1968 Skoda 1000MB air cooled V8 build up.

Now,THATS ACE!
The sound!!!

What does it sound like? I laid awake last night trying to think of ways to describe it. It depends where you are standing but anything like..
A tram running over 10000 party balloons during a vodka hangover
Two camels tap dancing on the roof of Stansted Airport in a hailstorm
A military band tumbling down the stairs of a disused lighthouse.

It doesn't sound like that T603 with the ejectors.

And a T613 is another air cooled hemi quad cam thing which is as you say a little complex. My opinion is that they applied the twin cam principle to hemi heads, which only permit 2 valves per head anyway just the same as my old lass. It can only end in trouble. What does one sound like? It makes a noise like a toothed belt running over 5 timing pulleys & about 16 idlers & auxilliaries. Plenty of Czechs & Slovaks understand but I think no spares available. There is a T613 based trike on the you tube which looks like a church organ & sounds like it too.

I have spent time organizing my pictures & stand by for more tonight.

Transaxle:

There is a saying which goes round my head that "they" only made stuff that way because that is what the machines did. For instance, why do Saabs have the clutch at the front? Because that's what the machines did. Why do Citroens have gas suspension? Because that's what the machines did. I am not saying the designs were wrong but to change them meant pulling out entire plants & back then that isn't what manufacturers did.

Tatra make trucks. That is why valve stems are bigger than the head bolts, that is why it is air cooled, that is why the transmission is stupendous because they don't have any little machines.

The transaxle is a split type like VW. Four speed synchromesh manual & reverse. The Gleason cut differential is carried on 2 x taper roller bearings which have an outside diameter of 140mm & a bore of 80mm. The drive shaft is 27mm diameter solid forged steel.
This picture shows one of the star wheels on the inside of the diff.



And the wheels on one of the drive shafts



It is quiet & it doesn't get hot & doesn't jump out of gear. It is an integral part of the suspension so when you install it make sure it points forwards & is level. To get it out of this Skoda it is neccessary to pull all the axles & shafts out.
They leak from the shift shaft, the speedo take off, breather & several places round the hemisperical bearing. Mine is dry apart from the first two. It gets Fuchs EP80/90
I retrofitted a proximity sensor & got rid of the speedo cable. Here is a picture of the speedo shaft.



Don't know anything else about it because it is 100% reliable. It is the only part which I didn't strip down. I just rinsed it out & used it.

Well, after I shortened the shafts as mentioned earlier.

Here are pictures of the original clutch which I couldn't find yesterday. It looks exactly like one out of an old Rolls Royce which I stumbled accross one day.

Fuel tank:



Originally slung under the spare wheel right at at the front. Didn't like it there so it goes underneath now. 54 litres capacity so enough to get you from Plzen to Olomouc.













The fill plate is like that in case it got fuel injected. It also used to have a petrol burning heater hence the small tube. The other dash 6 pipe is a breather. I didn't know what I was doing so I over did it. It has a 2" non vented fill pipe & seperate dash6 breather pipe with a rollover valve in it.
The tank is baffled & in the rear corner is what the experts call a surge tank. These valves are too expensive so why bot use a bit of nitrile sheet & hold it in with a bulldog clip?







Pressure testing.


Every object has its most difficult thing to fit. In this case, it is the fuel tank. If you want that, EVERYTHING has to come out. It is aas hard as changing a battery in a (insert name of modern vehicle here)

Fancy stuff:

Shiny, pointless, silly.
Enjoy..

The trim on top of the doors & the wings came off this..
It was a 1960 2 door pillarless Buick Lesabre with s 7.5 litre nailhead which had been lost off a pickup truck & trailer in an incident on the M6 whilst being moved by somebody who could do the job for a penny less. Not my gig. I just stored it. The signs said "report of snakes on carriageway"



Side trims came off one of these



The mirrors came from the States second hand & I had new convex glass made. It was super cheap to do.















Steering wheel.
Pressed aluminium & perspex. Centre bullet (shown elsewhere) is 3D printed, filled, faired & 2K painted.
Not available in the shops.












Stupid merchandise.
The Czechs & Slovaks will understand. Nobody else does even when I explain it.

T shirt


Stickers









Bumpers:
Just tadging them together here look...















Sidelights.
These are scooter bullet lights from a place in Halifax called Buzzsolomoto. They are top quality but the lenses aren't very good so I made my own.











Throttle box.
Stainless steel polished backplate, radial polished star & pianted with women's nail varnish. Ooo you can't sat THAT any more!









Rear inner wings.

The original Skoda 1000MB had a water radiator & a water heater unit in the back, each served by a grille. They look cool so I kept them. The inner wings serve no purpose other than to justify the existence of the original side grilles. They pretend to serve cool air to the cylinders.



Hot air cowls.
I think there is some rule about not having rotating knives on a car.



I nearly looked it up on Retro Rides to see if anybody had a dodge.

I had to dream up an idea & to start with the best I could come up with was a collender or chinois out of a commercial kitchen, or a chip seive like they have at the chuck wagon. Pity me.



Then I remembered the Mig theme.



So we get into to rolling cones with slashed ends. It took 2 goes. They aren't that good but they are safe.








Indicator & headlight stalks are 100% made here apart from the contacts which are made by Omron in Japan.



Flags.



Wheel spigot rings.

I was struck down afew weeks ago with a ghastly transmission problem which I am sorting right now. When I have the solution I will post it on here but maybe I should start a new thread about Tatra 603 gearboxes because this is of course a Skoda 1000MB. The Tatra people will never ne able to find it.
Advice please.

I agree about the bumpers, a bit of a chinless wonder at the front & a Hoseasons rental speedboat at the back. Some fancy sheet metalwork is in mind but the skills don't exist yet. It is all I could think of to make access to the spare tyre at the front & protect the hot air exhausters at the back.

No, it is just an O ring shoved down the head bolt hole. It doesn't help if the O ring gets shredded on the sharp corners & it doesn't help if there is a vacuum on the other side trying to suck the damn oil out.
The eggshell thick pot metal rocker covers are held down against a moulded rubber gasket with one M8 nut. The rubber lasts about 2 days before it goes all jellyfied. The next thing is to make an aluminium gasket with an O ring groove on each side all the way round so almost a Dowty washer. If this gasket were 5mm thicker than the original & glued down to the head it would mean the oil would go down the drain hole instead of collecting on the gasket.

I lost drive during a sensible launch from a T junction turning left. I thought it might be the drive shafts which are not home made but are of unknown metallurgy, ie. a new drive shaft end friction welded to a drive shaft produced in a communist country 50 years earlier. Anyway the drive shafts were fine. This shows the old & the modded. You can see the width difference between the Skoda 1000MB & the Tatra 603