01/04/2009 |
February and March have
woken the "Black Cat" up from it's winter slumbers. The insurance renewal
quote came from Adrian Flux, an increase of £75 on last year. As reported on
the NSCC boardroom I negotiated a better deal in terms of mileage, breakdown
cover, UK and European travel with Footman James. The major gain was
FJ have agreed to insure the car for an agreed valuation. I had to get
an independent valuation done by a friend of mine who is a Chartered
Engineer. This was a simple process of completing a form and submitting 3
photographs of the car to illustrate its condition. FJ accepted the
valuation and renewed the insurance for a saving of £25 on last years
premium. Almost anyone can provide an independent valuation, an automotive
engineer, a vehicle restorer, or club official are all acceptable.
The road tax was due for
renewal at the beginning of March. 1 year after SVA meant that the "Black
Cat" needed an MOT. I took the car out for a shakedown run
before the test, since it had not turned a wheel since November. The car
started first time and it was good to be behind the wheel again on a lovely
sunny day. The MOT was no problem and the car passed. However during the
test examiner drew my attention to the fact that the ECU wiring loom had at
some time been rubbing against the prop shaft. In itself not an MOT failure
but it did need attention. When I built the car I had routed the loom
inside the car next to the transmission tunnel. During trimming
the trimmer had decided route the loom inside the transmission tunnel and
secured the loom with cable ties passing through holes drilled in the
floor boards. Over the course of the year on the road the loom must
have moved and front of the loom had come in to contact with the prop
shaft. The solution was simple enough drill another hole in the floor
boards and secure the loom, pulling it well away from the from the prop
shaft.
By coincidence, once the
above wiring problem was fixed I discovered speedo had stopped working. The
speedometer is mechanical and driven by cable from a take off point at the
back of the gearbox. The instrument was refurbished and calibrated by Speedy
cables and up to this point had been completely accurate. The
instrument worked if the drive cable was unplugged an operated by turning a
screwdriver inserted instead of the cable. To test the drive
cable I left it unplugged from the instrument and drove the car a short
distance. It didn't turn. Reconnecting the drive cable to the
instrument and disconnecting it from the gearbox, the instrument read it the
gearbox end of the cable was turned. The fault looked to be
either the driven gear of the speedo take off point in the gearbox or
the right angled adapter between the gearbox and the cable. I ordered the
replacement parts from SNG Barratt. They would be easier to fit
if the car was on a ramp so I called Nostalgia to blag some time on their
lift . The agreed and I took the car and parts down to them. We
replaced the parts but it did not fix the problem. We retraced the diagnosis
steps and it brought us back to the same conclusion. One advantage we had
this time was that we could raise the car with the rear wheels free
put the car in gear and observe the speedo drive at the gearbox. It
didn't move. Removing the the speedo drive housing we could feel the
the driven gear was not engaging with the drive in the gearbox. The failure
was internal to the gearbox. For something so simple, we were faced with a
major expense in terms of labour, alone, to remove the gearbox repair and
refit it. Also parts for Getrag gearboxes are difficult to come by and
Getrag gearbox experts capable of doing the repair are not easy to find.
We decided on an alternative solution to replace the mechanical speedo with
an electronic one. A new instrument and sensor from Speedy Cables was
about £180 + vat. So here I am at Nostalgia Cars getting the new
Speedo fitted.
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