Bolting bits on

Ever get the feeling you might be getting in the way?

That's PMW under the sheet with buses, a Land Rover and even a dump truck all round it!

Best get on so the car can come back home.

This afternoon though was all about bolting bits back on. The boot is getting emptier as bits come out of there and are either returned home or go on the car.

Like the air filter assembly, radiator and electric fan which took up 2 1/2 hours today (see pictures below).

I had charged up a battery off UNJ and took this over today too.

I stored it in the Rover and brought back a battery I had taken off BRP and JEA's battery too. I intend to charge these batteries up as well and then I'll have a total of 4 charged car batteries for when I next attempt to start PMW - will this be a Christmas present for me I wonder?

Upping the pressure

I got back to PMW and the quest to get it running again.

First though I got the car up on axle stands and got the clutch slave cylinder bolted on. It was much easier to work out where it went when I could see the bell housing etc.

Meanwhile, last week petrol had been pumping out of the front carb which seemed a bit of a worry. I thought a float valve was stuck so I took along a spare set of carbs with the intention of swapping  bits over but found the fuel pipe that links the two carbs in the boot!

No wonder, it's supoosed to do that with fuel being fed from the front carb to the rear one via the fuel pipe I had not attached - idiot!

So, back to spinning the engine over with the plugs out and even with a battery pack attached there was still no oil pressure. At Bryce's suggestion we fed oil into the oil pump by removing the oil pressure sender and pumping oil in.

Then when the engine was turned over eventually we got oil coming out of the hole where the oil pressure sender had been so we were making progress. Replacing the sender though then meant oil coming by the oil filter housing so making progress sort of as at least oil was finding leaks!

Taking the spin on oil filter housing off the engine I found that I had left the outer seal on the old engine; what a pillock. There was another seal too which looked none too  clever so we replaced this with a new o ring, fitted the outer seal and put it all back together.

This time no leaks and enough oil pressure to get the oil light to go out so good news.

On to the next stage. Although we had an oil light which went out now, there was no ignition light. I trraced this problem to one of the alternator wires not fitting correctly so that was put right.

This was followed by making sure the plug leads were on correctly, the wiring to the coil and distributor in place and the points cleaned and gapped.

Couldn't get the car to fire up though even though we had a spark at the plugs. The battery was really suffering by now and we need to sort out the timing. The car is in an old shed with no lighting and by now bad light really did stop play.

Not bad though, I think the happy day is getting closer.

Getting close with PMW

I suddenly realised that actually I keep bolting bits on to PMW and it can't be that far away from start up time (GULP).

So yesterday it was time to see how close I could get.

Fitted the fuel pipes to the fuel pump and carbs then primed the pump and a nice little morale booster to see petrol in the pump bowl.

Next up fitting the distributor - two to choose from, one of which slotted in fine pointing at mnumber 1 and the opther slotted in 180 degrees out. Hmm - the second one is a new old stock one though specific for this early Mk2 2000 so that was the one fitted and the leads will have to be changed round to suit.

Connected the battery and the interior lights came on when I opened the door as well as the oil light when turning the ignition - another little morale booster.

So now time to turn the engine over with plugs removed to let the oil pressure build up as it's a rebuilt engine.

Bad news - major fuel leak at the pump. Down to me cross threading the connection (what a pillock!) but thankfully that could be corrected.

Next fuel leak at the front carb bowl which couldn't be fixed there and then so it's on next week's job list.

This all meant we couldn't turn the engine over long enough for the oil light to go out but the plus point was that the engine wasn't tight (I had turned it over by hand before as well) and there were no horrible noises so at this early stage it doesn't seem like I made a complete cock up of assembling the bottom of the engine at least.

Meanwhile, in the photo those of you familiar with these cars will see the clutch slave cylinder resting on top of the wiper motor (at the end of the braided hose). At this minute I can't see where it bolts back on!

NNext week I'll have the car up on axle stands so should be able to work it out but if anyone can advise me or send me a photo of it fitted please do!