed:
The handbrake cable has an integral collar which had broken, no longer actuating the left caliper. The handbrake uses a cam on the brake caliper to push the pads onto the disc, rather than conventional shoes. It can be quite fussy but hopefully a new cable will be all that's required.
The car only has one single wire O2 sensor and it has difficulty staying in operating range with the long tube headers and dual exhaust. Since removing the smog pump I had a spare 12v & ground in the engine bay. Running this to a new 3 wire pigtail connector, I then fitted a 3 wire heated O2 sensor. Now the car goes into closed loop at idle in 3 minutes. Perfect! This should help with my emissions, MPG and performance.
My bluetooth OBD-1 scanner has been a great bit of kit. I used it to datalog with a laptop to tune the car when I changed the intake and rockers. Here I'm using it with an app on my phone to see live readouts and watch it go into closed loop as well as the O2 function.
My throttle body has always had play in the shaft, which is a small vacuum leak and it's required a regular spray of WD40 to keep it smooth. On eBay USA I spotted a billet aluminium Holley 58mm throttle body, open box and 50% off. It's a bit step up from the factory 48mm butterflies and a beautiful piece. With the new intake it lines up pretty well already, although when I next have it apart I'll open up those extra 2mm on the side. It'll future proof any engine tweaks later on too.
I bought some bucket seats for a bargain price too, Sparco Torino II's. Not many seats fit in the C4 because the transmission tunnel accounts for half of the cabin and the handbrake is down by the sill. These should have fitted but the recline knob lined up perfectly with my seat belt reel and it was a no-go. I passed on the deal to someone who drove up from London. They were going in a track car replicating one their Dad built before passing away. The chances of finding another set must have been slim and they were thrilled.
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Then just about ready for MOT I had a setback. After changing the valve cover gasket on the passenger side and tightening the cover down it cracked! I was a bit miffed as I'd hardly snugged them down. I emailed the manufacturer Proform and asked for a replacement, as a new pair would be circa £300 delivered from the USA. I got them second hand with the heads in the summer and now with the roller rocker arms I couldn't go back to factory covers. To their credit, with no receipt they agreed to send me another one if we split postage between us. £32 later I was back in business. Although they sent it via the US postal service so it took a couple of weeks before it even showed up in the tracking at Chicago, but once it was on the system it arrived quickly and marked as a commerical sample worth $1 I paid no duties either. Result!
I didn't like the look of the bucket seats in the car and it made me realise the best course of action is to redo mine and take care of the cracked leather and worn bolster. It's only £400 for a complete carpet set and that had me thinking, if I do both, perhaps I should go for a red interior? It would look great against the black I think! In the summer a shares saving scheme with mature and I could redo the whole interior for about £1500 if I do it myself. It's a temptation and I think it would add so much to the car. It's going to be a bit longer before I can really swing a complete engine build anyway.
The other thing that has happened is my big shed arrived too! In the summer I made the base out of some sleepers and a mere 3 ton of limestone to level it out. A local company supplied the 10x8 pent shed and it's great quality, no chipboard to be seen. At 6'2 there's plenty of headroom for me too. I made a workbench and finally have my tools and stuff organised, it's so nice to have everything in one place for the first time in my motoring life!
(excuse the winter tyres)
And this week 10 years ago I started my first thread on here after buying my white 924 for under a grand.
10 years and 30 countries later here's hoping 2021 will provide more automotive adventures!
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