Friday 19 November 2010

an online owners' club has evolved naturally

Just recently I have been contacted by several fellow restorers, including Tim, here, and from his very interesting new blog you can see that there is an impressive number of resto blogs under way now. There was a time when it was just Truman and me.

Now that I am sort of back in action, I really must find time to read about everyone's progress and get out and meet folk, including Andy, who lives very near to me.

The great thing about blogging is that it creates a community of knowledge. Despite the best efforts of the owners' club's chairman, Harvey Pitcher, it was always a struggle to get people to write articles for the club magazine, so that increasingly it felt a bit of a one-man effort and my membership lapsed. But I suppose the immediacy of a blog and the feeling of pride you can have in your own creative space has meant that a new kind of club has evolved. I like the way we all help each other out with info and parts.

Good luck with your projects, everyone!

Friday 5 November 2010

You meet them all in restoring...

Colin Smith - a Good Man

My B Series engine is coming home next week, fully restored by my local Austin Morris guru - good man! Rang him this morning, and despite having stored the engine for nearly three years, since finishing work on it, he was adamant that he wouldn't accept a penny more.

You meet some great people in restoring; but you meet the rogues too. A few years ago an old chap asked if I would let him have a rare roofrack for his prized restoration and Truman and I generously donated it to this "fellow restorer", only for the rarity to end up on ebay with a starting price of £50 . Remember? When challenged he denied vehemently that this was the same one but eventually said he'd rather cut it up than give it back. Sour grapes at being caught out.

Well, as it turned out, that roofrack ended up being thrown in to a deal when this rogue later sold his van to Truman, who is letting me have it back
.

The roofrack which Trumans and I took off a van which I had found on the basis of a pub tip-off.
Read about "The Goat-Lady's van" here (sorry about the formating, which won't behave)

Tuesday 3 August 2010

A great image of a J Type chassis

Thursday 3 June 2010

Tinworm is tinworking again - after TWO YEARS!!!

I got back to work on the van today - for the first time in TWO YEARS!!!

Progress was made in August last year - but by someone else.) The last time I did anything on it myself was way back in July 2008.

I fabricated the tops of the windscreen, as planned and welded them in on both sides. At present it may look a bit rough, but I will do the fine finish at the painting stage. I will use por-patch to fill holes and to seal the the joins between old and new metal. For now, the entire windscreen surround is solid!

The scuttle now rings instead of rattles

Sunday 4 April 2010

Top of windscreen surgery




I have been out in the garage today considering how I will repair the top of the windscreen, where it really needs comprehensive surgery, but where the metal is frighteningly thin. I had thought of reinforcing the area with fillets of plywood inside the frame and fibreglass....but fibreglass and metal is considered a bad compromise as they don't stick very well and are thought to eventually separate.
So Now I am thinking of putting in a steel support and heat-sink.

I think this may be the solution. Rather than remove lots of metal, insert a 2-piece fabricated part from inside the roof. Then drill two lines of holes -along the eyebrow and along the inside edge (see dwg) and spot weld it with mig (not my spot welder, which only works well with virgin steel).

Great to be back at it at last.