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we are going to reuse the old internal doors in the new house. i took them to be stripped and this is the result. 2017-08-24_11-38-36 by sheepers, on Flickr in other news more weather boards are on and the spouting is finished. also some of the windows are in.\ 2017-08-25_01-57-48 by sheepers, on Flickr

Update time on Viva two.... Lesson learned. Don't leave Vivas parked up for two months on damp ground. I went to move it the other day and the clutch is stuck ! I have tried all the usual things to fix it and no luck. Its now sitting out there with a stick holding the clutch pedal down. Funny thing is that I have only recently worked on a mates Viva HC and it had come in with the same problem, which meant we had to remove the box and free up a very corroded clutch. The reason for this mighty wagon of mine being laid up? Well it ran out of WOF at about the same time as I had picked up a genuine Viva '90' engine. I had plans to fit it but its not happened yet. Hannah went to the UK to see family and brought back some parts, seals etc so next week we will tidy it up and fit it soon. What is a Viva '90' engine you ask? Its the uprated 1159cc engine that was offered as an option on HB vivas, and standard in the Brabham spec model. It has higher compression, high lift cam (that found its way into the 1256 Chevette/Viva HC engine), twin outlet exhaust manifold and Stromberg carb. Possibly some other things too.. some foamer can quip in here.. It all combines to give a very useful jump in power from 50 to 70 bhp! Twenty extra ponies is not to be laughed at when you only start with 50. My wagons chassis plate states in the options that it came with one of these engines but at some point it has been stolen from the car. The engine I have scored actually came from this ropey old car here... ...which Slacker Sam had bought and then sold on to the fella I bought the wagon from. He split the car down as it was rusty as (although some of its shell has also made its way into my wagon) , hung on to the motor and I managed to score it a few years later for $100. Its been rebuilt and apparently goes really well he said, useful for towing other Vauxhalls around etc ... Came with all new ignition parts too. Pretty happy with this lot and looking forwards to fitting it! I have cleared a little area in the workshop to work on it....

Been a while since posting, so much driving happily I did have to rebuild my diff, bugger I took no photos but pretty cool setting the pinion and carrier preload, shame about my rubbish condition cwp... The urgency for this job was of course in aid of attending another Chrome Expression Session!! Two days of solid track cruising with no issues except for a dropped alternator adjuster bolt (but not the gilly belt thankfully!) I was pretty keen to throw new 165/65R14s on my Equips but my tyre guy couldn't get them to bead, hence the miss-match, running Riverside R-109 14x7j out back with the new tyres (stretching the sidewall so they can be mounted to my 8j later) I wore the wrong flamin' shoes too, dress shoes are not conducive to heel-toe but I sure made it work regardless! On to the pics So much chur @Snoozin

Gary is having some moments, that's for sure. Ordered the 60 kit from treatland and fit the thing, ran mint for a little bit. Didn't have the right jets for the standard carb so I leaned it out a bit and had a blast, it was fun until the baby soft seized.... Took the engine apart to find minimal scoring on the barrel and piston, cleaned it up and snapped a piston ring putting it back together. Damn. Put the original barrel/piston back on to find that after every 3rd or 4th kick the motor would give a horrifying metal on metal squeak. I've managed to track down a new transmission/bottom end in Hawera which I'll get here soon hopefully. Ordering new piston rings too and gotta wait for them to come from the states. Sadly gary may not be ready for the weekends Auckland ride, but I may have another FA to chuck the seat on for the day and hold everyone up. Big thanks to @Shakotom Garys seat looks good though. It's given me sweet inspiration for future paint work. I've also decided I need a legshield. Can anyone help out with one? They're near impossible to find...

Good meet! Thanks to everyone who turned up.

Update time. Vivadom daily driving has been pretty damn good. Especially when 2 months ago I finally got around to changing the voltage settings for the wideband O2 sensor on the ECU so that the ECU would get the same reading as what the Innovate gauge shows. It’s a common setting fault and took all of 5 mins to get them to read almost the same. What does this mean though? Well for ages the ECU and hence the tuning program, Tunerstudio, have been receiving a ‘leaner’ voltage than what the engine was really at. This meant that in tuning the final outcome was always a bit too rich. When the ECU was in closed loop ego control it would take my preferred AFR table settings and adjust to what it thought was correct.. which was not. With the ECU now getting the proper signal we re-tuned the car on the way back from Blenheim to Motueka. It was too rich everywhere and after not long was leaned right back. Driveability remained the same, but tail pipe smells improved J I have not gone super lean, sticking to around 15~15.5 on cruise. We filled the tank back up in Motueka and the cars economy had improved returning 32 mpg (8.8l/100km). There is still room to improve but happy with that. So this was all good and everything was fine and dandy for the last month or two. Then the other day while leaving town I started to hear a teeny whistle sound. I just put it down to the throttle body making the sound because sometimes it does just this. The other thing I thought it might be was the idle control valve. I didn’t look into it any further. However, over the next few drives I noticed it was hunting a little at really light throttle openings, like slowly accelerating away from standstill. Hmmmm?... Then that whistle again, this time when I got home one evening. I popped the bonnet and listened around. I couldn’t pinpoint it but when I ran my fingers around the back underside of the plenum box where one of the runners joins I heard the note change. An air leak. Bugger. I looked with a torch and could just make out a little crack on one of the welds I had machined down…hmmmm. Bugger. Oh well.. I was planning on doing a modification to the throttle body pulley so why not sort it out now. I drove the car into the Viva hospital and started surgery. It didn’t take long to pop the bonnet off, unplug all the bits needed and start removing the inlet manifold. The trickiest bit was the return fuel line which was stuck to the pipe and hard to get too. One hour after having parked the car in the surgery and picking up the scalpels I had the manifold on the bench. I worked out pretty quickly why the manifold had cracked where it had. To explain how we need to pop into the police box and go back in time…. Maybe not that far though. Lets try again… Nup.. still too far. This time… Errrgggg. Again… Oh dear lordy..one more time… Ahh… that’s better! Righto..now remember this original plenum chamber? Made from some bent up 2.5mm alloy sheet. It had buckled diagonally when welded and I had then set up the runner heights to suit when I tacked them in place. I had to try and straighten it so it sealed correctly (using our house as a press).. It all worked out OK at the time because it flexed enough to seal when bolted down to the runner flanges. However a few years later I had that backfire and blew the lid off. I then fabricated a new plenum from 5mm alloy sheet and its was nice and straight.. It did not flex. This is how I think the crack happened. I decided I was not going to try to weld up this little crack because I knew the heat would warp the runner flange and nothing will seal. So I bought some posh looking South African epoxy putty, a bit like minute mend or quicksteel. It requires a lot more mixing than the others but sticks really well and smoothed off nicely. Kevin kept guard while it set. While the inlet was off I did some measuring and worked out the dimensions for a new offset/eccentric throttle body pulley. Then I machined down a lump of alloy bar and ended up with a new pulley. I got to use our new mill with a 2mm slot drill ( I could have used a hacksaw and file but this was more fun..) The new pulley effectively gears down the cable pull at the start of the throttle pedal travel and speeds up at the end making for a much easier off idle transition. You can see the difference between old and new here.. No more kangarooing down the road for people not used to this engine with its lightweight flywheel etc. I refitted the inlet manifold, plugged everything in and tried it out. WAY BETTER!!! Went for a drive and its so much easier to ease the throttle on out of corners or from standstill. Much more user friendly and I now wish I’d done this mod ages ago!

Went and got a TIG lesson from a mate, told him I'd never used one before etc and expected to be zapping up some scrap. I was wrong, he set up the welder and explained it all, put 2 tacks on my handle bars and then put me straight onto welding up my bars without so much as a test spot weld! Added a couple M6 nuts to the underside of the cross bar so I have somewhere to mount gauges from. Not perfect, but a bit more grinding and a coat of paint will hide all sins lol Oh yeah, another parcel arrived today... We'll call that a 50cc bore kit for legality sakes... Also CDI, small end bearing, a pile of cable end fittings, 3 sets of wrong clutch springs, stickers etc. Think I'm going to build another engine rather than swap the kit onto the current one, need to talk to @Mr Vapour about getting one of the spare engine's cases blasted up all pretty I think.

Poor suzuki being infected by Harley filth

I was think of selling my HQ Statesman but would never get an original one again plus I have fully rebuilt it mechanically over the last 3 years so I'll just keep it

I'm thinking v8 Chev diesel

2017 Event - A few of us are planning to ride on smaller bikes from Whakatane(ish) around the East Cape and back over 3 days, at the end of November when its nice and warm but not too busy. No requirement on bikes, something unsuitable and small is preferable though. I'll be on a CT110, VG his NBC110, couple friends on scooters(~50cc). Looking at about 600km, about 200km/day. Thinking a riding speed around 50km/h should give plenty of time for looking around and activities and sightseeing during the day, but not too fast for the smaller bikes. Where possible the route is off busier state highways so there will be some longish sections of windy gravel, but little traffic and no rush means you'll be fine. Accommodation around Whakatane, Hicks Bay, and Gisborne should be easy to arrange, be it campgrounds, cabins etc. There will be a ute and/or trailer that can carry fuel/luggage/spare bikes as well if anyone wants/needs to sit out any parts. Coast trip Total by John Bell, on Flickr Things to see and do on the route may include but not be limited to Serenity Lighthouses Wharves Churches Time travel. Horses, all of the horses Gangs Waterfalls Slip'n'slides And some of this You got 3 months Holla at cha boy, what do you reckon?

Thanks man, Darrell sorted me out this week. this tiny set can reach in behind the carbs, getting ready to fire it up, you might still see me!!

With your manifolds and stuff, I have some 8mm nuts that use a 3/8" socket to tighten them. Bought a hundred of them so drop in and grab them, Im in the workshop tomorrow bro !!

Lifter, rocker, and see how it goes. Probably be just fine.

Even the higher spec 90 engine is pretty low compression. Chuck a low pressure turbo on it with suck through carb. Something like a CT9 or CT12 off a small Toyota would do it. Unbolt for wof.

Yep. Tiny and light. Picked this one up and lifted it on to the bench easily. Maybe modify the shit out of the soon to be spare engine!? Three bearing crank for minimum resistance and max economy... Edit: then add turbo.

Was just out the front and a suzuki carry all?? Tray back thing cruises past. (Pretty sure they were 2 stroke originally? ?) Some silly fucker has dropped what sounds like a Harley engine in it. Lol Actually didn't seem to go too bad either.

Silly suggestion but Honda f20c or k series? I've got a really cheap k24 you can buy

The original 1159cc is only about 80kg all up i think. Thats turn key all accessories (no box)

Sorry to see you're having motor issues man. Don't sell it though, can guarantee you'd regret it! I almost bought a Brougham once and I'm still kicking myself for letting it go

Barra

Isuzu 4xe1 twincam - more power than a 4age

That red sealant is something else by the way.

I'd always though the Gyro was a uniquely Honda idea, turns out it's pivot system is a British invention, which played a part in BSA's demise Ariel 3 by BSA Then Diahatsu had a go at it with there Hallo

Nothing too exciting to report really One little Aliexpress parcel came this AM Looks the part for $12. And started having a look at my bars, this is how they come from the factory with mounts for all the trim and optional windscreen etc etc Bit of rough cutting later and there already starting to look a bit better Spent a bit of time with a flap disc cleaning them up some more, when I realized I'd better check that they actually fit on the AF35 stem haha And this should pretty much show my intentions with them Going to finally fire up my TIG tomorrow too, taking it and the bars down to a mates for a lesson. Also tried the new carrier rack on, took a couple little tweaks and the threads drilled out of the factory holes but it fits nicely (took a gamble on a late model rack fitting the earliest model) , I need to draw up some light mounting brackets to get cut out on the waterjet tomorrow too.

I'm an engine rebuilder lol so it's like maybe half a day to rebuild a piece of crap like this but I just was hoping not to have to. It's def a head off job at the stage since one cylinder has been sitting with a lung of water for a few years.

Gone fistin' 10/10

Long overdue update! I've been using this car as a weekend pleasure cruiser, done a few tow jobs here and there. Just enjoying the car In a more Legal manner. So we headed away for a weekend in June and took the Stato on its first maiden voyage-not too far just an hour and a half drive from Waimate to Twizel to see the inlaws. I absolutely loved loading up the car with the wife and kids and going on a drive up the high country but... it wasnt with out a few hiccups. We were 1 km out of Omarama when the whole car started to shake up and down and side to side. ( quite a weird shake really cant explain it!) limped into omarama went to put the spare on and that was a no go as it was bald and deflated I was caught with my pants down. the old whitewall had started to separate $120 later and a mediocre replacement fitted we were back on the road anyways made it to the inlaws house enjoyed my weekend even though it was freezing cold. all was good until we had to leave two days later. The car started to miss just outside of Twizel that then grew into a backfiring out the carb. rang the inlaws got towed back to their house and we borrowed the Mother in laws cressida. I said my goodbyes and left a big slut in Twizel I called John from South Island couriers to bring the car back to me 2 weeks later along with $250. I tell you what it was an expensive weekend. Since then its just sat in my Garage I've been at the point where I dont want to sink anymore money into it ( as its hemmoraged so much money already more than I've let on here at OS) I have even considered moving it on. I'd tested the waters on Facecrack and got some interest but then it dawned on me I just cant bear to part with it. The thought of some young fuckwit making it into a boozer makes me angry. since June Mrs Wylde removed the Right hand rocker cover and found the rocker arm on Ex #7 torn in half and a destroyed lifter the cam lobe survived the ordeal though. My intial thought was that It jammed a valve when we were up in Twizel. so Today I took the head off unfortunately I stopped taking photos at this point but I got the Head off and removed the valve spring. The valve was not stuck! I'm confused as to why or how this happened. Can I get away with replacing the lifter? or will I need a new cam too? Or just LS/Chev/Big block it? TL:DR - A new tyre and a fucked engine!

Botany burger fuel used to do hot rod nights there, there's usually heaps of car parks there during the week

You can thank old mate bugalugs with the "insomniac" child for that. Someone suggested last night that we could park in the section further away from the Warehouse and food places (roughly in front of the Reduced to Clear store) as that whole area remained fairly empty all evening. Sure it's not right next to Burgerfuel, but as mentioned neither was the top carpark at Ellerslie nor Countdown Manukau.

didn't get to make it last night because the car wouldn't start - either a battery or starter motor issue I think - shut the garage door without too much further investigation . Westgate would be too far west (IMO) - has to be fairly 'central' ie; no further south/east than Mt Wellington - No further North than Takapuna - no futher west than current location. that way its sort of fair to everyone-ish. Difficult to think of locations that aren't Greenlane McDicks to be honest.

I did try to hold a couple of carparks, moved too early and someone else snaked the second spot though. I find Mt Wellington is often very busy with the supermarket being there and construction going on at the moment limiting carparking spaces.

HAAHHH!!! PUZZLE MASTER!!!!!.. I cut the end off the triumph exhaust to get it in there. Now I have to walk all the way down the other end of the garage through my 'living quarters', the storage piles and the 'workshop area' to get the the other side of the car. Might be faster to just crawl through the doors. Motorbike battery was nearly flat, wouldn't start it, same deal for the STARVIA battery. I put the motorbike battery on charge.

Recycled PC, fresh install o' windows, won't connect to the innernets. On fucking ethernet. 20 fucking reboots later... Christ I hate windows most days. Restoring windows 1% 1% 1% 1% 1% ...

So I want to try get the STARVIA into a position where I can get it out of the garage. Maybe I can take it for a WOF so I can drive it!! Unfortunately, the STARVIA is the first thing I put in the garage then I put all the rest of the crap in. The garage is full as because all my house stuff is in here and I am living in it while the house is built. There is no driveway, there is just a ~30cm drop outside the roller door. I want to avoid moving things outside for this exercise, it's wet and muddy and currently dark. I'm standing on a bench to take these photos. I think there is JUST enough room to fit the STARVIA behind the Triumph with its arse pointing out at the door. I somehow need to get all the stuff behind the STARVIA to in front of the STARVIA. Then use the trolley jack to pull the front of the STARVIA around behind the triumph.... Problems: That big box behind it is a fireplace on a pallet... it's fucking heavy. It's too wide to fit down either side of the triumph. There is also a flue kit there, it's not heavy, but it's big. The thing in the bag behind the bike is a lazyboy, it's not heavy, but it's a big and awkward. The bench by the roller door is too heavy to move. The triumph can't move, it's on axle stands with no suspension. I need to lift the drill press onto the bench I was standing on without breaking my back. Feels like one of those sliding puzzles with the one clear space and you have to move the different size shapes around.

I've been collecting timber from a sawmill 'up north'. Is my ute OS? I reckon it are. It's also bloody awesome. It has self canceling indicators and power steering, but everything else you need to do yourself. The objects in the mirror are precisely their own size and I need to get out of the cab to engage the free-wheeling hubs. I love that ute. Sadly the generator died last weekend (as did a number of other things). It's a real challenge trying to keep tools dry enough to use up there, but after forking out a significant portion of the cabin budget on a replacement generator I managed to finish another frame today. I've gotten a bit better at calculating tangents... but of course there are mistakes aplenty. Sorry about blurry photo. It was almost dark

There will be ways, there is an alternate documents forms here. This gives you "permission" to register something if you are missing any of the vitals. Basically, you just write your sob story, and someone, somewhere has a read and is all "Yeah/Nah" and gives you a piece of paper allowing the NZTA agent to add it to the system without any further questions. I doub't for something like your bike, that they'd give a shit. You have most of the paperwork. So will probably be sweet. But won't know until you have dumped 184 bux at the form however. There's a checklist in the form of things you need. Have to provide photos, and an offical entry compliance person must physically sight the frame and engine numbers. You have half of it, if the dude can't find bill of lading, then you will need to use the above form, and it will probably be sweet. Its such a fucking grey area, god damn the whole NZ vehicle registration system is so Michael mouse. All depends on the mood of the womble you get on the day. And nobody you speak to has any fucking clue what they're doing, or what the process is. A shame really. Its not rocket appliances.

You could explain that the M engine was designed by toyota to have a safety release valve when excessive hp is developed, thus protecting the driveshaft from failure.

Double dose of lol's. Gotta take the fire too it and introduce it to the bent way of life. Getting there for the AKL ride on the 27th.

I will now rummage through all my fading memories the happenings of the last few weeks since the wagon became legal, weeks of holidays, drinks, sunshine, fettling of various old car things. Hopefully as I type it will become clearer.. Since getting the car back into life I have just kept using it for all sorts of trips and its been fun. I love the looks it gets. Often I get thumbs up, usually from young folk who might not even know what it is but certainly like the fact its shabby. Older people often smile too. Many comments But it was never 'right'. I felt it had better potential and didn't believe that the engine was knackered. It was not using much oil but enough to make me look further than just the patches it left here and there. Every time I drove it Id discover afterwards a new fresh coating of oil mist over everything. I checked the rocker cover and sure enough that was loose. But still the mystery mist kept appearing.. hmmmmm… Finally I worked out that it was spinning off from the front pulley. Luckily my stash of Viva spares had a new seal. I popped off the timing chain cover and swapped out the very very hard old seal. The nice soft new one stopped the mist. Yay. But that rough idle was annoying me. More so the engine shal=king about and making the exhaust knock the crossmember. This I had to fix. It was too close and sat quite low as well.. So I cut off the down pipe and while it was off I repaired my previous ‘repair’ to the manifold joining flange which had started to leak. Knock be gone but still the car idled rough. I checked the compressions and they were all good @ 150 psi each (which is way higher than the 130 Mr Haynes tells me to expect so I either have a gauge that lies or someone in the past has skimmed the head?) But still the car ran rough. I finally bought a new timing light. A self powered one. So good not having to plug in the battery leads! With my new light I was able to check the timing which turned out to be only about 5 degrees out. So I was happy that Id managed to get it so close just by ear but not happy that it was obviously not the cause of the poor idle. I checked the valve clearances. Now things got messy… the manuals all say check them hot and many sources out there say the best thing is to check them with the engine running….. NEVER AGAIN will I try using feeler gauges on a idling engine! What a kerfuffle and resulting mess! After I had spent many clean rags clearing up the oil from everywhere I set the clearances hot. They were all pretty good actually. I screwed the rocker cover down and started the engine. TINK TINK TINK TINK TINK…. WTF?!!! Where’s that coming from. Oh no.. have I dropped a valve? Sounds like piston slap or a broken piston top but higher pitched? Oh dear I thought. I popped the cover off and started the engine. Sound has gone! What? Looked at rocker cover and I could see marks underneath from where a rocker was just touching my altered breather gallery… Oh OK. So tightening the cover down further on a new hot cork gasket just pulled it down that bit more to touch. One swift smack with the hammer and the sound was gone So what is causing the rough running then. I had been pulling the plugs after every few runs to look at the condition. Always the front 1 and 2 plugs were clean and borderline lean. The rear 3 and 4 always a touch oily. Hmmmm. Then I looked at my servo and breather lines heading into my inlet manifold- remember back when I changed the positions?.. I popped off the servo one and sucked on it. Hang on… no resistance! What? Bugger me.. I have a split diaphragm in the servo causing an air leak. Which also explains the hefty brake pedal ( I’d just put that down to poor brakes bedding in or not being manly enough..) I plugged the tee on the manifold and started the car. Wow!! What a difference!!!! So smooth. I was able to lower the idle speed right down. Then double checked the timing, tweeked the carb jet a little and it was heaps better. Next drive was way smoother, engine had more pull and no lurching. Heaven. But I knew it could be even better. So I undid the breather pipe from the inlet and re-routed it down the back of the block, holding it in place by the bottom of the bell housing with a zip tie. I plugged the remaining takeoff on the tee and started the car… even better! Yes!! Having got rid of another ‘air leak’ helped no end plus was also explaining why the rear two plugs were constantly oily. I will source another HC servo and for now just put up with a harder pedal. The brakes work well but just need a shove. As for the inlet take off I will move the position to just after the carb in the middle so its even across all cylinders. The breather can remain to atmosphere. Now I knew the engine was actually OK I gave it an oil change. The old oil was not too dirty but it did smell. It burns a little oil at start up past the inlet valve stems. I have found out that this earlier engine doesn’t have stem seals but a friend who owns many Vivas said they used to slide an O-ring down the stem so most oil ran over the o-ring rather than down the guide. Nifty idea I might try if I do pop the head off. Im now a little reluctant to take the head off as its running well..but I am a little curious to see how carboned up it might be?. So my once rough running Viva is now a very smooth little car to drive. In fact its an utter joy to drive, allowing for a general lacking in power. My fears about driving up hills have been removed. Yeah it’s a bit slow but only on one very steep section do I need second gear, otherwise its third gear and cruise. Its ideal about town and fantastic for popping to the beach, a trip it has done many times now. I like it. I like it a lot. I just cruise. Windows down. Chilled out. Lifes a breeze. I love the way the car handles with the tiny engine up front. Steering is very light and it fun to flick around. Many more little things to tidy up now and make it a nicer place. Hannah’s mum is over from the UK on holiday so I made the most of her baggage and got her to bring over lots of stuff I got cheap on ebay Uk. See here… New dizzy cap, rotor, a full set of mint Vauxhall service manuals (only £1.50 ), full head gasket set (cheap), a few magazines, adjustable electric fan controller, a chrome air filter which doesn’t quite fit but I’ll sort that. So that’s where I’m at now. Just using it. Transporting mountain bikes (easy pesy).. Going to the beach.. Sitting pretty in the afternoon… Taking me down to my local village for moonlit strolls along the beach.. Just generally being a very good fun wee classic daily

Follow up snap at the Marina, actually clean this time and with new wheels and grill as well as my lovely Goodline front bumper