1980 Austin Princess mild custom - 1951 Lanchester LD10

[dungbug]

I've used Rustoleum paints on vehicles before and agree that they are nice to work with, also used Rustoleum furniture paint as the missus wanted to 'upcycle' an old unit we've had for years. Same ease of use as the auto paint.

The Princess is looking pretty awesome, it's a lovely feeling when you reach the end of welding up a car isn't it

[vulgalour]

There is no "end" when it comes to BL and welding... but yes, it's a good feeling to be where I'm at with it.

[dungbug]

Jun 28, 2015 17:45:16 GMT vulgalour said:

There is no "end" when it comes to BL and welding...

Haha, same situation with some of the aircooled VW's I've owned.....More of a 'work in progress' than a completed job.

[mk2polobloke]

I recommend you buy a couple of wire cup brushes for your grinder. They cut through paint so easily without damaging the metal, they don't clog up like sanding/flap discs, they last for ages and they're cheap. You need goggles when using one though 'cause they spit out wire strands which don't take any prisoners!
Try bare metalling one panel at a time, repairing it and priming as you go.
Great to see you back Angyl, keep going.

Edit to say, I like the look of the sharp paint edge at waistline and wheel arch in your last picture.

[Ian]

Great to see this getting nice and solid after all the time you've had it. I was sort of sad to see the beige go, but I think the purple suits too.

[vulgalour]

mk2polobloke: I wasn't having much joy with cup brushes either, they don't seem to want to dig into the paint that's on there. Really, I have no idea what they've painted and repainted it with, it just defeats everything bar the rust coming through from the back.

ian: It's keeping most of the beige, there'll still be the roof, the top half of the body and the 'face' of the car in beige. The purple should help slim down the very tall looking middle of the car and make it look a bit longer, emphasising the wedge shape a bit better.

[blackpopracing]

Youcould use sikaflex to put the sill trims back on with. No drilling or seal required then. Also no water can get behind it either if you seal it well. It will never come off again ever though.........

[vulgalour]

Sikaflex is pretty good stuff, very versatile. There's a bit of a running gag with Mike (who unit the Princess is at) and me that he uses Sikaflex for everything and I avoid using it at all costs. While it's a good product I'm not sure I want to risk using it to hold the springy stainless trims on to the sills without having some back-up fixings. Can you imagine the mess a full sill length bit of stainless could make if it dropped off while you were driving along?

Little bit of fleet news. The Corsa now has its original radio installed in place of the aftermarket Alba. I'd sourced this radio specifically for the car as the original goal was restoration (still is, really, even though it's in daily use). It's a surprisingly good little radio and it's restored the function to the dash-top pod that displays the pre-select and radio frequency when you're listening to the radio which is a neat little feature. The odd problem with the door becoming the radio on-off switch when opened and closed turned out to be the windows. When you wound the front windows all the way down they would pull the speaker connectors and unplug them fully or almost fully. Then, when opening or closing the door the connectors would meet or part with the speakers. A re-route of the wiring has cured this problem and now the radio works in the conventional manner.


The Corsa has also been fitted with a new idle control valve after the original was found to be stuck in one position which has cured the first start and idling issues it had. The bias valve for the brakes may well be faulty too, there's something amiss with the brakes but investigation is ongoing there.

Only other little update is the Renault engine is now on the engine stand. Bit of a faff as there's some disparity in size between tiny engine and big stand. A lot easier to work on and around the engine now so I can focus on getting those pistons unstuck far easier as well as taking up much less space in the unit.

[blackpopracing]

Trust me they wont fall off with sikaflex! My windows are bonded with sikaflex and car manufacturers use it to glue wings on.

[vulgalour]

Couple of jobs done on the Princess today. First was taking off the old fuel filter which had definitely seen better days. It's been on there a while now and I do mean to get one of those nice glass-and-chrome ones, I just can't resist how cheap these things are and they do the job well enough.


New one on and churny-churny until it had filled and fed fresh fuel to the engine...


... and I could churny-churny because for £35 my starter motor was refurbished and now works so well it's rather caught me by surprise. The starter has always been a bit slow, I'd put it down to the car just being old, turns out it was already on its way out when I bought the car three years ago. The refurbished item wasn't repainted (at my request) and they even cleaned up the bare alloy bits. Did a cracking job visually and in terms of performance.




Four bolts later and it was back on the car. Another fiddly nut for the power lead and I had a working starter motor.


The car was willing to churn and the refurbished motor wasn't now killing the battery as it had before. Usual routine undertaken of cleaning electrical contacts and checking fuel was getting to the engine when I found the car wouldn't fire until I finally diagnosed the issue as being that I'd got two of the three wires connected to the coil in the wrong order, that done the car fair burst into life with a heartening willingness and even idled reasonably well. Planned to spin the car around when an almighty screeching started up.

Obviously I was concerned about this and at first thought I'd fitted the starter motor wrong somehow. Checked belts, checked items for heat, looked for obvious damage and started the car again. All was as it should be, no screeching, so stuck it in reverse (which it was reluctant to do) so I could turn it around in the yard. Drove back about 2 yards before an almighty screeching began again.

Very worried now I went through everything I could, started the car and left it out of gear to wait and see if the noise would manifest. Absolutely nothing did. So I gingerly put it in first gear and attempted to drive forwards the two yards I'd given myself. Queue a clutch that was squealing and slipping like a pig on ice.

Just as well I bought that new clutch kit then.

Put some brake fluid in the bores on the Renault. Noticed that some came straight out through the bottom where it should so I'm cautiously optimistic that it will unstick with some patience.

[vulgalour]

Not made any further progress on the Renault engine. Brake fluid removed, Cola tried and found to be good at cleaning some darker deposits and little else. Diesel put in but not really gone anywhere so it's definitely rebuild time on that. Never mind, no harm done by trying things the slow way.

In other news, I sold the Xantia tonight. It is a brilliant car, it really is, but it was never quite the right car for me. My brother was expressing the need for a car now he's moved up here to live a few streets away from me and we got talking about how he missed the Xantia and how his partner missed it and the kids are quiet when they ride in it... one thing led to another and it was decided he should get it back. The other major reason for it is that he was going to buy the Corsa but when the insurance quotes came back at twice that of the Xantia it just didn't make sense.

Best of all, I make a profit on the Xantia and I've even got a couple of cars I'm already keeping an eye on that aren't any more expensive to insure: a Rover 214Si two door and a Daihatsu Copen.

I don't know what I'm going to buy exactly just yet, I'm thinking it'll probably be a two door petrol of some variety. I might even forgo buying a Xantia replacement and funnel the funds back into the Princess so she can be my daily again. I'm not in a rush, we'll just have to see what pops up.

[brc76]

Please tell me you are going Copen. (Crosses fingers)

[vulgalour]

I didn't buy a Copen, instead I bought THIS.  1994 Rover 414 SLi, which is a pretty unusual R8 variant.




It was an extremely short notice thing.  My brother and I were browsing Gumtree and ringing buyers of cars who had sold their cheapy vehicles or had scrapped them and were just about to give up. Then we spotted this one for £275 with MoT until April next year (and a clean sheet with no advisories!). It was a 2 and a half hour drive away but we took the chance on it.

The drive home was entirely uneventful. It might only be a 1.4 kettle but by crikey it's surprisingly brisk. Did about 130 miles on under £20 of unleaded.




I am VERY happy with it.



Toys include:

- electric tilt and slide sunroof

- electric front windows

- remote central locking (one door doesn't really work)

- factory alarm immobiliser that does work, as I found out in the service station

- Remote boot and fuel filler flap release

- Adjustable steering column

- Xplod CD player but the original Rover radio and code too, happily



It's not perfect, and I wouldn't expect it to be at £275.  In its favour is an MoT until April next year which had no advisories at all which always bodes well.  It does need the wheels balancing as they're a bit jiggly at 65mph but not terrible.  It may need the tracking doing.  Brakes are very good, clutch can drag a bit below 10mph so that's either in need of adjustment or replacement, I'm not sure which yet.  One electric mirror is broken, one door doesn't work properly on the central locking and the wheel trims are vile.  There's lacquer peel everywhere, it looks like a skin condition.  Interior is reasonable but not perfect.

The car has done 104,000 miles but doesn't feel like it, the whole thing still feels solid and tight.  It's incredibly comfortable for me, it's actually the right shape, and the overall dimensions of the car are pleasant too, it's very easy to live with around town in a way the Xantia isn't.

Tomorrow I'll get some fresh pictures and show some of the things I will be putting right.  The car has the right feel to it, like it's a car I'll be happy to invest time and money in.  Everything about it is just how I want it to be.  I might lower it a bit and put some interesting wheels on it, equally I might leave it standard and get some decent Rover trims for it instead.

[grifterkid]

That Rover is a very good buy... Superb!

[vulgalour]

CHA CHING


It has some rust, nothing serious and all sortable.


This is the worst bit, it needs a couple of about 3" patches let in. Someone has bodged it when it was a tiny bleb by the looks of things and while it looks ugly it's arrested further rust development.


The roof looks like post-sunburn peeling skin. I'm considering painting the roof gloss black.


Lacquer peel on the bumper and fade on the plastics. Considering smoked rear lights here too just to smooth things out a bit.


Coating on one of the rear window trims is lifting. Not sure how to resolve this just yet, don't really want to take it back to shiny metal, I'd rather it be all black.


Really minor bubbles on the rear drivers door. This is also the door that the central locking doesn't properly work on.


More lacquer peel, the photograph is really flattering to it.


The bonnet is buggered complete with lacquer peel and a dented corner. I'll probably replace it with another red bonnet. I hate the grille, I want to kill it with hammers, just not quite yet.

[vulgalour]

It has the best interior, really comfortable and in reasonably good order. Grimy in the usual places and in need of a Vulgalour. It feels a lot like a modernised Montego inside.








Top corner of the front driver's door card corner has collapsed, not sure I can repair it so I might need a new door card.


Spectacular repair to the passenger electric mirror which doesn't work and shows me an excellent view of the road just to the right of the car and nothing else.


Looks a bit tired, but then so would you after 107,000 miles and 21 years.


Those wheel trims! More hammer time, I think. Could do with losing just a bit of arch gap too, and maybe some nice period alloys.


Just after taking this last shot I was asked by the new neighbours if I was selling it. I have never been asked if one of my cars is for sale before. Clearly, it's a highly desirable vehicle. Or the new neighbour is a chancer of the highest order.

[vulgalour]

Spent a couple of hours today giving the Rover its first wash, which it very desperately needed.  It will need two or three more washes to really get it properly clean and get all the fiddly crevices done.  It also badly needs a machine polish for the scratches in the paint.  That said, today I got everything above the bumper line clayed and cut back to shiny paint, a little effort will see the last imperfections dealt with nicely.  Then I sacked off the miserable wheel trims so I'm now rocking miserable steel wheels for a bit instead.

 





I hate the facelift grille on these.  I hate it so much I'd rather drive around with the car looking like this.

 

 

I did at least want to try and fill the gap, if for no other reason than to keep the radiator protected.  Had a scouted around the scraps at the unit and found an Alfa Romeo stainless steel sill trim which had seen better days.  Luckily, two of the fixing holes lined up perfectly and after some trimming and fine tuning I have a rudimentary grille.
 The fit isn't the best and I don't mind because this is very short term.  I can use the bonnet properly and it looks marginally tidier.



 

The boot lid has been resprayed at some point in slightly the wrong colour.  It has got evidence of cats climbing on it judging by the scratches.  It should all just machine polish out.  I spent a bit of time removing some foam Os from the rear screen, no idea what they were for.


It's not a huge difference in the pictures, the phrase 'Resale Red' comes to mind with how photogenic this colour is even with the utterly ruined bonnet.  I'm definitely going to un-facelift the front, like I did successfully with the Xantia.  I've even had a pre-facelift car in the same colour pointed out to me on eBay that's being broken so I've dropped the vendor a message to see if I can get grille, bonnet, wheel trims and rear bumper for a decent price.  The rear bumper on mine needs a fair bit of cosmetic work, if I can just put a better one on it will save me a lot of grief.  I've got access to my brother's old 216SLi (hatchback rather than saloon) which is the same colour and has many of the parts I need so I've been quite lucky really.

Long term I want to get the ride height dropped about 40mm and possibly go up to some 15" alloys instead of the current 14" steels.

[sciclone]

Those black window tapes look like they're hiding some chrome, which was pretty common in the early 90's. You may be able to get a bit of bling if you remove them..

[nomad]

Congrats on finding some mojo & a neat ride
We had a 214Sei (same vintage as yours) in Nightfire red a few years ago, found it a great but under-rated daily
From memory, main weak points are cambelt & anti-freeze, check those then hopefully it's *just* cosmetics Alloys maketh the motor. Good luck getting the laquer sorted!

[vulgalour]

Someone over on another forum pointed out a pre-facelift 400 in the same colour as this one being broken on eBay so I fired off a message to see what's available.

sciclone: Those rear window trims are stainless with a tape or powdercoat or something on top. I'd strip them back to shiny but they don't match up with anything and blend better with the glass in the factory finish to give that almost-wrap-around-but-not-quite rear screen look.

nomad: Underrated is the best word to describe these cars. They're regarded as totally pedestrian, even dull and grandparenty and I suppose that reflects on the sort of people that bought and owned them long term. I've got to flush the coolant through a few times on this one and get that side of things in rude health. I'm lucky in that my brother and Mike (who owns the unit) both really like the K series and know them inside out so if things do go kettle shaped I'm in good hands.


The car has surprised me in the way it performs. It's on discs and drums which are usually adequate but not that impressive, particularly when you've come from driving a hydro-Citroen for a year. This one stops lovely and feels very composed, even with what we think is a slightly warped front disc (need to measure this to check). The little 1.4 K series I was expecting to be a bit underpowered given the size of the car, I knew the 1.6 was really well balanced for the car but thought the 1.4 might be a bit ploddy. Not a bit of it! We came back on the motorway and even at a sat nav 70mph the car still had more to give, it's a really willing engine. Wind noise and revs aren't even unpleasant, let alone the unbearable racket I was expecting at motorway speeds. Gear change is precise but not notchy and not so close a gate so gear changes can be made appropriate to mood and driving conditions. The seating position, for me, is absolutely superb. I've done 150 miles or so in it so far and haven't had a single grumble of numb limbs, aching back or anything, everything feels tailored to fit me which was always an appeal of my brother's old 214SLi. To drive this one feels like it's done about 80k and the previous owner was using it to commute from Nottingham to Wales regularly on the motorway, for some cars motorway miles are kinder and that does seem to be the case with this one which has actually done 107k.

Last MoT was a completely clean sheet, not what you'd expect when you look at it at all. Mechanically it's very, very good and just in need of a few service type items. Cosmetically it's pretty horrible. It's exactly the sort of place I want to be in car ownership at the moment.