Messages

51

General Banter / 6th Annual Vintage Stony - 1st Jan 2015.

« on: December 30, 2014, 06:16:34 am »

First show of 2015

Market Square & Cofferidge Close Stony Stratford

An informal gathering of Vintage and Classics Cars and Motorcycles between 10-00 am and 2pm on Thursday 1st January


http://www.stonystratford.gov.uk/Events/6th_Annual_Vintage_Stony_2015/6th_Annual_Vintage_Stony_2015

Umm 90 mile round trip in an open car that cruises at 30mph and does 13mpg

52

General Banter / I feel dirty...

« on: December 23, 2014, 08:53:16 pm »

Whatever !

53

General Banter / Last valeting day before Christmas ?

« on: December 20, 2014, 01:48:35 pm »

9c and sunny

Already washed, polished and valeted three cars today

Saving the other two and motorcycle in case there is more good weather after Chrimbo

54

General Banter / The Beast Of Turin.

« on: December 07, 2014, 01:43:52 pm »

Quoting: Cunning Plan

28.5 Litres in two cylinders

28.5 litres (1,729 cu) in four cylinders or 7.12 litres per cylinder

https://grrc.goodwood.com/festival-of-speed/latest/video-28-5-litre-fiat-s76-fos

55

General Banter / Had a drive out this morning.

« on: December 07, 2014, 01:37:35 pm »

Quoting: F Body

Note to self, change those horrible Euro Spec MOT legal rear lights back to the American spec ones

Done yesterday actually whilst I was waiting for some paint to dry on the Model T

Quoting: F Body

Will give her a polish when I'm bored over Christmas, probably by Boxing Day lol

Well the weather was horrible this morning, so after I'd been out with the dogs, I had a "garage" polish



Back up to 99% shiny again, although as I get older it's get more difficult to squeeze into tight spaces and a lot more difficult to get out again



Still need to do some chassis detailing, if I ever get the time and space I want to replace all the fixings with stainless steel

56

General Banter / The Beast Of Turin.

« on: December 05, 2014, 07:11:47 pm »

Fiat S76 brought back to life after 100 years !

All 28.5 litres

57

General Banter / My Model T is now "offically" a Luxury car !

« on: November 30, 2014, 04:27:32 pm »

Quoting: Cunning Plan

Looks nice, but as you have no roof, is it not going to get really wet and mildew?

Only if it rains

NB : I fully intend to drive it in the first snow of the year, but it's not the sort of car you drive in the rain

58

General Banter / My Model T is now "offically" a Luxury car !

« on: November 30, 2014, 02:21:08 pm »

I was out in the T this morning when I took a phone call from Management, luckily just for a change I was stopped at Greg's,  because the first owner forgot to order the bluetooth option

So Management doing her good deed for the day had taken a load of clothes and shoes to the clothing bank. However when she went to put them into the container there was a roll of car carpet standing besides it, too big to fit inside.
Now with her years of hearing me rabbit on about health & safety, she immediately realise that it was a serious trip hazard, so rang me for urgent H&S advice
I suggested that she put it into the back of her car and bring it home, so that I could conduct a through Risk Asessment



As luck would have it, my Risk Assessment showed it to be a brand new roll of car type carpet, approx 2m wide x 3m long, my years of finely turned Health & Safety experience kicked in and I devised a quick and easy countermeasure to reduce any hazards ?

I'd cut it up to fit the Model T

First remove the floor boards :



Use as a marking template :





Then cut out the carpet (safety first always ask a responsible adult for guidance before using scissors or knifes)  :



Stick down with some spray glue last used to fix the headlining in the GMC van. Note : A further task completion Risk Assessment revealed a likely hood of the carpet strips fouling the pedals, so the carpet was cut back around the pedal box area.



Finally Management gave it a once over with the vacuum, the Model T is now "officially" a Luxury car with fitted carpet

59

General Banter / Had a drive out this morning.

« on: November 29, 2014, 02:48:43 pm »

Seeing as the Camaro was last cleaned way back in September sometime I gave her a run out this morning

Then gave her a good wash when I got back :



Probably her last run this year, just checked the data and she has been driven in 23 different weeks this year, probably about 30 different trips totalling 643 miles which equates to about 21 miles each trip



Note to self, change those horrible Euro Spec MOT legal rear lights back to the American spec ones



Will give her a polish when I'm bored over Christmas, probably by Boxing Day lol

NB: She's still for sale if anyone comes knocking on my door, but I am in the process of completing the documentation for garage number three





Wanted to run the bike, but it just hasn't dried out enough, so run her up and down the dry bit of road until she was good and hot

60

General Banter / My little Imp !

« on: November 18, 2014, 05:52:58 pm »

It's a Lincoln Imp

61

General Banter / Happy 15th Birthday F Body !

« on: November 16, 2014, 04:22:35 pm »

Quoting: Cunning Plan

I didn't know you still had it. Where do you store it now then as I presume the T goes in the garage?

In the house garage were it's always been, I have another secure garage just around the corner in the next road and negotiating for a third

Speaking of which it was rather cold and very foggy this morning so we stopped at Greggs for a hot chocolate



I'm wondering how the Model T will drive in snow

62

General Banter / Happy 15th Birthday F Body !

« on: November 15, 2014, 08:11:40 pm »

Hard to believe that she was born on Tuesday 16th October 1999
Gave her a good 40 mile run today and took a couple of pictures











I think I'll be buried with her, unless the Model T or bike kill me first

63

General Banter / New Datsun zero star Ncap rating.

« on: November 08, 2014, 09:06:22 pm »

The $7,000 Indian-market Go is meant to provide cheap and reliable transportation for growing, upwardly mobile families, but apparently somewhere along the way between cheap and reliable Datsun (or rather, it's parent company Nissan) forgot to include "safe" as well ?

Because of its failures, NCAP said that the little car carries with it a "a high probability of life-threatening injuries" in the event of an accident, bearing in mind it doesn't have ABS or airbags !

[AM]

64

General Banter / My little Imp !

« on: November 08, 2014, 07:11:42 am »

Quoting: Roadkill

I must be old, too.

Quoting: Big Mouse

I must be getting old

I AM old

65

General Banter / My little Imp !

« on: November 07, 2014, 12:38:23 pm »

Quoting: F Body

Once I chase some of the threads out with a needle file, I'll post another picture of it fitted to the car

Before :



After :

66

General Banter / My little Imp !

« on: November 06, 2014, 01:01:34 pm »

Luckily not a Hillman Imp like the one I took for MOT many years ago and it failed due to corrosion, can you weld it I asked ?  The reply still haunts me to this day "You can can't weld the floor pan to fresh air"

Anyway I'm pleased to announce my first purchase of something that is actually older than the car, this is a genuine propeller radiator cap from a 1913 Manchester built Model T , complete with period Imp



As you can see it's standing on a wooden display block, which means that I bought it on E-Bay for just over £30. The owner obviously didn't release it's value when fitted to a Model T, being well over four times that amount





Once I chase some of the threads out with a needle file, I'll post another picture of it fitted to the car

67

General Banter / Lickle Winter Project.

« on: November 01, 2014, 03:41:13 pm »

Rubbed down and  started painting the bodies :




Got one trafficator working

http://youtu.be/Erly_ys3TwM

Also ordered some brighter flashing 6v LED bulbs :



http://www.dynamoregulatorconversions.com/flashing-indicator-bulbs-shop.php

68

General Banter / Lickle Winter Project.

« on: October 25, 2014, 03:58:00 pm »

Planning to fit indicators to the model T, but don't want anything too modern



Picked up these on E Gay last week for £16, the last similar set I bid on went for £95



You can buy new VW 6 volt ones for £158 each  So these are 12v which I will rewind and convert to 6v



They are 1930's Lucas Semaphore Trafficators, a bit modern I know but needs must :



The yellow plastic ends are only £4 each if you know where to go :



Going to strip them down, rewind the coils, replace the 12v bulbs with 6v flashing LED's and buy new yellow ends and chrome strips

69

General Banter / Analogue Engineering.

« on: October 25, 2014, 03:44:29 pm »

Dam these car things don't last five minutes, 97 years old and after some off roading last week, the drivers side foot board started to collapse



Caused by a large tree stump and our old friend rust



Didn't have much metal in stock, but found this U section which I welded together :



Had planned to grind the welds off, but they were that good no dressing was needed



A good coat of black smoothrite :



Then weld into place :



Note the hose in the background and a fire extinguisher, I've seen too many good cars turned to ashes by some minor welding

I jumped up and down on it and it was fine, so the jobs a goodun

70

General Banter / Analogue Engineering.

« on: October 22, 2014, 04:39:49 pm »

In a digital age  !

When I first got my Model T I asked on a forum what sized imperial spanners I needed, because many of the bolts are quite large +1"

They all laughed and told me to buy a sturdy 2" adjustable spanner, which had three main uses ?

1/ Undoing any fixing up to 2" size.

2/ Hitting things with.

3/ Using as a pry bar.

Imagine my surprise when I asked were I could buy a 1" size plug spanner socket (them spark plugs is big mother fookers).

The answer rather predictably was "Use the ruddy spanner"
and it works a treat



Took them out to re gap them down to .070" from 0.090 which I hope will improve the hot starting. Pleasantly surprised from the results of my smell mixture tuning a while back ?  Just as it say's , run the engine until warm, turn the mixture screw in until you can smell petrol in the exhaust gas (H&S warning it's bloody hot and you could pass out) then back the screw out half a turn. Plugs looked fine



Must stop tarting things up, but old habits die hard

71

General Banter / F Body's New Car ?

« on: October 14, 2014, 07:41:04 pm »

Quoting: F Body

To be continued...........................

It was then sold to a Mr J.B.Cost second hand on 10th August 1921 :

Mr Joseph B Cost was born in Logan County Ohio in 1870 and worked in the local municipal department. He appears to have been some sort of water Engineer. His primary role involved the inspection of water pump windmills and the improvement of their design for greater efficiency.
Being as he was 51 years old when he bought this car, I can surmise two possible scenarios ?
Firstly that working in a small local municipal department, that he didn't earn that much money and therefore this the best vehicle he could afford ?
Or that he bought the vehicle for one of his three sons, John, Edward or Louis ?
There was no formal system of vehicle registration in the county at this time, so that one may assume that the vehicle was kept in the families use for many years until formally changed hands again.
But Mr Joseph B Cost lived for 77 years up until 1947 and I imagine him teaching his many grand children how to drive the Model T

To be continued....................

72

General Banter / from the mig welding forum ...

« on: October 12, 2014, 06:33:43 pm »

Cool

But cutting up old gas bottles what could possibly go wrong

73

General Banter / F Body's New Car ?

« on: October 09, 2014, 08:28:54 pm »

Quoting: art b

so marti what the history behind it ...

It was built as a standard black two door touring model in 1917, it was sold by a company called Sparks & Hamilton in Bellefontaine, Logan, Ohio.

It was then sold to a Mr J.B.Cost second hand on 10th August 1921, who lived at RFD 1 Quiney, Logan, Ohio. When it was recorded as having lights run from a storage battery on the running board.

It is not clear exactly how many Model Ts were built between 1908 and 1927 but it was over 15 million !
This vehicle was built at the  main factory in Dearborn near Detroit, which produced the vast majority of Model T's, but many cars were also built in other countries including Canada, New Zealand and several other countries including (Trafford Park in Manchester). Production peaked at over 2 million vehicles in 1923 with over 150,000 of these produced at Trafford Park.

This is main reason why so many T's including this one survived. The secondary reason for the survival of so many American T's, was the great depression in the 1920's. People simply couldn't afford to buy a new car and garages across America made a living by keeping the T's on the road.
Even after the depression, the car's were passed down through several generations of the same family, meeting basic transport needs.

So what happened to this T during it's 97 year life ?

To be continued...........................

74

General Banter / 52 Colorized Historical Photos That Give Us A New Look At the Past

« on: October 07, 2014, 07:40:29 pm »

This photograph, titled "During the Race" was taken in 1906 and of a girl in a 1902 Renault and is the first real colour picture of car




http://jalopnik.com/this-is-the-very-first-color-photograph-of-a-car-1641925578

75

General Banter / Went shopping.........

« on: October 02, 2014, 07:20:40 pm »