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So Hannah and I took the Imp for a two day road trip. Part business and part holiday. On Friday we drove up to Lake Rotoiti, Nelson lakes national park. On the way we checked out some old classic cars a fella owns who wants me to do a load of bodywork on. The Imp drove really well. The sun was out and the music cranking (some ambient tunes from David Tipper since you ask). We had a good coffee and then a nice walk on tracks around the lake. That evening we drove through to my olds place in Blenheim. A nice day out. Here's some photos... Chilled out at my parents, a feed of fish and chips, wine. A grand way to finish a day. Following morning we set to head home. Filled the Imp up, did some maths and allowing for a very optimistic speedo we reckon on around 40 mpg. Not bad considering the gearing at 100kph. Headed home, sadly into rain as a cold front was moving up the Island. Drove long way via Picton and Queen Charlotte drive because narrow twisty roads and go kart car... Over the Rai Saddle, sitting with the flow of traffic. I give the car some stick to pass a motorhome up the saddle and then when cruising down the other side the wee car does that thing.... 'JOLT!' The car does a small but very noticeable stumble. Like a tiny rev limiter. For those that have tuned megasquirt, or maybe other EFI, it felt like when you click burn. "What was that?" Hannah asks. "Shit- I don't know but it felt like an ignition thing, not spluttering fuel thing" I reply. We both go quiet. I almost want to turn the music down and listen for any untoward mechanical sounds that might be there. But I don't. I'll play it cool. Don't worry. Don't get Hannah worried. It was probably just a... fuck. I don't know. I'll just say nothing, drive a little slower and whatever it was will be a memory soon. The silence is piercing. Now I notice every bloody vibration. I'm watching all the gauges like a jet pilot. All the time my mind is going through all possible scenarios. What could that have been. What if we breakdown? 3km pass. It seems ok. I start to relax. Only one big set of hills to go. I pass another rental car, most likely the scurge of the kiwi roads, a Nissan Tiida. I dont know because I'm still having a mini stress.. 'JOLT'. Here we go. This is happening. This time its for good. The car dies and I have to quickly think where I'm going to stop to fix it and quick before I slow too much and that silver blob I just passed drives up my bum. I spot a forestry road on the right, coast across to it (whilst trying to make it look like nothing is wrong so saving face for all classic drivers who get the "oh old cars are so unreliable...") I pull to a stop and the engine splutters to its last road driven rotation with a bang. Bugger. Remain calm. Reception on phone? Not a chance. Tool kit in boot comes out and we go through all the obvious things, concluding that it is indeed the ignition. Annoyingly it was the ignition module, of which I didnt have a spare. If it were points I'd have fixed it. Such is life. Luckily the rain had stopped and double lucky that across the road from the forestry road we parked on was a farm house. The kind farmers wife took us in, let us use her phone and fed us tea and biscuits. I called a mate out with his trailer. We have AA membership however its the basic cover that would have got us to a garage. I knew a Garage wasn't going to fix this and we'd still have to get home. Yeah nah. Stuff that. Mate turns up with his trailer and we have a choice as chilled out trip home. We fed him dinner and it was all good in the end. Big thanks to @Sanfiddy for rescuing us! Oldschool spec favours. I only took one photo of the day... So that was that. On Sunday I removed the dizzy and then the module. It fails the tests as predicted. Here's the troublesome module... Come Monday and at my local wreckers looking for a module. I dont want to spend $120 on a new one when I'm about to fit full engine management. No luck locally but we were in Nelson on Tuesday and I found one at a wreckers there, cheap too. Fitted it that night and brooooooommmmmm The replacement was a proper Hitachi module whereas the one that let its smoke out was a no brand cheap one. Even felt lighter if that means anything. I took the broke one apart and it looks like a little cityscape inside- heck it would scare a Barry used to the kettering system... I also managed to score a spare couple of dizzies, converted with accuspark. My bench looks like a bomb went off in a hitachi factory... I'll need to fix them up, check them out and then I could always have a spare setup in case. That is until I fill the Imp with boxes of electronics and then there's no chance Mr AA man can help me. It'll be like every modern car- useless when broke. In other news- this turned up from China the day we left for the lakes... Its a brand new Hitachi 306 clone, all for not much more then a full carb gasket set costs. I had ordered this before I had scored all the other Megasquirt bits. Anyway- I'm still looking forward to trying it out because my worn out carb is about as good as I can get it. The new one looks so shiny. I'll report back with my findings on how deep the quality goes...

Decided to try and get this thing riding a bit nicer, previous suspension setup was a little soft and hit the bump stops a bit too often, and with the extra weight of a 4age it would of been worse. Went with a set of Fortune Auto's coilovers all around, since I'll end up chucking an F series or similar diff in and I have the skills to strengthen the rear strut towers. Picked up another pair of struts, cut them down and and blasted them. Wound them all the way down and the front ended up a little higher and the back's a bit lower. Might try and get the front down a bit more, to at least were it was. Made a stainless distributor blanking cover. Bought a Flo's upper water outlet, as it looked to be the much simpler and tidier way of doing the cooling system. Needed a RWD waterpump (inc pulley), thermostat housing and a little bypass pipe to complete the setup. And of course with everything else, when you change one thing you have to change something else. The FWD alternator bracket fouled on the thermostat housing, so I got a RWD one from Japan. Borrowed some Flo's 4age to K series engine mounts and made up my own. Sitting in the hole. Had to space the engine mounts out by 8mm, possibly because of the Cusco mounts being thinner than factory ones? Dizzy relocation kit installed, had to cut a bit of a hole in the fire wall for some clearance. Stripped the interior, pulled out the dash, heater, seats, carpet and scrapped off some sound deadening around the gearbox tunnel. Cut a big ol' hole for the J160 to fit. Probably didn't need to cut so much out, but to make it easy to drop out and fit, some extra clearance was needed. Also wanted it to sit up above the sills and chassis rails. Made up a gearbox mount. Added two extra body mounts further back so that it spreads the load a bit. Has heaps of ground clearance as well. The J160 shifter needed moving forward as it lined up with the end of the handbrake. Cut up the original shifter housing and welded it on to some ali tube and 12mm plate. Spent hours on our little lathe turning up the adapter bits. Works mint, barely any flex and feels like it should. Moved it 200mm forward from the Altezza position, 50mm more than the SQ kit and 40mm back from where the factory Starlet one was.

Who knows about injector pumps? A bit smokey when you put your foot down (but otherwise fine) makes me think there is something worn in here... So whats the plan....? Firstly, I cant touch it until my mini is done... Last WOF was in 2018 so somewhat thinking of just putting it through seeing if the list is managable and using it from there. But long term I want to pull the whole thing down a do a chassis swap to a late model hilux/navara etc and build it up from there. Will respray and refit as much interior as possible to make as comfortable as possible. Only thing which would prevent that is if I have to rego as a 'scratch build' and do a cert from there. Otherwise would either repower or rebuild the running gear and do a disc brake/power steering modification. Time will tell.... Discuss

I hit a bit of a brick wall with progress because at some point I want to paint the engine bay and underside, and was trying to do things in a way which meant I could get that done, get the engine sorted and painted and in for good and then do things like make the exhaust afterwards Then I realised that was stupid and I was wasting time mucking around trying to figure out things with the engine on the stand, and whacked the motor and box back in . I need to get everything done then I'll take it apart for paint last Shifter mounted, i wanted it up high so it's not far from the steering wheel to the shifter, @RXFORD/matt from tin tricks helped me out again with that by folding up a shifter mount and putting some fancy holes in it And put the carb and hat on, the bonnet doesnt shut so I'll have to figure out what I'm going to do with that

On to the flywheel. First remove the dowels Weld a stud to the dowels to attach the slide puller. Weigh it. Into the lathe. Sorted. I also machined the face in the lathe. I machined the outside area where the pressure plate clamps down .5mm to give the pressure plate more clamping load. Weighed it after.

Dropped the head off at a local reconditioners for a leisurely soak in the cleaning bath and a very light skim (I suspect 3 & 4 cylinders had been talking to each other). Have to say I was blown away with how good a condition it was in once all the damn black rich running carbon had been dissolved. Cleaned the valves and gave them a light lap. Enlisted the help of an “Oldschool Holden Spring Compressor” I had lying around which made light work of the double valve springs and all it needs now is a fresh coat of the obligatory “Torana Yellow” paint.

Hole in the exhaust was an easy fix, but is somewhere i think i will be visting again eventually Stuck all the many many chrome trims back on And backed it into the sun then down the road and reversed up the drive - this side has been drying for a few weeks so it got a quick polish with the big slow grinder then bunged the trim back on this side too, now its all back together. Last pic of a car in this shed got to be parked on the lawn in waiting for me to bung it into storage for a while sheds now starting to fill with boxes and about 2 vanloads of stuff taken to and from storage and the op shops

Its been a while since the last post; almost exactly a month. Although it's been quiet on here, work has been slowly progressing on the TVR. Unfortunately I've been suffering serious issues with motivation recently, and getting down into the garage to work on the car just wasn't happening often. It hasn't helped that for every little scrap of success I've been having with the car, I would get a big wad of failure dumped on me. It seems like a constant battle at times. When I could get into the garage and plug away at the TVR I did. I have done a lot of testing, cleaning and investigation into the K-Jetronic system trying to chase down the running issue it has. This will be the subject of a post in the near future, but I'm learning a lot about the system and how it works. Hopefully that knowledge will lead to me getting it working correctly, and helping others along the way. In the meantime, I did have a couple of small successes. One was the gas struts for the bonnet and boot. The old ones were well poked, and held nothing, so other means of support were employed. The bonnet and boot may be fibreglass, but they sure ain't light; I didn't want to take one of them to the noggin. Not flash, but they worked. The boot had the wood plank, and the bonnet had an aluminium tube. I did some ringing around and research into the option of having the existing struts regassed, as finding a set of struts in the correct length and with the low pressure they require (100NM) locally didn't seem possible, but the cost of regassing the struts, if even possible, wasnt much less than a new set of struts from SGS Engineering in the UK. The old ones appear to be the original Stabilus Lift-O-Mat struts, as the date mark on them is 04/80. They did pretty well to get this far! Upon removing them, three had some pressure, although minimal, and one of the bonnet ones was completely dead. Removal was easy. The old ones had plastic locking pins that needed to be removed and then the ends could be popped off the ball with a long screwdriver. All of the ball joints had to be removed to replace with the new shiny ones, which is easily done with the appropriate spanners. The replacements are lovely and shiny, I'm glad I went for the new option as the old ones just never would've cleaned up as well. They are Nitrolift branded, and gassed to the correct 100NM. It appears SGS custom build these for each order. The ends are particularly nice They fit and work perfectly. Much better. For the money spent, its a great upgrade from the saggy old struts. Moving on, the second win I had was finally working out what the ashtrays are in the early Tasmin. My old ones were badly rusted and falling to bits. They weren't useable and looked terrible. I suspect this was from rainwater coming in the window due to the failed/damaged seals. The front was literally being pushed off by rust, on the driver's side. There had been a lot of information/discussion on the internet about the ashtrays being from a Jaguar XJ6. I can dispel this myth now, they are not. You could probably make them fit, but they aren't the original ashtrays. I purchased a pair of ashtrays from an XJ6, and when compared to the TVR ones the difference is subtle, but there. Jag on the left, TVR on the Right. The Jaguar ones are rounded on the sides, and slightly taller. The mounting tabs for the ashtray into the housing are completely different too. Speaking of the housing, that also differs from the TVR one. TVR Left, Jag Right. Jag is slightly smaller in all directions except depth. Its slightly deeper and has a sloped back on it, whilst the TVR one is flat on the back. The mounting hole also doesn't line up. So, with that bitter disappointment, and waste of money, I kept digging. I eventually found that the 2 Door Range Rover Classic used the same ashtray as the TVR, but finding one of those was proving impossible. It wasn't until a member on the TVR Wedges Facebook page pointed it out, that it was suddenly obvious where the ashtrays came from. I almost felt embarrassed I didn't notice it... they're from a Series 1 Rover SD1! There it goes, sitting there, in the door. Finding one of these was a lot easier, albeit blue is a rare colour so I have ended up with a pair of tan, like the above photo. It turns out that TVR modified the Rover part slightly, by removing the foam tape off the back of the housing, and bashing the mounting hole with a hammer to flatten it off (sits proud normally, and the ashtray won't sit flush in the door). They aren't perfect, due to the tan, but I'm keeping an eye out for a blue pair, but will give dying these a go at some point. Better than rusty old ones falling out of the door! So once again, I've been left with some small victories, which are better than nothing, but the KJet system continues to fight me. More on that later though, as thats been a big, ugly, process.

Another small job I wanted to take on whilst the car was in bits, was to check the valve clearances. I had no history of it being done, and its a fairly important thing to check on these engines, and not hard to do. Valve clearance is the small gap that must exist between the rocker arm and the top of the valve stem. This gap allows for expansion of the parts as they heat up (mainly the valve), so that there isn't either excessive space between the two (valve won't open as far or as long, and will make a loud tapping noise) or too little (valve may not close, and can result in a burnt valve). Some engines have the means to self adjust, usually via a hydraulic lifter (those things that make Mitsis go "tick tick tick"), but on these older engines (and even some modern engines, like Hondas) the clearances were a scheduled service item and needs to be checked and corrected. On this engine it's nice and easy to access with the intake piping out of the way. It's just a matter of removing the valve covers, of which mine were leaking anyway. It turns out that a few of the valve cover bolts weren't even finger tight, so no wonder the oil was getting through the gasket! With the covers off, you need to use a socket and ratchet to rotate the engine so that the crank timing mark lines up with TDC on the front pointer. If its correct, you should find that No 5 cylinder valves are "rocking" and this is when you measure No 1 cylinder clearances. "Rocking" is the term for when you watch the rockers on that cylinder and you will see the both are at the same height, but if you rock the crank one way, one rocker will push down slightly, and if you rock it the other way, the other rocker will push down. Ford Cologne engines are a little special, so the layout isn't quite what you expect. Take note of the layout of the intake and exhaust valves, they aren't always in the same order. The clearances should be as follows. These are done on a cold engine (about 20c ideally). The exhaust has a bigger clearance due to the additional heat the valve is subjected to. When checked with a feeler gauge, there should be a slight drag on the blade, but not too tight, or too loose. You kinda just do it by feel and get to know what it should feel like When one cylinder is done, check the list to see what rockers will be rocking next and turn the crank (in the direction of normal rotation) until those rockers rock, and check the clearances on the opposing cylinder in the list. Easy. If any of them need adjusting, there will be a screw on the opposite end of the rocker, that either needs to be loosened or tightened to open or close the gap. Most cars have a locking nut to stop it rotating, but the Cologne doesn't, so turning the screw will adjust it, and it self locks. Mine were very tight, so I used a six sided socket and rachet to turn them. A little goes a long way though, so sometimes even a slight tweak of the screw will be the difference between loose, and the right amount of drag. Five of six cylinders had valves that were too tight to get the blade into, and one cylinder was loose as a goose. I don't know what this means, hopefully it isn't a sign of valve recession due to a lack of lead, but time will tell. It could also just be bad adjustment from a previous mechanic....

Yawn... Might slap some white on this bitch next week. Also might not.

So I've been somewhat pining for my old canvas topped Land Rover since I sold it a few years back.... the prices on these have started to get silly so I've been thinking I need to get back in the game or loose it forever.... But this time I've been on the lookout for a different model to allows the whole family to join in the LR fun and have been somewhat dreaming of overland camping trips in Central with the kids. So something along these lines popped up on a FB page a few months back, messaged the guy, seemed like a good option but had no funds at the time, others were interested so said thanks and moved on. Now I came into $$ and messaged again a low and behold its still available and they want to move it on.... Quick trip up to Timaru to inspect and back a few weeks later (today to pick it up....) So what have I got...? Its a 1962 SIIa (383th of the export model off the line, so early in the run) 109 StationWagon. Its been modified a fair bit (on declaration papers from '92) to run a Nissan ED30 diesel (my old one had an ED33..) into a 5speed Nissan box which is somewhat mated to a LR transfer case. It also has the (very good) later axles from a Stage1 V8 (basically a Dana60) to give 3.9 gearing with freewheeling hubs. A keen eye will note that the nose has been pushed forward - it doesnt need to be to fit the ED30, I wonder if it had an earlier 6cyl conversion. Body is a little rough (as we will see) but is largely complete. Got it home and first thing was to give it a waterblast, the lichen has gone to town on the paint.... Has a 'very period' winch.... I've figure out that most of the gauges work, has a wee heater with an exposed fan (watch the fingers)

Not even off page 1 and already time for an update! Whaka yeah! Bought a turbo manifold, seems pretty ok? Like is new, which is good but has obviously been sitting for a bit before being freshly powdercoated and sent to me, but will allow the attachment of the hairdryer for the turbo noises and that's what really matters. Is strong too so should be cool. Bolted manifold to engine, bolted turbo to manifold, clocked turbo. Bottom of both A-pillars looked like this. Then they looked like this... Cut the rust riiiiiight back. Most of this I am fairly certain was caused by poorly repaired rust at the top of the A-pillars, which allowed water behind the windscreen sea at the top, down the pillars, and then pooled in the wiper tray. Still needs a fettling and tidy up, but all 3 skins are in and replaced and strong af. didn't remember to get a photo of the passenger side but that's done too. Also in the above photo you can see the *ahem* clearancing needed for the turbo and manifold, this is fine as this area isn't occupied by wheel and tyre, as they stick way outside the factory guards. I will close this in with sheet steel shortly. Should be getting the pieces of steel I have had cut up for the body mounts today, been getting a really good deal on these through the engineer we use for work, he cuts them out of steel he has and just charges me the rate they pay for steel, no cost for cutting or anything. The labour may or may not get charged to whatever job we have going on at work at the time, but i wouldn't be surprised haha. A lot easier and more accurate than doing it myself, I don't have a bandsaw so I have to cut everything with an angle grinder, which isn't the best for parts I want to match perfectly side to side. Also bought my clutch, so will bolt the engine to the gearbox, and that will be that (here's hoping). Also bought a flange for the turbo to start the downpipe, and a heater matrix to try and start looking at where that will fit and how it will all work. Plans for the next week: - Get flywheel surfaced, bolt up clutch. If I get the body mounts tacked up, take off body, remove gearbox, mate together. - Tack in remaining body mounts. - Finish engine cover frame. If I have any extra time, start to close in with panel steel. Have teed up a guy at work to do the final welding for the body mounts for some liquid refreshments. He is a good/ticketed welder so will be good to have confidence that the body won't fall off while I drive it down the road. Let me know what I am doing wrong/I am a fool for thinking I can get this frankenstein done for Nats 2020. On a serious note, anyone who can help/has suggestions to do with tuning/ecus/wiring, please hit me up. I am no expert on most things, but wiring is something I worry may be a serious stumbling block, and I don't know if I will have the money available in time to just pay someone else to do it.

No it's not, but that's one way to come across as a bit of a dick.

Still have a blockage somewhere in the fuel system but it is a intermittent thing. FFS. Anyway, got a WOF. Went to the Raza because Humber.

Here's a better shot of the .5mm step This is our flywheel grinder The flywheel get mounted to the round turn table. Then the grinder head swings to the left and you wind the grinder head down onto the flywheel. All sorted and ready to go off for a balance. We don't have a balancer so we use another reconditioner for balancing and he uses us for crank grinding. There's some machines that arnt viable to own as you may only use them a couple of times a week.

2 months til Urewera nicotine and nangs so time to try make the TS50 go again. After doing a bit of research I figured out that I needed a motor from another mono shock model as the gearcase is a different shape to a TF125/DS80. Much barry spec searching found a late model monoshock TS125 was a thing so started looking for one that was cheap enough to take a punt on the engine fitting. Found a $100 "blown up" shitheap on marketplace that @datlow the GC picked up for me and even delivered it from Wellington. Turns out with some brakekleen in the carb it runs fine, gearbox sounds like a bag of dicks but I put some oil in it and its happier. Piston/rings look fine through the exhaust port Encouraged that my blown up engine runs pretty good I pulled it out this arvo and offered it up to the TSfiddy engine hole. Tight fit but still lots of room to add mounts once I somehow hold the engine square and in line with the chain. Stoked to have something thats finally going to fit with minimal work, just make 3 mounts swap stator and coil to get 12v off the engine then sort out some sort of bodged together spanny

More joyous progress on this thing. I got me new clutch pads and springs. The new springs were considerably tighter than the existing ones, they definitely helped a lot. There's a lot of conflicting home-mechanic information on the internet about installing clutch pads, and how long you should soak them in oil for. Some suggest an hour, some a day, and a few "ex-GP" mechanics recommend months. I am impatient and soaked them for an hour. It feels great now, best clutch i've ever felt on a bike so i call that a win. The first couple of mangs it did slip a small amount, but once motor got some heat into it the clutch has felt fine and no further issues. Will be interesting to see how long it lasts. Carb now has standard size pilot jet in it and idles nicely. Still a little rich, but ok for now. Just need to get some miles on it. A lot of faffing around has gone into making it run nicely, i had to make a frankenstein throttle cable out of four, then had a local bike mechanic shorten the upper cable as it was too shlong. With a smooth throttle cable, new front brake and new clutch it feels like i just bought this thing off the show room floor! I just need a mirror and to get both brake switches to work and i am ready to pay a visit to the re-vin man. Much excitement. also spotted this wild as fuck RX125 at the DGR in Wellington - sounds just as wild as it looks. Some inspiration for further down the track...

Not heaps to show with what I've been doing.... been building all the brakes/hubs up with the best used components I've sourced off these parts cars. At least I have now got it rolling.... I've bought another project so this will definately be for sale when complete....

Honda Country Calendar Collection.mp3 These are my 4t farm spec bikes for rounding up nangs at the shed. 2 x CT-200 Auto AG with pull-start because getinbehindyamongrel. 1 x CT-125 conventional I don't really know why I have these, other than cheap. One came with a thistle grubber which hasn't yet been useful. Will probably offload but keen on some @UTERUS Thomson's track action first if there are thistles up there.

Vivas got such an awkward floor pan.

Better late than never.

Just shelve it like PPSC does with everything these days

SUZUKI A100 I saw this at Kumeu with an 'offers' sign on it but CBF at the time, so grabbed the guys number. Rang him a week later to find he had been dicked about and wanted rid of it so I went and grabbed it. Motor was seized so separated with big hammers, cleaned up barrel and throw a new piston at it. Bike has decided it likes to seize after long periods of WOT. Will throw a bigger main jet at it one day. Is fine around the suburbs.

Still waiting on that LH main bearing and seals, they sed 2 weeks but it has been like a month now, if those parts turn up I can put the motor together. had to repair the front brake plate with my new found skill.

Got this a wof in august. Needed to replace a few things like steering rack, engine mounts and a brake cylinder. Kind of put it on the back burner while working on the orange van and house. I played around with the jets in the bike carbs and felt I got them a bit better. Still seems to run rich at idle, pilot/fuel screw screwed in quite far, and doesn't have the pick up at mid range when I put the foot down. Yet to investigate too much. Have started to make an air filter housing for the carbs. Using a cut down filter from a Hyundai pony? It was cheap at a swap meet so I built the housing around that. Carved up a wooden template and used the press to make the initial swage in the lid. Folded and cleaned up the edges before pressing and drilling holes for the thread studs to hold it all together. Will probably just clearcoat it. Next step is to actually tune the carbs better.

My brother got his plates approved from pictures, but they weren't from one of those suppliers. We drew them up ourselves and had them CNC machined. Just because it was approved doesn't mean it is legal

Well its been a while since I've updated this thread. Mid July was where I last posted up anything of worth. Little Imp got parked up in the corner of the workshop so leaving anough space for our neighbours to make use of the shed while we took off to England for a decent holiday. Hannah got to catch up with her family, we both did heaps of cycling and running, had plenty of sunshine and beer plus I got to go along to the retro-rides gathering 2019! As I always do I had a fantastic time there and came away with boosted Mojo and lots of ideas. Before leaving the UK I ordered a few spare parts for the Imp... We got back to NZ in September, just in time for the start of spring. The Imp was sitting there tucked away, a tiny little puddle of oil under the sump just like a good little English car should have... First job was to fit the shiny new lenses. Hannah jumped straight into that, an easy but so very satisfying job to do... We then took the steering rack out and fitted the new centre gaitor. Hooray for a rack that holds oil... Having decided I was pretty happy with where the temp gauge needle sits once fully warmed up I carefully measured the resistance across the potentiometer I'd been using to adjust it. I then made a little joining lead fitted with a resistor of the same value. This replaced the adjustable item and should be it for the temp gauge. At some point in the future I may well make a new instrument cluster to suit the dash as I rather fancy having a rev counter in a place that I can actually see it ok. We have been driving the Imp since getting back to NZ as much as possible. On its first journey out since back I got this pic... We've had a few decent trips including a one really neat drive all around the local valley roads and hills, some gravel roads etc. Its so fun to drive. I'm really getting more confident with the handling and how to get the most from it. The engine seems fine and loves a good trashing. The carb is still a bit iffy with that worn out primary spindle still allowing some air to sneak in. I have ordered a new carb from China and will see how it goes. It was cheap enough to try and when I eventually fit injection I can sell the carb on. Whilst out on that really fun drive I got this photo. Shame I only had my phone as the sky was quite moody... After lots of driving I checked the plugs. They look fine with what I think looks to be a good colour... I thought it better to fit the fire extinguisher I bought before our holiday. It tucks away neatly behind the drivers seat... In other news I have been collecting many different parts needed for a conversion to fuel engine management. I just scored another megasquirt one (2.2) ecu plus a full loom and some edis bits - this time from our mate Rob in return for me doing some machining work for him... I need to decide on a few bits needed and also in which direction to go for the inlet layout. Maybe Itbs but maybe a plenum with a single tb. I foolishly dillydallied about when there was a full set of cbr900 ITBs on trademe for $55 including injectors and loom and subsequently missed out on them. At the time I wasn't sure about the suitability but for that money I could have made them work. Not sure on ideal throttle size but they were 40mm each which given the Datsun only has 30mm inlet valves I figure they'd have been plenty. Then I would have had all of the doorts! I'll keep looking... I'll be using a 36-1 trigger wheel, also supplied by Rob. Luckily there is ample room to mount it on the back of the main pulley. Both MS1 ecus I now have use the earlier version 2.2 board which don't have built in VR conditioner circuits. I can make a VR conditioner board and use VR sensor, of which I have many. Or I could use the Edis setup (which has a VR conditioner built in and uses a VR sensor) that came with the MS1, of which I suspect the ECU has been supplied already configured to use. I have never used Edis before. Hmmmm? Its a bit ugly and clunky though. I dont like the quite large ignitor box I'd have to sit somewhere. Or I can go with a Hall sensor but then I'll have to locate one from a wreckers- but what car? As usual I want to do this conversion as cheaply as possible because its just more satisfying for me that way. In my first few casual searches it seems that they are quite pricey and can be a bit frail or temperamental in use? More research is needed, of which I must say I do find to be one of the most fun parts of modifying! Oh also - I fitted a new speedo cable and now have a speedo needle that doesnt wibble-wobble all over the place. How thoroughly modern!

Thought I may as well start a thread on this raging beast, a friend of mine (may have been on here once) moved from hamilton to dunedin and abandoned it on my doorstep. He had had it sitting for quite a few years. Is a 1600 with twin strombergs & extractors - the motor has had some unspecified work done, apparently from a rally car. Body is in pretty decent condition, original paint is extremely worn and has surface rust for dayz, only welding required is in rear arches due to 3/4 inch coating of oil everywhere else. interior is 5/10, seats & dash have seen better days. lots of new suspension bushes in it which is nice. bodges required: weld rear arches where needed, sand & seal surface rust fill old badge, aerial holes etc muck around with ignition, it is totally pre-bodged and doesnt turn off with key until an electrical load is introduced i.e brake lights, horn (which to be fair is pretty funny) ideally obtain electronic ignition from chrysler. minimise ridiculous oil leaks put seats and dash cover on to cover wrecked originals wof treat with disdain as not proper leyland product. feel free to question my sanity on this thread, updates will be fairly slow as im only home a few days a fortnight!

Not a bad 3 day rummage around. Got to meet some new faces of old schoolers. Bought a km48 Sachs, a bunch of ammo boxes, a nice mecjar keg, a Carter afb, a bunch of Street rodding magazines and a few other bits. Was looking for a nice original Seagull, most were around $200 to $250.00 but had odd wingnuts or Bodgey fixes. An old guy yesterday morning unloaded quite a nice one as we were walking by. Had a yabber and he mentioned the price would be around the $200.00 mark. Done the rounds and went back to see $350.00 on it, the fucker wouldn’t budge below $300.00 so I left it with him.

Thanks again Chris, you and Aaron have got me fizzing about starting my moped build

/hairy beard rides? You must be exhausted

Me & @Geophy went looking for the OS parkup but couldnt find ya. Great to meet up with @bathcollector and also @gazguy dropping by every hour to stash stuff at our site. I sold really well over the 3 days. Brought a pre unit box for my drag bike project. 2 matchbox Vans. A Totara tree and two species of Lancewood trees. Stoked as

He can teach her about sperm oils uses in the great outdoors.

I'm Soo looking forward to this.

LH inner side cover was all smashed up with 3 chunks missing and the lower sprocket cover tab was missing, I gas welded it up, proper fusion welding not low temperature brazing.

@Nominal tag.....your it!!!

Legally the plate has to have been supplied by the government or in more recent times a government agent for the production of plates.

I've ordered some cable stuff so I can make the clutch, throttle and brake cables for the cub. The new Gy6 head arrived today. The casting quality is pretty shit house. I gave it a bit of a tickle up with the die grinder Finished off the exhaust and intake flanges. They are bigger than factory now. Intake flange is now port matched to the head and ready for me to find sone tubing

okay, so it's probably against the rules (but I'm a bad boy) - I've remade the sticker design to be a bit closer to the original and changed the design a bit. As long as everyone who voted for it is still happy:

There are no words to describe the magic that is Topec. Also can confirm there is a 'big' outdoor fire pit (accurate dimensions unknown) but any wood donations would be fab. Apparently there is a wood-fired pizza oven too if any secret pizza chefs want to epic meal prep I can be available for tasting.

I couldn't sleep so I carried on with the switch wiring for the cub. Soldered new longer wires on most of the switches in order to avoid having joins midway down. Yes the housings need to be cleaned and polished but that'll happen later I just need to extend the brake switch wiring and thats the controls done. I've kept the brake switch wires separate in case it ever needs to be replaced

Also finally got my Escort flares off Bruce a few months ago. Going to chop them up and have a crack at fibreglass work, moulding them a bit better to the 1300 and getting the fitment right. Theoretically it looks easy enough but will soon find out. The guards didn't cost a bomb so not a great loss if I butcher them haha. And yesterday I finally got a call from Murray at Weber Specs saying that my carb is ready so shot around after work to pick it up, along with a malpassi fuel pressure regulator. He's done a top job but damn he is expensive, even with mates rates ! Ah well gotta pay for quality so let's hope she's purring when she fires up. That's all for now anyway, off on holiday in a few weeks so probably won't be anything to update until maybe December if I find spare time to work on the old stead. Chur, Tai

Excuse the palm ive been slowly killing. Bastard got in the waste pipe Put lunch and beers on and got the cab off. Debating weather to acid dip or sand blast still. ill give it a water blast and get all the lines and shit off it 8CDBB3D6-F2DE-4E90-B4A9-2034D84EF311.png