1972 Rover P6 2300TC - Saab B234 Turbo

Today I thought I'd have a look at the front brakes and carry on from where I left off. I was having big problems with clearance between the range rover calipers and vented discs. I'd previously rebuilt the brake calipers from my donor car, and had them running on this one for a while, so dug them out and split the halves, wedged a nut between the two halves, nipped the bolts up and then spent ages disassembling and reassembling the hub/disc/caliper until everything lined up:









I've fitted the discs on the hubs temporarily with washers to get the correct offset and spacing in the caliper, and called a favour so hopefully a 7mm spacer will arrive sometime early next week. I've also made some phonecalls trying to hunt down a spacer kit for the rover 3-pot calipers so I'm planning on getting the uprated front brakes sorted by the end of next week. This should be fun as the heavily pitted v8 discs I had fitted before were vicious, nice clean vented discs should be fantastic when sorted ;D

With the front wheels off, I've taken a few more pictures of the chevy wheels and one against an original rover wheel:

I had to do some welding on my brothers mini today, so the rover got booted out into the sunshine for a bit







;D

Cheers

Stance wise, the front sits about 1/2" higher at the front, and with the dropping roofline looks a bit pants. Either I raise the rear a little to make up the difference, or drop the front, or even possibly both? Not sure either way yet, but when the new engine goes in, it should pull the front down by possibly 1/2" - 1".

Now the bumpers are black, I don't know whether I should paint the chrome light surrounds black, or leave them shiny? It's one of those things that could work either way, but I've got a spare set of lights so I could always paint them and try it.

Awesome build................

It just gets better every time i look...

Are you going to fit a balance pipe in the exhaust? improves torque at low revs no end.

That looks awsome I live the wheels and stance suits it down to the ground (no pun intended)

Ah, my mistake, thought the V8 was already in and twin pipes were run through.
When you fit the true twin system, its best to fit the balance pipe as close to the engine as practical, this is usually somewhere around the gearbox area. 2" system should have 2" pipe ideally, but min 1.5". Or you could just siamese them for a few inches if space allows.

I really haven't had much time to touch the rover over the past month or so. My daily driver mondeo started to break every few weeks, and with work commitments, the rover went on the backburner.

That hasn't stopped me doing a few little jobs though for a little mojo boost. With some of the interior going back together, and the cabin now sealed, and two threads in the general board about steering wheels and steering wheel covers, I thought I'd do something with the wheel. I'd been looking for a while for something that'd be suitable in a smaller size than the 16" original, and the sportier looking 15.5" wheel I've had fitted from my old 3500s spare arts car.

Most aftermarket wheels are either woodrim or chunky leather, with a huge ugly centre boss. A little thinking out of the box, I decided to stick with the genuine rover wheel, but make it smaller . I stripped the old cover and manky original cover underneath, and cut the rim off the two spokes. I cut 4 1/2 inches out of the rim and welded it all back together, resprayed the spokes and boss, then covered the rim with 10mm petrol hose, and then fitted my lace up vinyl steering wheel cover ;D .





The smaller diameter is subtle and fits in well with the black interior. It has such a 70's feel to it now, and cost only a few quid for the petrol hose and cover kit ;D .

Awesome work so far!

Do you think you'll have any clearance issues with the V8? Depending on who you talk to at Rover P6 meets some say it will go straight in no problems; some say no way, as the inner wings are a different shape.

Regards,

Ric