1987 Quantum Saloon

[Laters]

Over the last few years a few hobby cars have come and gone.
Most were bought blind and delivered & non lived up to my hopes sadly.
In late Jan early Feb of this year I wasn't really looking for anything new for the garage & was totally running out of motivation for the project I had in the garage due to the ever growing list of issues.
At that point whilst browsing eBay one night I noticed a red car in amongst the items you may be interested in on the left side of the screen.

I clicked it and was met with a ok looking red quantum saloon.
I had a quantum 2+2 convertible for many years that I bought back in 2003 as a damaged wreck & spent 6 months repairing it and rebuilding it using a very run down XR2 I bought for peanuts for some missing parts for the quantum
Once on the road the 2+2 was used every summer for 7 years till the rear seat area started to get a little small for the growing children.
It sat in the garage unused for 3 or 4 years & was eventually sold to a school friend as he always liked the car.
Within a few months of selling the 2+2 I knew I had made the wrong choice but sadly it was gone and no chance of getting it back.

Of all my fun cars the 2+2 was by far the most enjoyable. It wasn't the quickest but handled far better than it ever should have and could be hustled along nicely & really is one of the cars I should never have sold.
The quantum saloon styling is not for everyone and yes from certain angles the rear is a little awkward but the front styling being similar to the 2+2 is pretty much spot on for me.
It was for sale with a very short MOT, that ran out the day before it was delivered to me, plus had a few running issues and hadn't been used much in the last few years but the previous owners had spent some money with a lot of new parts.

It was for sale on the south coast and couldn't be further away if it tried so collection or viewing the car before purchase wasn't a option so it was another to be bought blind.
At least this time I knew there would be no rust issues with the body being a glass fiber monocoque.
In the photos it was clear the gelcoat was in need of a little tlc but the interior looked tidy and once running the engine didn't sound too bad.

Within a few hours of seeing the photos and video walkround of the car a price was agreed with the seller and I became a quantum owner again.
I remembered from my last quantum that there were not a lot of the saloons made, they made 215 but how many are left after 30 years is unknown as of now, with it being a full 4/5 seater it probably suits my needs if everyone was wanting to come in the car & made a lot of sense.

I arranged for a guy to collect the car for me via shiply website. He was delivering a car from scotland to the south coast so when he had off loaded his delivery he was going to collect the quantum for me and then drive up to his home which is about 30 miles from me where he would leave the car on the transporter overnight and deliver the quantum to me the following morning.

I was very nervous that morning to see the car in the flesh for the first time and hoped it wasn't like the others I had bought blind and a case of cars really can look a 100 times better in photos than real life.

It arrived and I was over the moon. Yes the gelcoat requires a wet sand and machine polish as its is a little patchy and faded in places, more on that later.
After going round the car there were a couple of issues I wasn't aware of but overall nothing that put me off and I was really pleased with it.

Only change I have made since it arrived was to remove the horrible wheels it was fitted with & treated it to a new set of wheels.

New wheels fitted in the photo.

[Laters]

Since it arrived one of the first things to try and fix was the poor running.
Its fitted with the later tldm round top carb which can be a pain from past experience.
The carb was fitted with a service kit and all the diaphragms were replaced along with all the rubber fuel pipes, using genuine cohline fuel hose, so that should make things better.
It did but something still wasn't right.
After more checking there was a quite large air leak on the inlet manifold which a new gasket between inlet and head and tightening the nuts/bolts helped fix.
Again a little better but still something not right.
After more checking the brake servo was still working but had quite a bad vacuum leak and with my hand vacuum pump I struggled to hold a vacuum. A used servo was found which still has a slight vacuum leak but was better than the original.

XR2 brake servos are becoming hard to get and a full seal kit can't be found. I can get all the seals bar the one I need for both servos.
At some point I am going to take the plunge and change it to a twin master cylinder bias brake box type setup to eliminate the servo issue for ever.

When it arrived the passenger door was catching the body and had clearly gone out of alignment. A few hinge shims and all is back how it should be, its clear the top door hinge has been bent & I will change it at some point but shimmed it so the door opens and closes properly for now.

Both door locks were removed and changed for some high security type that I managed to find as new old stock on a shelf in a old car spares place.
Once fitted properly that adds the advantage the doors can be deadlocked and can't be opened from inside or outside till unlocked with the key.

While it has been sat in the garage I found a nice puddle of blue coolant under the front of the car.
I did think the radiator looked a little tired and was on the list of things that might need changing.
Currently got a nice upgraded airtec uprated alloy radiator to fit but got a little dismantling to do to get to the mounting bolts.

Once that is done going to give it a proper wet sand and machine polish as the photos don't show the gel coat patchiness.
In the sills are a couple of steel reinforcements that the seat belts bolt to and have been known to go rusty. I di have concerns about the reinforcement.
Out came the endoscope I got for last xmas. Its not a mega expensive one but first time to use it in anger.
Unbolted the seat belt bolt and removed the lower seat belt bar which left 2 holes to get inside the steel reinforcement.
What I found I really didn't expect.





From the photos it not only looks to be very good with no corrosion but looking at what appears to be a weld it looks like the steel has been galvanized to me. Unsure why there are welds on the metalwork but clearly done before they were inserted into the glass fiber body and glassed in.

I have now found out that the car has spent some time on the continent which could explain the lack of MOT history and the gel coat fading on the upper surfaces of the body rather than all over as normal.

Overall I am still over the moon with it and really happy I moved the other projects on to get this.

Moving forward the plans are hopefully I will be able to find a early type weber and inlet to replace the round top type currently fitted.
Maybe some other option I am unsure.
Currently no real plans to change the CVH unless I come across something unexpected. Had a few CVH powered cars and I know people complain about harshness but I have always found them to be fairly reliable and robust with tuning parts still quite easy to source.

[xbl]

I lusted after one of these as a self-build from about 16 years old. I think they're one of the better looking kits.

[Alpina99]

Nice car,
Looking forward to seeing the future updates about it,
Nigel

[philsford]

I do search for these hardtop ones every so often, they are my pick of all the quantum variants. Well bought.

[Laters]

When you think what will be the easiest of jobs turns into a slightly bigger job.
The nice new Airtec rad is still sat in its box awaiting fitment due to the lower mountings being self tapping bolts but the upper mountings are nuts and bolts but could I reach the nuts with the nose on?

Time to take the nose off for access which I knew could have been a difficult job as more than likely was last removed/fitted about 30 years ago when the car was built.
I expected rusty bolts that were going to need grinding off as others had found.
Luckily they all came undone very easily apart from the one that snapped off.
I had to destroy the mesh grill to get access to the top bolts holding the nose so will have the remake new mesh grill when assembly time comes. Already got a roll of alloy mesh thats more or less the same type as the original anyway.


The reason for the leaky radiator quickly became apparent and I am not sure how its been holding coolant so well and does look to have been leaking for quite some time.
Certainly had moneys worth out of the radiator and it might explain why it was running a little warm.


On the very lower edge of the nose there was a small amount of damage visible if you looked close enough.
From the inside the damage is nowhere near as bad as feared & is a nice easy fix that will be done while the nose is off.



Added job is replacing the snapped big head type bolt that snapped and will remove the rusted out square spot lamps & replace them with some new ones that include DRL. In two minds to replace the amber front indicators for clear while I have things in bits.

[Laters]

Bit of a well overdue update on the Quantum saloon and its lack of progress.
As with a lot of Quantums the headlamp lid hinges were showing signs of wear.
When originally built QSC only used a small brass hinge for the headlamp lid which when it wears and stretches that causes the headlamp lids to not sit level with the bodywork and they are usually loose and rattle when bad.

The ones on the saloon were not that bad but did decide it was something that needed attention.
The hinges are pop rivetted to extension plates that are then bonded & laminated to the nose section and the headlamp lids.
After quite a lengthy search we managed to find some brass hinges the same size.
We had to buy a few sets to get a pair with as little play as possible.
There will be a redesign at some point but with delays and other projects taking too much time we went with putting it back as it was just with new hinges.
Turned out ok as the lids are now nice and flush with minimal movement.

Next job to be tackled was the multiple old alarms. Non of which worked.
Was decided that reaching under dash was getting us nowhere so dashboard was removed.

Only took just over half a hour to get the dash out and with dash out & that not only confirmed the fears of a few different alarms but also confirmed its time in Spain as one of the old alarms had a instruction manual taped to it along with a hand drawn diagram all in Spanish along with the name and address of a garage in Spain.

Once all the old alarms were out that left a lot of loose wires so was decided to unclip the lot and go back to the original loom & start again with the new alarm and central locking controller while adding extra wires for the electric boot release & power and signal cables for the car audio setup that is a few more steps down the list.
Looks a lot worse than it is and once the extra wires have been added its all getting wrapped in loom tape and secured nice and tidy before the dash goes back in.

[jimi]

Back in 1992 I was so close to buying a Quantum saloon, I even drove up to Aberdeen to test drive one at a Quantum agents (Grampian Heritage Cars) Nice car, fast, comfortable, well finished, if you didn't know you would have thought it was a production car rather than a kit.
Then life, family etc interfered and that idea got knocked on the head.

How's this for a coincidence, the day after reading your update I was clearing out a cupboard and came across the brochures and the 1992 price list/order form and photocopy of a 1991 Which Kit article on the Quantum, yours if you want them ?
I'm in the process of scanning them, so I'll stick some pics up on a bit

[Laters]

May 7, 2023 15:41:47 GMT jimi said:

Back in 1992 I was so close to buying a Quantum saloon, I even drove up to Aberdeen to test drive one at a Quantum agents (Grampian Heritage Cars) Nice car, fast, comfortable, well finished, if you didn't know you would have thought it was a production car rather than a kit.
Then life, family etc interfered and that idea got knocked on the head.

How's this for a coincidence, the day after reading your update I was clearing out a cupboard and came across the brochures and the 1992 price list/order form and photocopy of a 1991 Which Kit article on the Quantum, yours if you want them ?
I'm in the process of scanning them, so I'll stick some pics up on a bit

Only just seen your post.
Interesting I have a couple of the single sheet brochures but not seen that one before.
I will send you a PM.