Wow! Six months or so since I last wrote about the Viva. This is not because nothing has happened. Things have happened but nothing big. Lots of little jobs, some of which have made a huge improvement.
First off. The brake master cylinder started weeping out the back and down the front of the servo taking all my carefully applied spray can finish with it. Damn. So I ordered another seal kit and stripped the master. Right in the very first bit of the bore was a little bit of surface rust. enough that it had been wearing away at the last seal and it lost its edge. I gave the bore a hone, fitted new seals and applied rubber grease inside the bore at the end after it was assembled. Hopefully no more wearing.
So that was exciting.
Here's some photos of the excitement...
see that seal edge all rounded off...
Next up was to replace the front control arm bushes. The original ones were knackered. All squishy and deformed out of shape. These take all the loading when the brakes are applied. They stop the wheels ending up in footwells under hard braking plus they set the amount of castor. Quite important things. I should have replaced them years ago. I had the bush kit sitting in the boot for ages but it was just one of those jobs... always on the back of my mind, knowing full well it will be easy and make a difference. Instead I did an engine swap or two. Oh well.. better replace them then.
The decision to finally get around to replacing them was made much easier by finally having a hoist. So up the car went and fueled with a cup of tea and a big dose of enthusiasm it was off with the control arms.
The state of these!...
But the new bushes were the wrong size!!! Listed for an Viva HB but blatantly much bigger in all dimensions. Not even a chance of fitting.
So back on with the old ones and ring the suspension place I got them from, then the distributors. The bushes are for a Torana! Same designed front end but bigger to take more weight. Oh. But they located a set the right size internally and I'll have to turn down the outers. They can send them and I just swap the bits over. Off the phone, car off the hoist and my tea was cold :-(
A week or two later I finally picked up the bushes. Country life now dictates I don't go to the big smoke that is Nelson as often. Once home I hoisted the Viva up again, off with the arms, another cup of tea and remove the dust sheet from the old Colchester lathe. I have not machined poly for maybe 20 years since doing my apprenticeship. Very sharp tooling was needed. I had to use some old thing called HSS! I even had to grind the edge on this oldschool tooling. The result was smooth and the size was now right.
Here's some soft swarf..
Then in with the new bushes. Down with the tea. Still warm. Yay!
While the car was up I noticed the front tyres were unevenly worn beyond salvage (Actually noticed ages ago but was ignoring due to $$$). So with car now armed with a lovely new pair of bushes I drove to Nelson, had some lovely new Falken tyres in 185/60 13 size installed and then got a full wheel alignment done. The fella at the new place I took it is well known through the Nelson car club for knowing his onions and he spotted as I turned up an excessive amount of toe out. That will be the cause of the scrubbing. I was also running a touch too much negative camber on the front. I couldnt get it any less so before I took the car out I took another mm out of the slots on the top arm allowing him to adjust it. Also a bit less castor was ordered as I felt I wanted nicer turn in, less weighty steering and I would deal with the old car/side wind float. When I picked the car up it was instantly better! He said the wheels needed 20-30mm of pulling in via the tierods to correct the Toe out!!! I could tell when I lifted off the accelerator in town and the car would roll further that there was a heck load less drag now. Sweet. This will equal better economy- not only fuel but tyre wear!
Job two I have been putting off...
This..
Doesnt look so bad and Ive happily ignored it. But no longer. I did this..
Then it was all gone. This made me happy.
Third job I have put off. This one has been bugging me, and Hannah even more, for a long time. Self cancelling indicators. Or lack of. Ever since I fitted a new steering wheel boss for my uncles old Motolita wheel I have not had self cancelling indicators. Because I never did that 20 minutes extra work in fitting a little ring.
I had kept the ring from an old Viva steering wheel. I cut it down, drilled two holes in the current wheel boss then glued the ring in place with JJ quickweld epoxy. Just in case. Hey wow. A throughly modern car. No more telling every single person who jumps in to drive the Viva that the indicators don't self cancel.
Its often those little things in life eh.
Here's some photos of the proceedings..
Oh and I did this too. I gt sick of the slightly sticky throttle body. The butterfly gets sort of jammed shut and makes it hard to squeeze the throttle open gently when pulling away. I added an adjustable stop to the pulley so I could crack the butterfly open ever so slightly avoiding the jam..
That is all for now. I'm going to have a play with the ignition timing table that I had retarded a while back trying to chase that low speed vibration which I now know is the long single piece driveshaft.
With the ignition timing back to where it should be my quest for better economy will improve. I did an oil change last month and went through the my Scottish book of mileage and fuel usage. I have some stats here..
7374 miles I drove with the 2.0 litre KF V6. Over those miles it had averaged 29.14 MPG. Not bad at all considering how much of a thrashing that engine has had.
Then I swapped in the 2.5 litre KL v6. I have since done 5689 miles with this engine and overall it has averaged 28,1 MPG!!! So with the extra 50 or 60 bhp that bigger engine offers I was pleasantly surprised at that. I figure it being its not having to work so hard to shift the car.
I am still chasing more economy from the engine but realise it will never be modern car amazing when I am trying to push a brick through the air. But its fun trying..
