ThePog

I have had discussions with a certifier, according to him the roof is not an area that they worry about.... but I have heard many stories similar to yours. It will need a cert anyway as I am mounting extra belted seats, so the plan is to do all the certifiable stuff first including the roof with no other fitout. I will get the cert then go from there. TBH this is going to be a pretty sparse fitout, I am uninterested in shiny stuff and formica etc.Insulation and plywood is about as flash as it will get.

I bought some seats from the wreckers, some fixed ones out of an Escudo, some swivelly ones out of a Previa, plus some swivelly mechanisms out of another previa to graft into the Escudo seats. This is because I need to use all the space we have, and have 4x seats that don't swivel and become the lounge is not an option. I got shit bored doing quotes today so decided to give the seats some loving instead. Some Escudo Seats; Some swivelly things with extra lumps; Swivelly things without extra lumps; I trimmed the long seat legs and rewelded the tab mounts back at the same level as the short ones, the intention was to mount the swivels to these points but i discovered an easier way; Which was to weld bits of metal directly onto the frame; And not forget to reinstate the lever springs for the lever that locks the swivel in the ahead position and the 180 deg position; Then weld the swivel things on, plus a lever to release the catch; The result; I shall mount these on rails now and put them in the bus....

Nissan Civilian GTR Yyyyyeeeeaaaaaaahhhhh! Do a skid bro

The extent of the problem;

Yea it is a good looking wagon, slightly angry from the front..

Tell me what a fuckwit I am - go.

Here is Ian, my very recently acquired 1980 Nissan Civilian bus. This is going to be our family camper, somehow we will fit four of us in.... There are a few minor issues; some rust, the charging circuit doesn't really work, the gearchange mech is kind of sloppy, there is a short in one of the rear lights, but the major issue is that the standing height inside is a maximum 1.5m. This is unfortunate as I am 1.92m tall. Even my youngest who is 10 cannot stand up in it. Some fairly major surgery will be required to rectify this unfortunate circumstance. There are a few other niggling things to sort out, but nothing important. He is pretty sound though, he drove from Mataura near Gore up to Nelson with no issues apart from the batteries dying from lack of charge. It got a pretty good going over today and i am happy overall. Carjam shows the odo to be dodgy as fuck, but even allowing for that it has probably only done 100,000k. It is indicating 60k... The drive along the south island was achieved pretty much 50/50 by the previous owner and then by Sidewaysickness, who had way more battery issue than the previous owner did during the first leg, but finally got it here late last night. Discuss Anyway, pics;

Small, pictureless update again. It was still a bit hesitant when foot down, plus starting was kindof marginal. I had a think about what might be the issue and thought I had better check the dashpots on the carbs as this was an easy thing to check, both of these were basically empty. I filled these up and all the hesitation/starting problems went away. The oil all fell out when the carbs were upside down while lapping the valves I guess... Next was a pinhole leak on the top rad hose, it now has a cut down Valiant bottom hose to replace it. Since putting in that thermostat water based things have been failing due to the increased pressure. I am guessing there is not much more to replace now due to this. I also reset the tappets again cos one was very noisy, thats all good now. I have a few jobs to do over the next few weeks, the heater fan is rubbing and is noisy as fuck, one axle seal is leaking a wee bit and I might swap out the brake booster from the spare car if the bore size is more suitable. It is of the same later style as the one in it now. Thats it.

I have dicked around with this a bit, there is no really mint solution. I ended up just buying the cheapest sony mechless bluetooth headset, it just works. It is half depth so I guess you could fit it behind the original and hook up the volume knob and play/pause button - those are the only two i use. This was the best thing I could find after a lot of searching http://pricespy.co.nz/product.php?p=2600792 But I would have had to find an amp etc so it was still cheaper to go the headset route.

Took the day off yesterday and missioned it all back together, scraped off the piston tops, changed the oil and filter etc. Started straight away so I got it up to temp then reset all the valve clearances as this needs to be done hot. All was basically fine except for a chuff in the exhaust where I had split it and a bit of a hesitation when accelerating, I thought this might mean the carbs needed a balance, but then I remembered that I had adjusted the points gap when I was troubleshooting the problem. So today I sealed the exhaust and reset the timing, it is good as gold now. Dizzy has one of those sweet knobs to fine tune the timing without having to crack the clamp, which is superior. Should be good for another 100000k now.

Lapped the valves in last night;

I have been chipping away at this in the evenings, it is kind of therapeutic as it is not a car i need to be going, so I am not rushing anything. Here it is installed in the shed and getting ancillaries stripped off; I had to borrow Shanes engine crane to lift it out, the head has lifting eyes, and this is extremely necessary due to the head weighing as much as a normal engine. Things came off pretty easy, although the two manifold bolts had to be cut off and this took about 2 fucking hours to cut through. I also forgot to drain water out of the block so it all went down the bores and the pushrod holes. I will change the oil and filter anyway I reckon. I would have struggled anyway cos the tap on the block did not connect to anything, and the bung on the other side of the block was fucking immovable. I cleaned out the tappet followers and there was an unusual amount of clag and metal chips down in them, I am not sure where this has come from as a quick looks shows the pushrods etc to be basically sound. I cleaned it all out and the tappets might be a bit easier to adjust now. And what do we have here? We have a spot on diagnosis is what we have. Things look pretty good in there other than the obvious. The water galleries are a bit clagged up but everything else looks pretty normal. There is a wee lip in the bores but nothing to worry about. I just gave all of this a good clean up tonight, no pics tho. The offending part. Shane also has a spring compressor, so i will clean up the valves and probably lap them in. I also have a set of valve stem seals, those will no doubt get chucked in there too, although it doesn't appear to leak past. Might even make it to Kaiteri next weekend.....

Yea, going by the spares i have it will be the only way to do it without breaking myself. Will be able to check over things while I am there so all good really.

So driving around on Friday the old bitch started running on 4 or 5 cylinders not the recommended 6. Heaps of spark there, but I tweaked it all up anyway, no change at all. I chucked Shanes compression tester at it today - the readings were 0, 0, 110, 120, 130, 140 Psi. 1 and 2 chuffed in the same way when testing, so i reckon it has blown the head gasket through between the two.... I will pull the head off soon and see. Stink.

Cos that lazy fucker Jones only painted the visible parts in red oxide, so it looks a bit shit without hubcaps. I might sort that tho.

So the previous owner Jones came down to visit with his family and spent the time running around in the Snipe, his eldest son cried when they had to leave it behind.... Jones painted the bonnet for me and made some executive decisions around the styling, ie removing the granny trims from the wheels to make it a bit more ratty. I like it, it is a bit less nana spec;

Dude, this shit has fully occurred to me already, I reckon a sneaky rebuild of one of the engines is in order, maybe even a 5 speed behind it.... we will see.

Ye that, altho Jones says it always got up to temp sitting in akl traffic

Story time. The temp gauge usually only just registers, but on Saturday on the way to the swimming hole it went right up and the heater was blowing pretty hot too, I figured a faulty thermostat and clearly a fucked heater tap cos 30 degree days and non turnoffable heaters suck. As it never really registered full temp the heater obviously wasn't getting noticeably hot. Sunday morning I open it up and find no thermostat at all.... then the spare cars engine also does not have one. There is a listing in the internets for one however. i track down the right number and surprisingly Repco has one, it fits into the spare housing i took along to Repco so i get it along with another gasket. Installed it and go for a run, it quickly gets up to what i consider a normal temp and stays there...sweet. Driving home the stereo starts going crackly, then I turn a corner and my leg gets burnt by steamy hot coolant dripping from the heater valve. Not too burnt cos it is using the stereo to cool things down on the way through which is kind of considerate of the old girl. Fortunately I have a spare heater tap in my massive parts stash, this one is actually fully functional. I install this after pulling out most of the dash, then hop in for a quick run to get it up to temp. Everything is sweet, but on the way back turning into my road I hear a distant crash, which turns out to be the stereo falling onto the road cos i left it on the boot during my test drive.... So a win and a loss, karma is restored. I have also now bought another BT stereo....

I finally moved the last of the parts into my shed, mostly engine blocks and heads, 3 engines worth...! These I got off the truck by the sparta method, now they sit in the dirt amongst a pile of kindling that was a pallet lol. The engine design is interesting, a lot of metal and sod all cylinder; Rockers; Looks kindof like a dohc; Big ass exhaust ports, apparently the head was tweaked by Harry Westlake; But weird ass semi siamesed intake ports; IT"S A HEMI MOTHERFUCKER

You can fill the extra with porridge

But you asked to use the gimp suit...?

It may not seem like it from my day to day attire, but my wardrobe has hidden depths. Like Shanes mum.

So the steering ram started getting flaky again, plus as discussed previously the thing was banging like a $5 whore, so i thought I would sort that shit out once and for all. Basically the pin that stops the joint rotating inside the ram needed a serious upgrade. I reckoned this could all happen without removing the ram from the car, so I jacked it up and went to work; All dissasembled. That hole is where the pin goes, but it normally fits from the inside. I drilled it out to 8mm so i could fit the pin from the outside and replace it easily should it go to pot again. To that end I made this; That looks the shit to me. I started to reassemble it all and at this point fucked up quite badly by somehow getting the two ball bearings stuck inside the joint in the wrong place. It was full of grease and the little fuckers did not want to come out. So I then had to remove the ram which I did rapidly and in a quiet rage. It did make the fitting up a lot easier once I got the balls out; If it gets loose again I can replace it with everything in place. So that done I chucked it all back together. It feels good now, much more direct and the power steering is not quite as light as before which is an improvement. Its all good. The old girl easily keeps up in open road traffic, and hustles along surprisingly well in the twisties once you get used to the feel of it. I passed my neighbour in his new Singer Vogue at serious speed the other day on the way back from the beach, it was fast enough for my wife to be yelling at me, so probably around 125km/h lol.