kws

Honestly after a few years, a couple of bottles of gas and lots and lots of tacking sheet metal into British/Aus "steel", I'm still really happy with the Weldtech I got. I ain't no master, but for me rookie moves it does everything I have asked of it. https://www.mitre10.co.nz/shop/weld-tech-mig-inverter-welder-160a/p/349602

Im having a nightmare getting the bloody axle out at this point, it'd be a welcome sight to have oil come out with it. Slide hammer puller is on the way, hopefully that sorts it.

Did a solid 10 hours on the Marina yesterday and I'm bloody broken today. The WOF guy was way out of bounds, having now actually looked at what's under the car. The rust at the front was surface rust on the underside of the battery tray, and the underseal was a real non-issue. There were a few areas where it had flaked or scraped off to bare metal and had some surface rust, but otherwise its stuck on there better than my wire wheel could do. The big nasty horrible rust in the boot came off to nice bare metal with just my cheap soda blaster...

When I worked there for a few months many years ago, the tanks were more than big enough to fit wheels into. I'd be surprised if they'd downsized them. I saw some really nice quality chrome come out through that place (I was on the zinc plating side of things)

I can't comment on MS, since I've not used it, or the current state of Speeduino since it's been a few years for me, but having poked around in my blog posts from when I was playing with it, goddam it was good fun and really hit me in the nostalgia feels. I'll do it again at some point; I still have a spare Speeduino and most of the bits required to make something run on it, I just haven't had the right car. I can concur with the above recommendation regarding the trigger wheel, batch injection and wasted spark. It's almost comical how easy it is to get that setup to work, and in my case, run and drive better than the old Lucas EFI right out of the box. I probably wouldn't bother building one like I did nowadays, not when it's so easy to get a nicely built off the shelf unit with a housing and everything; I think one was linked a couple of pages ago. If you want to have a dig through what I did, its all here, https://tasteslikepetrol.net/category/projects/speeduino/page/2/ and https://tasteslikepetrol.net/category/projects/speeduino/

I thought that's what I had been in here for, whoops. But yes they're a great engine, plentiful and I believe there are some RWD boxes that will bolt right up to them too

That's handy to know, if I survive this WOF check I might be in touch for the next one (if I remember) I've had nothing but good dealings with those guys before, but my friend with an SD1 was also failed by them in the past (after I suggested he goes there...) for weird things they kinda pulled out of nowhere like they just wanted to get rid of him. I thought he failed an attitude test, but clearly they just have days where they cant be bothered with certain/old cars.

I've got some work to do in the next couple of weeks, the Marina is booked for a WOF at a different workshop in three weeks.

This is the original one I had CBC sleeve and then I fitted a kit from the UK to it. It's going to head down to CBC for them to chuck a seal kit into, hopefully it'll last longer this time. I lubricated the seals with either brake fluid or rubber grease (or both) when I fitted them. Probably just cheap shite rubber.

Doing the rear wheel bearing on the Marina, do I need to drain the diff first? It's a borgwarner diff, similar to what's in escorts, capris, Datsuns of the time.

Spoke to a very helpful chap at the local blaster, and the general consensus is that if it's stuck there and not flaking off, leave it, it's doing its job (and it'll be a bastard to try and sandblast off). So I'll roll under the car, clean up the surface rust, remove and clean up and any flaking underseal, reapply new underseal where needed and then I'll call it good enough. A new wheel bearing is on the way to fix the noisy one he picked up, and the slave cylinder which chose to shit itself on the hoist is going to get redone (again). Then it'll be off to a different workshop for a pre-WOF check. A huge thank you to everyone for your support and suggestions, it's really helped to formulate a plan to move forward.

I thought that too, I'll need to check again, but last time I looked there was no play in that end of the rack and no knocking over bumps. I have a nolathane replacement in my spares if I do need it.

Yeah I won't be taking it back there and question if the rest of my fleet should go there now too. It's just convenient to home and until now hadn't done me wrong. I'll see what the blasters say, but I suspect it'll be a "no thanks" from them. If thats the case, I think I'm going to tidy up the surface rust I missed, clean out the rails, and take it to another workshop for a pre-wof check and see what they say.

He pretty much shut me down for anything I offered, and just stuck to his guns with "the underseal needs to be removed otherwise I can't go further". I think throwing the VIRM in his face would just piss him off and he'd just push back requiring a panelbeater sign off so its not his problem. The more I think about it, the more it feels like he just wanted it/me gone. He didn't even back it off the hoist, he told me to drive it off myself and go.

That's pretty much what happened to the front floors, that, and old mate riveting patches over the holes. It's funny to think that my old classic Mini, which I put through re-rego at VTNZ, had the same underseal and went through with no issues but I need to strip it all back for a WOF when the rego is on hold.

It's an option, but I'm concerned if I don't do something with the underseal taking it somewhere else might be a waste of time anyway. I've been recommended a place by a fellow Rover owner locally that was a bit more old car sympathetic for him (he also got kicked back at the same WOF place I did) As much as I hate the underseal, if I don't have to touch it, I won't.

Damn. I've got some calls to make on Monday, but that's not promising to hear. I don't actually need the car blasted, so if they can't strip the underseal, and I end up removing the underseal myself I won't bother with blasting.

I suspect it's a case of this, the abovementioned visual issues, and the fact it has not had a wof for almost 30 years. That'd put most WOF people on alert.

By "body sealer" do you mean the horrible tar underseal I want to get rid of? Thats the whole reason for getting it blasted, to remove that horrible shit without me having to spend weeks chipping it off myself

It won't be going back there... They have been fine for all my previous cars, Rovers included, but his attitude towards the Marina was a bit off.

The time finally came. After many years and countless hours of work, it was WOF time. Before the WOF, the first thing to do was to replace the failed Lucas washer pump. This was completely dead, even when powering it straight from the battery with a test probe. It turns out I bought the pump about 3 years ago, and only fitted it in Jan this year, so way out of warranty now. I sourced a cheap unbranded replacement locally. This didn't even get the honour of arriving in a box, just some bubblewrap with a part number sticker on it. Other than the label, they're almost identical. No surprise. Both from China no doubt. I quickly screwed it into place and rejoined the hoses Finally everything was working again. The new Tex wipers were a bit disappointing, with a very average effort clearing the screen, but hopefully they just need some time to bed in. I've been doing some closed road testing recently to make sure everything is working well, and trying to bed the brakes in a bit too. It turns out, I had done almost exactly 10km since getting the car. As bought, back in 2021 The day before the WOF, 2024 In my travels I did notice two things. First, the ignition timing was just a smidge too spicy, and there was some pinging noticeable at lower RPM. Not good, so I wound the timing back from nearly 15deg to 10deg, and that seems to have fixed it. It's a little less keen to boogie now, but it's still 100x better than it was before I set the timing the other day. Plenty of time to play with that once we're on the road. Secondly, the front bash plate that protects the alloy sump from getting its face smashed in, was scraping a lot coming in and out of my driveway, and I noticed how close it was to the road when cornering in the video the other day. So I wanted to raise it just a smidge in the front. Sure, it looks cool as heck that low, but I don't want to smash the poor thing to bits. After MUCH fiddling with the torsion bar trim adjusters, I finally got it to settle at about 10mm higher than it was. It's lost the forward rake it had, and the sill is about level now, but it brings the bash plate just high enough that it's not hitting things now. Finally, just to be cocky, I jacked the rear of the car up and fixed the exhaust leak I had at the join above the rear axle (with lots of paste), and adjusted the handbrake just a little bit tighter. Maybe, just maybe, it'll pass with no issues now. The next day I got up bright and early, played musical cars and fired the Marina to life. It was pretty cold this morning, so the engine was a little grumpier than in my previous testing, but quickly sorted itself out. I backed out, closed the garage, got to the end of my street and turned the corner.Right into the path of a police car full of officers. To say I puckered a little is an understatement, but they didn't even give it a second look and I spent the rest of the drive to the workshop laughing my arse off at the odds of that happening. I arrived, parked up and then the waiting began. For the first time in almost 30 years, the old girl was waiting for a checkup. After a bit of a wait, the tech hopped in, fired the old girl up and took it for a quick road test. Here we go! Seeing him coming back up the road really hit me, it's such a cool looking car to see driving around. I hope when I drive it around, I can brighten the day of people on the street too. He rolls it onto the hoist and proceeds with the checks. TOOT, yes the horn goes. All the lights worked (a miracle), and the wipers and washer worked. They have a good look around with a torch, checking all the nooks and crannies, near hinges, down pillars, inside the boot, everywhere (I'm not sure they're usually this thorough on my other cars...) The hoist goes up, and my heart is in my throat As it was in the air and being checked over, a young couple picking their car up walked by and the girl commented to her partner "oh wow, look at this beauty!" pointing at the Marina. The tech is poking around under the car, checking all the usual things. Bearings, suspension, steering, etc. He also did some poking with a big prybar. After a long wait, I got the news. It's not going to pass. Long story short, he stopped the inspection and basically changed it to a pre-WOF check instead of an actual WOF check. A variation of my worst case scenario had happened, he wasn't happy with the underside. To clarify though, he made no mention at all of the work I had done. The issue he had was the old shitty lumpy tar-based underseal all over everything. In places where it was chipping off, there was surface rust, and for the rest he wasn't happy with what it could be hiding (nothing, I've seen the other side of the metal, but he can't check that). The stuff covers literally everything under there Very old photos from when I got the car There were also some other stupid things that I'm beating myself up over for not sorting, like the chassis rails having some rust flakes still in them, visible through the drain holes (from the old floor and rear panel rusting). Despite trying to clean them up at the time, I didn't do a good enough job. The other spot he was concerned with was inside the boot, near the hinges It's all surface rust and will clean up easily, but I guess since it's near the hinges he wasn't happy with it being like that. There were some mechanical issues, but he wasn't really keen on going into detail on them after showing me the bodywork issues he wasn't happy with. He mentioned the RH Rear wheel bearing was noisy and there may be play in the rack. Overall, I was devastated. It really crushed me, after all that work, for it to fail on bloody bodywork issues. The only positive of it was that it wasn't the work I did (as I feared), it was the work I didn't. I have always hated the underseal, it's on everything, it's really clumpy, and it's uneven and chipping off. It covers all bolts, nuts, threads etc under there too, which sucks to work around. If you try to lubricate anything with CRC, it melts the tar and turns to a hell of a mess. I should've really removed it all when I did the floors. Because he decided to not proceed with the WOF, it also means he hasn't entered it into the system as a fail, and I don't have to fix it within the defined 28 day timeframe. I'm thankful for that, because it'd be a pain if the workshops were busy. So, where to from here? Well, he explained what he wants to see; he wants all the underseal gone, and any surface rust and any uncovered issues to be sorted. He suggested having it sandblasted, treated and then undercoated again in something modern. I've been mulling it over and looking at my options, and I think from here the best option is indeed to have it sandblasted, to remove the underseal I hate anyway, and then have it zinc coated by the blaster. Once I get the car back, I will then paint the underside in a hard wearing single stage paint (yellow, of course). I'm not really interested in undersealing it again, I'd rather have it painted (unless anyone can convince me otherwise? This isn't a daily and won't often see rain). I have some calls to make tomorrow, to see what options are available to me, and the costs. I'm not made of money, but this car has cost me less than any of my other projects (monetarily, it's a complete time hog though) so it deserves to have some money spent on doing it properly. We ain't done yet, there is no option other than pushing forward.

Anyone who knows me knows that I've been hanging out all year for this day. It was trackday time! The previous trackdays have been so much fun I have been eagerly awaiting the next one. Of course, after the last trackday, my first in the recently purchased Alto, I left a little lukewarm on the car and had a large list of things that needed to be changed before the next one. If you have been following this project since the start, you'll know since its last trackday the Alto has basically had a full going over; all new suspension including lowering, an added rear swaybar (and functional front one), stiffened rear engine mount, replaced thrust bearings, lowered seat rails, an intercooler change, and bigger brakes, amongst other smaller things. In the build up to trackday there was one project I have been quietly working on; the intercooler water sprayer. As mentioned when I swapped the intercooler to the SWK one, I wanted to reinstate the water spray the previous owner had set up, using the stock shroud My goal, since reading that the previous owner found the 1L bag of water under the bonnet too small for his use case, was to fit a 5L bottle in the boot, with a pump, and have it pump water to the front. This is similar to what he ended up with; a 3L bottle strapped to the rear panel. Obviously since I spent great expense refitting the interior, including the foam insert in the boot, a bottle like that was of no use to me, so after lots of research I settled on a bottle from Aliexpress which fits in the foam insert, almost perfectly. The filler cap sits a little proud, so I squished the top of the bottle down a bit to make space To run the setup I was going to use a cool little timer relay, which was adjustable and triggered by a momentary button. I set it to run for 30 seconds each time it was triggered Unfortunately despite initial testing showing great promise, the damn thing decided to go pop when bench testing and never worked again. As did the button, which is a damn shame because it was a nice JDM button with blue illumination which I was going to use to show when the output of the relay was turned on (thus, showing when the pump was running). With that disappointment I decided to run the hoses and wires and mount the bottle anyway. To feed the pump, I drilled a hole in the top of the bottle and fed the hose through a grommet into the bottle, using an alloy fitting that came with the bottle as a weight I only had a Tee joint, so blocked one side off. This keeps it nice and low profile Using some trim tape, I stuck the pump to the side of the bottle and ran hoses to and from it Before wiring the whole thing in I gave it a quick test by feeding power to the pump The pump primed fine, but instead of pushing water along the hose, it decided the path of least resistance was through the joints on the body. The pump leaked like a sieve. Useless. At this point I was getting pretty pissed off with everything failing, so flipped to Plan B; the week before trackday, order a universal washer bag kit and hope it arrives in time. Yes, it's the same setup the Japanese owner was running that was too small, but I don't care if I have to top it up between each session (I did). Thankfully the courier pulled through and the kit arrived in time. I quickly set about installing it into the engine bay Before wiring it in, since everything else was failing, I jumped the two pump wires right to the battery and tested it Great success. You can't see it but both jets are working and creating a lovely mist in the shroud The kit comes with this ugly generic button, which being momentary I would have to hold down to spray, no good when going full attack Rummaging through my spares I uncovered the toggle switch that came with my clutch start canceller. A nice metal switch with a good click when toggled I chose to power the pump right from the battery, using a fuse holder I pulled out of some other project and ran another wire into the cabin to the switch, so all it was doing was grounding the pump. I was originally going to install the button on the right side of the steering wheel, where the other buttons are, but this seemed like a nice "temporary" place to put it, on the bracket that came with the kit. It's just taped in place, so easy to remove later. It's easy to access, and visible from the drivers seat. The big long toggle is handy when wearing gloves With the dash put back together, the wiring tidied up, and the bag filled with water, the IC water spray saga was complete, for now. The next owner can do the boot install if they care enough That was that. Friday rolled around, I cleaned the car (check out those big brakes) Packed my tools, checking things off my list as I went, so I didn't forget something important like the camping chairs and chock last time... I rolled the Alto into the garage to pack it, as the weather was being a bit less than great. I suddenly thought, "I should apply some old CarPro Reload sealant I have to the bonnet and bumper, just in case I get oiled again". This resulted in me spending an hour or so coating the car in Reload, top to bottom, front to back I will say even though that stuff is well expired, it works really well. There's more gloss, the paint feels smooth, and the water beads off. Impressive considering the paint really needs a machine detail. And we were off. We had a two hour drive ahead of us, in the dark. The Alto did really well, and the new suspension was miles ahead of the last trip to Manfeild where the rear kept bottoming out (blown shocks and soft springs). The one thing that did suck was some a-hole following me in a late model BMW SUV hunk of junk, with his LEDLAZERBEAM headlights, shining right into my eyes through all three mirrors. The dipping mirror I fitted was a godsend, but I still ended up having to fold the wing mirrors in to stop us being blinded. I pulled over at the next town and let him pass, only for him to turn off anyway. Dick. The next morning we were bright and early to the track, having stayed only metres away, and picked out our pit to camp in for the day. Considering it had been heavily raining the day before, the weather was mint all day. Shortly after, the rest of the crew rolled up. Yes, even blue Alto friends were back, rebuilt engine and all! Huge respect for the work they put into that car, and they were still keen to bring it back to where it all went wrong last time and try it again. Thankfully it was all good this time, and they had a blast punting it around the track. I loved seeing it out there We did a couple of sessions together We had a couple of nice little battles. I was surprised, even on my high boost, their Alto wasn't easy to catch. It seems it may not be quite as stock as they expected That pass was caught from both inside and outside, thanks to me remembering my action camera and external mic The Alto managed to surprise a lot of cars on the track, and got thoroughly thrashed by others (that 206 GTI just danced in the corners, was a treat to watch) It's an angry looking wee thing A casual flyby of both Altos And a flyby of my Alto, being driven in anger So, how did the Alto do? Very good. The first big improvement was the seat lowering, which meant my helmet was no longer pressed into the head lining, and I felt like I was sitting in the car, not on it. The big brakes, using Chery rotors, worked an absolute treat. Heaps of stopping power, and didn't set a foot wrong all day. I brought the stock brakes with me just in case, but weren't needed. Finally being able to run most of the day on high boost was excellent. Intake temps were a lot lower than in Jan, which would've been helped by the low teens ambient temps, but the intercooler water spray did a great job too. Generally when running, it knocked 10-15c off the intake temps, and when turned off the residual effect worked well to help the IC shed heat once off boost. The most surprising thing was how cold the intercooler was once I returned to the pits. The Greddy IC last time was hot to the touch, but with the water spray, the end tanks on the SWK intercooler were cold. Not left overnight cold, but almost colder to the touch than ambient. Very impressive. On high boost the LSD works a lot better too, especially if you're brave enough to power on early in the corner. The amount of cornering traction was incredible. You brake hard into the corner and get straight back onto the power and let the LSD pull you around it. The suspension upgrade was well worth the money. Last time I had issues with the car wandering, not really wanting to go around corners and bumps really upset the stability, but now the suspension just settles into the corner and holds on. The rear follows the front, as it should. It really boosted my confidence in the car compared to last time. So, times. Last time, on high boost, my best time was 1:42 This time, in my first session, running standard boost, 9 laps into it, I ticked off a 1:39. I was already faster than last time, and I wasn't even on high boost yet! That pretty well set the tone for the day, unless there was heavy traffic, I hardly did slower than a 1:40. The real surprise was one particular lap in my third session, where I went full send and dropped into a 1:36! I was skedaddling for sure There is heaps of room for improvement in the corners. Although I picked up some speed, it was mostly through the middle and on the straights, where the power and braking came into effect. I believe at this point I'm limited by the road tyres, which although good tyres (Yokohama ES32), just don't have the grip to hold on and get that cornering speed up. I have done some digging around to see what is available in 165/55R15, and the options in NZ are almost nil. Zestino has an option, but at $300 per tyre, that ain't happening. Yokohama can order in some AD09 from Japan, but there is a 3-4 MONTH lead time on those, subject to production. Bridgestone won't even consider the idea of bringing in RE004 in that size. The day was an absolute hoot. I love being on the track, and will be looking to do more trackdays next year and maybe even get into autocrosses and the likes too. The best thing was that everyone drove home, in their car, under their own power this time. No one really had any mishaps, except for my friend in his recently acquired Swift Sport who decided the tarmac was boring and he'd rather do rallycross. My wife unintentionally caught this on the very end of the clip she was taking, and none of us even saw it happen (as a side note, how good does that K20 powered EK9 sound...) No harm done, just some mud up the side to wash off So that's another trackday done and dusted. The Alto was excellent, all the mods worked perfectly and the car was a cohesive machine of awesomeness. In saying that though, the Altos days are numbered. It'll go up for sale at some point soon, when I can be bothered, as although I love the little dingus, I have other stupid ideas for other stupid projects that I need to liquidate the funds invested into the Alto for. I'm hoping to move to something that I can use in basic motorsport events that is worth a lot less than the Alto and has ample parts availability in NZ just in case I send it too hard. I have a car/project in mind already, so we'll see how that goes. Until then, if I still have the Alto in Jan 2025, it'll be out on track again at the next trackday.

I couldn't help myself, I wanted to know what the cold start was like now with a working choke, correct mixture and advanced ignition timing. It's very good. It has never started like that when cold. Usually it's ages of cranking, the starter kicking out a few times when the engine tries to fire, a couple of backfires out the intake and then eventually it would rumble into life, begrudgingly. Once it was running it wouldn't take any throttle until it had warmed up a bit, and the choke was a balancing act (particularly since it wasn't working properly). The engine is running so well I need to completely reassess how I use the choke. Apparently this time I had it out for too long and it started to misfire, but pushing it right in, the engine dropped to idle and ran smoothly, like it was already warmed up, and that was less than a minute after starting. I'm very impressed, for a 50+ year old car to start and run like that.

Yeah I'll go the slightly long way. I gave them some real good shoves yesterday and made them smell and the pedal is better. It's no surprise they moved on pretty quickly from unboosted brakes, but at least i have front discs

It's happening, the Marina is finally booked in for a WOF. It's only a couple of years late, but better than never. I started the day with a checklist of things that needed to be done before the WOF booking in a couple of weeks. The first was to drain the fuel tank of the 2+ year old fuel because it stinks, and the car is hard to start. With 18L of new high-octane fuel in hand, I used the drain plug on the bottom of the tank to get as much out as I could. I underestimated how much was in there, so couldn't completely drain it, but the fuel coming out was definitely yellow, and stank of varnish. The new fuel can mix with whatever was left in there, it'll be fine. Moving forward I wanted to drain the filter, pump and lines too. I unhooked the feed hose to the carb and stuck it into a bottle. I disconnected the coil and fuel pump, and turned the ignition on. Using the handy dandy connection under the bonnet, I ran the fuel pump and pumped the fuel into the bottle. This is what came out It's much darker than what was coming out of the tank, and stank. I ran the pump until nice clean fuel came through. I tossed up wether to drain the fuel bowl on the carb or not, but in the end I removed the three screws and removed the top And I'm glad I did. The old fuel was rancid, but there was also an amount of sediment in the bottom of the bowl I used a hand vac pump to suck the old fuel out and used a rag and carb cleaner to clean the bottom of the bowl. Once I reassembled the bowl and used the pump to fill it with fresh new fuel, I wanted to check the spark plugs. I haven't checked them since I fitted them a few years ago, and with all the cold running, hard starts and bad fuel, I expected them to be pretty grotty. Surprisingly they weren't that bad. One was a bit darker than the rest, all had some degree of black carbon, but none were really fouled. I gave them all a quick clean with a wire brush and brake cleaner and refitted them. Since I was there anyway, I thought it was wise to have a look at the points. It's a good thing I did, as forget the points, this is what I found instead Yup, the center carbon post is completely missing and the spring has been wearing the center of the rotor down After some investigating I found the little carbon post down in the bottom of the distributor, under the points, sitting with the mechanical advance. I didn't want to leave it there just in case it jammed the advance, so using a small pick and a pair of offset needlenose pliers, I managed to fish it out I have no idea how long it's been like that, but it wouldn't have been doing anyone any favours. Thankfully I'm a hoarder, so I had a replacement cap and rotor in my stock. I quickly swapped them over and after a quick sand of the points we were good to go again. With the ignition back together, I tried to start the car, and despite the fuel being fresh, the ignition working, and the choke pulled out to its stop, it wasn't having any of it. It was then that it occurred to me to check the choke Sure enough, with the choke pulled as far as it could be, the jet under the carb wasn't pulling down like it's meant to (to let more fuel into the carb). With some gentle prying it slowly started to move At this point I stripped the top off the carb too, so I could access the top of the jet. Whilst there, I also found the same excellent piston lift pin that I used to tune the Mini I thoroughly cleaned the jet and gave it a little WD40 to help it move freely, and now the choke operates as it should. It should've been obvious that the lever in the cabin was only pulling out about half way, but it's been a long time since I've had another manual choke. I cleaned up the piston and needle, and refit with new dashpot oil Now the car started, easily. It's amazing what a functioning choke can do! With the car starting and running well, the next thing to do was an oil change. Of course I had to warm the engine up for this, as I did the last oil change cold and 20W60 flows real slow when it's cold. A quick trip to Mexico for a closed road test was needed It runs and drives really well. The brakes are terrifying, but more use seems to be helping, although a remote booster might be on the cards at some point. A loud rattle present on decel turned out to the hood prop rattling in its bracket and on the air cleaner housing. Easy fix. It was still flat and gutless though. I had wanted to check the timing for a while, but it's a pain in the bum to do on these, plus I needed the car at full operating temp, which I didn't often do. A normal car would have the timing marks easy to access and see, usually by just pointing the timing light down into the engine bay. Not the Marina though. The timing marks are on the bottom of the engine, accessible through the front of the lower bash plate I painted the timing pointers yellow and the crank mark white ages ago, so it was easier to see. The four pointers are TDC, 5, 10 and 15 degrees Before TDC. The timing when I started was so far off the scale I think it was actually after TDC, not before. The spec is 10 degrees BTDC. I slackened off the distributor clamp and gave it a tweak. The revs picked up and the idle smoothed out. It didn't take much, but we were sitting bang on 10deg now. I adjusted the idle back down to 500rpm, and tweaked it a little further. I'm running approx 13-14deg timing now, because I'm a spicy lad that wants more power from his 70s Sports Car, and I'm running high octane fuel. With the timing where it should be, I wanted to see what the mixture was doing. What better way than to use the lift pin on the carb that I just found? I lifted the piston and the revs rose significantly, indicating a very rich mixture. Using my handy little SU jet adjustment tool I tweaked the adjustment nut until the revs only slightly rose when the piston was lifted. Perfect. With that, it was time for another trip to Mexico and hot damn, the car boogies now! Previously it felt really flat, didn't want to rev and couldn't get out of its own way. Now it wants to rev, and properly hoofs it down the road (for a Marina anyway). Great success, can't wait for it to be legal and I can see how it really goes. Another plus is that although noisy in a couple of gears, like all Marinas (it reminds you it's doing actual mechanical things), the gearbox shifts lovely, even at high RPM and on downshifts. Back home, I put the car on stands and drained the oil. It wasn't that dirty, but it was quite thin and although stuff all Ks, it's had a lot of cold starts, and it's been in there over 3 years. Oops. I decided not to change the filter this time, since it's expensive, rare, and it's not really done that much work. I'll change it once the cars been on the road for a bit. 3L of Penrite 20W60 went in the top and didn't come out again. Yay Another quick fix for the WOF was to replace the wiper blades. The old ones are proper plastic, so didn't really do the job of clearing the glass. I grabbed some Tex stainless wipers with the bayonet fitting They fit well and look good. I gave the arms a quick scrub with some scotch pad and they look a lot better Sadly I can't test them properly as it appears the Lucas washer pump I fitted in Jan has seized and failed. Lame. I have a replacement on order which will hopefully be here this week. Lucas ain't what it used to be, and it wasn't that good to start with. The last thing I needed to do was to clean all the windows and then fit a high stop light to the rear. I didn't legally need one, but I hate how invisible classics are these days. The brake lights are small, dim and low down on the car, so hopefully this LED unit shining into the eyes of people behind me might give me a chance of them actually seeing me. I picked up this Hella Matrix unit and really like how it kinda looks period correct but uses modern LEDs. Fitting it was less than fun. Trying to line up the grey decal on the glass and get it centered and straight, took a lot of tries before I just gave up and sent it. I flipped the pads on my clamp and used it as a one-man brake light tester It works well Standing behind the car seems to be about the height for it to have the hot spot right in your eyes. Hopefully that's about standard modern car driver eyeline too. With the help of my wife, we tested the rest of the lights, which did initially show up a dodgy connection on the RH brake light bulb, but a quick reseating of the bulb fixed that. Thats it. There is only one thing left on the board. I guess the next update will be after the inspection, where I know it'll fail. What on, well that's yet to be seen, but having been off the road for almost 30 years, it could be anything. It's been good to finally be doing mechanical work again. I was sick of bodywork.