yoeddynz

Hiya Geoff, Yeah thats the book. I have gone for just enough clearance and can always add more with more....bashing. The steels have 60 series tyres and with them on there's heaps of room. I'll see how it goes but as it is the tyres are about 10mm away from the footwell on hard lock at the closest point which I reckon is fine as i figure I'll never use hard out lock and brakes. Nothing would catch- just rub.

I had already thought about that and Dino is now in the wood shed. But walkies will be a problem though because its quite obviously a dinosaur, can't hide that, and I fear some locals might frown upon me walking a dinosaur at the local riverbank.

Back in Blenheim to get the Viva ready for its cert. I have borrowed some 13 x 6 alloys from a fellow Viva owner in Nelson - cheers Andre. They are actually quite rare Vegas? which were fitted to the Twin cam HS Chevettes and the droopsnoot Firenzas. I've never really been that keen on them but now they are on my car they look quite nice (but I still prefer my steels..) Anyway- now I have legal wheels to get my cert with But no photos of them Because they have 185/65 tyres I have had to do the clearance mods to my footwells as per the DTV sports part manual. It involves very careful, controlled swinging of a large hammer. With the wheels sorted I fixed a leaky exhaust flange and then turned my mind to tuning the engine in the hot Blenheim sunshine. I had got it much better last time but when I adjusted the timing I had forgot to take off and plug the dizzy vac advance. With that done I advanced the timing by about 10 degrees and then lowered the idling. It now idles much better and doesn't bog down anymore. Sweet. I still think its ever so slightly rich and its idling around 12-13 on the meter. I'll see if I can get it better tomorrow plus use cert man Kendall's meter when he checks the emissions. Took it for another quick spin and its much easier to drive about now without constantly bogging down. I do think it will always be a touch fussy at low revs with the street ports not helping much with suck at low low revs. Time will tell. I had also lowered the brake pedal with the help of a hacksaw and the welder to match the clutch pedal. Its much better now. In all the old road tests back in the days one common complaint was the height of the pedals. They were noted as being too high and often easy to catch your foot under the brake pedal when coming off the throttle pedal. Finished off with a spot of cheap carpet I was given over the tunnel just to make it a little bit less 'painted metal' and a bit more cosy. Its black carpet and I have always planned that it will get black carpet but now I think I'll keep it original and fit some nice red carpet for that full on 60's feel. Cert tomorrow. Wish me luck.

I giggled just ever so slightly. Not really a laugh. Definitely not the big old belly laugh I was hoping and thinking about for as I keenly soldered away. I feel let down actually. But the dinosaur is pretty cool and sort of makes up for it.

I just built exactly what you said in that order, turned it on. The telly exploded and dinosaur magically appeared in the microwave. I think the comparator was backwards? These Gizmo ones phatt20? what are they like and where are they sold?

Hey cheers for those links man! Good stuff. The turbo tuning tips for minis don't always work for my setup as the Metro turbos blow through, whereas mine is suck through. But still good info. I have played around with the tuning today and its heaps better. I'll update my thread now. Just had Kendall Bradley ring up from Nelson to confirm he'll be over to cert it (hopefully) tomorrow so tonight I'll probably sleep badly thinking of everything that could go wrong.... He seems very friendly and interested in the car on the phone though so hopefully all will be good.

cool- link says out of stock. i shall consult the resident oldschool jaycar man....

thats a lot of photos. nice Paykan - you need to start your own build thread for it.

I think old chum, that you'll find its actually "and THE bitch ain't one" Yes. I believe that's the correct wording. I know this because I recently witnessed some young men, who had not quite grasped the proper function of a peaked cap, thoughtfully playing this tune rather loudly from a phone as they stumbled along quite obviously having forgotten to do up their belts.

I want a really small adjustable shift light that I can mount under my strip speedo. Something like a little bright Led that will only be noticed when it shines. The reason is because I like my old school strip speedo and I don't want to mount my rev counter on top of the dash for asthetic reasons. So currently the RC is mounted under my dash and is fine for general tuning etc but when I want to rag it I want to keep my eye on the road and not be looking down. I have searched for such things as little discreet leds but it seems that every thing available out there is the size of a small lighthouse and capable of lighting up a hall. Thats not me or the style I want. So I thought I could buy something like this.... http://www.trademe.co.nz/motors/car-par ... 583258.htm then rip the guts out, mount the adjuster under the dash and wire it to a little led flush mounted into my dash. Could it be that easy? It looks like this above example would be wired in parallel with my current old Trisco rev counter I have mounted under the dash. Does anyone know of other simple kits that offer a adjustable light that just simply wire into the stock rev counter?

I'm enjoying the style of that old ghetto blaster.

Good idea. Its worth asking. I did a weeks work experience there many many years back and they all seemed nice enough.

OK- so where can I get them tested? What's involved in the testing- ie is it a visual thing or do they actually x ray them. Or use dye. Anywhere in Nelson? Or can I get my old workplace, Cuddon engineering, to have an engineer look over them tick them off? Would that suffice? What a bloody ball ache!

OK- took Viva for Woof pre cert and was told by testers there that my wheels might not get a cert. They usually deal with Don Hoff there and apparently he doesn't like widened steels, wants them stripped, x ray tested etc etc. I've just been out for a test drive in Viva after tightening hub bearings. I drove to blenheim car parts and while showing Geoff the car he spotted the wheels and said " ohhh you won't get them certed, it'll be a pain and they'll want to strip them every time its for a warrant cause they can crack where they are welded etc. Lots of sucking through teeth... Hmmm what to do? Anyone on this here forum with widened steels had any problems? Should I just swap them everytime I go for a wof - put on my old 13 x 4.5" wheels. Would the police spot them as being widened? If so I'll need another set of bloody tyres Anyone know what Wayne Martin is like on widened steels? Billy and his mate reckon that the fella who I was going to get it cert'd through, Kendall Bradley, works through Don Hoff so thats no bloody good. I'd rather get it all cert'd and keep it legit then have to piss about swapping them.

yeah- not heard of this before. Will ask in the cert thread about it now......

Took car through wof yesterday morning. Apart from the items to be cert'd it failed on RH headlight aim too high, wheel bearings a touch too loose, speedo not working. The wheel bearing were really loose! I have tightened them up and guess that after having packed the hubs and thinking I had them set right they have loosened off. Would loose wheels bearings cause a shimmer when braking? The speedo cable inner is slightly too short and wasn't quite engaging into the square hole in back of speedo. I never even noticed it wasn't working yesterday as I was more concentrating on other things like revs, boost..oh and the road. I'll sort it out by shortening the outer. Headlight aim easy. They really liked the car at Blenheim testing station which is cool. Was noted how quiet it was. Good- a nice wee sleeper 8). They also mentioned that some Certifiers want to see widened steels X- ray'd/crack tested.???? Not sure what the law is. Will find out. Boy I miss the UK when it comes to modifying cars!!! I'm pretty sure my wheels were built by elite wheels in Chch many moons ago but I have no receipt as I bought them second hand. They hold air and the tyre man who shod them noted how almost perfectly balanced they are. After the test I took the long way home and hannah took the short clip of the rev counter and boost gauge. It goes up to 5psi and holds there. Sweet. Pulls really well and sort scared me in 3rd as its just an old Viva and I am only used to old diesel hiace speeds. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQxKYs14w6A When the waste gate opens I can here the exhaust note change. Sort of hissy ? like sound from tailpipe- sounds cool. Quite happy. When I got back home I sorted the bearings adjustment and fixed the speedo. The cable inner was not quite protruding enough into the speedo to drive it. Last night before leaving Blenheim I took it for one more quick spin and the shimmy under braking is less. I think a wheel alignment wouldn't go a miss either.

yeah we'll be around. Hopefully will have the car in nelson by then so we can do some of the classic car events there. Your welcome to swing by chateau truck for a cuppa.

please please please i hope you can. We were looking at a bedford cf jumbo a while back but it was on a cof. Walked away- not paying 115 bucks each time it needs a cof ! Guy selling it reckoned you can get them downrated?

shit i dont know. Just driving a classic about again will be awesome. And more time for cycling too. Must get a tow bar so i can combine both.

Sweet. That what I want to hear! He seemed sound as when I spoke to him on the phone.

Cheers man. I'm well excited now!!! Heres an update from the afternoon. Picked up car, now with extra muffler in the back. Just a longer coby under the boot. So much quieter now. Much better. Most wont know what engine it has. I decided I had better get some go juice into the tank so stopped at Caltex. And there near Repco was a beautiful little Anglia with lotus steels in what I think is Ford olympic blue? I love Anglias! So cool. So small too. My Viva is pretty small but next to the Anglia its large. Back to Vivas though. Still bogging down. Then I started to notice how bad the brakes were binding. I thought maybe heat from the turbo was affecting the master cylinder? Got home and jacked up rear. Backs were binding too. Pedal had no slack. I had wound the bloody brake light switch in too far so master cylinder was not able to fully release As soon as I wiund it out and got some free play into pedal the rear wheels unlocked! sweet. Now it doesnt bog down so bad. I guess I never noticed as it needed some heat in the system before the brake fluid needed somewhere to expand- and because the master cylinder wasn't returning it couldn't expand into the reservoir so it instead started to apply the brakes? Pedal now feels softer and more normal with out the built up pressure. Brakes work well. Sorted the wipers out. I love old cars!!! It takes like only 10 minutes to have all the heater matrix/fan and then the whole wiper assembly out. It was the arm on the motor being 180 degrees out that had the wipers working backwards. 2 minutes later and they were working fine I've installed a washer bottle, from a Mazda b2500 I think, in place. It fits perfectly and looks like an old bottle should But my little jet nozzle thing on the bonnet has broken! jolly pain in the backside

I like tidy engine bays but not the over done full on show cars, you know, all the shiny extra crap. My pet hate is chromed bonnet catches and really shiny chrome finished catch tanks everywhere. or badly placed brightly coloured radiator or filler caps. Its annoying for me when a car engine bay starts coming together and I get to that point when its just right. But then all the extra hoses, vacuum hoses, wires etc have to start going in and its gets filled up, all messy like.

yep- keep it all hush hush now I'm Mr number plate.... Not started engineering business yet but next week we hope to build a little workshop at my brothers- just 10m2 to avoid need of consent. Then i'll be on the look out for a small lathe etc. Loving this wee car so far. Much quieter now. Quite fun finishing little jobs tonight now that I know the major stuff is done. Spoke to cert man Kendall Bradley from Nelson- he seems like a GC and well friendly. If car passes wof tomorrow except for the lack of cert then I'll be bokking him to look at it two weeks time!

Wow. I love catching up on the builds here and yours is tops! I too agree with above comments that the black radiator looks better than shiny silver. The copper lines look good and will go off to a duller finish which I think would give it a nice factory finish. Or fit steel pipes and paint them black too so they are more hidden? And after finally driving my Viva today for 2 minutes with its maybe 170 ponies and giggling away I cant imagine what a 13B with a turbo the size of a large babies head would be like in a lightweight car. Immense I imagine.

We just took the Viva for a drive Its very quick! Had to take it down to my local exhaust place. They will move a muffler across because where its been placed it may touch the prop shaft when it drops down with the axle if car leaves the road ie big jumps... Plus I'll get another muffler added as I want the car quieter. Anyway. Last night I made a new number plate up to replace the missing one. Turned out really nice- in fact its too mint so will need to be 'weathered' to make it look older. I made it by carefully cutting the numerals out of thin alloy sheet. This took a while to get them neat. Lots of fine filing. I then masked the front of each, etch primed the back side and then stuck them onto a primed peice of 3mm alloy sheet cut to size. with the numbers stuck down in place I paint black over the whole lot with matt black enamel. Then this morning I peeled the masking tape off and hey presto- new plate! ;D I wish I didn't have to go through all this but such is the way of NZ where you cant get new 'old' plates and instead have to replace them with ugly white ones. This morning it was a little rush finish off some small things. For now I have wired the Rad fan to a spare switch on the dash. I'll add the thermo switch/digital readout later. Went to fit the wipers and then discovered the motor is wired backwards! ::) So out with that later and sort it. So out the driveway, up the road, no seat belts as I forgot to bolt the buckles back in, temp gauge reading fine, all good. choke still out on a fast idle as I was paranoid it might stall. First impression was 'ooooh its quite nippy' then on next street I gave it a bit more welly and thought 'crikey- its bloody fast- COOL!' I don't even think I went beyond 5000rpm and boy it gets up there quick! I was giggling. ;D Steering wheel feels odd in the typical Viva offset to the left way. Handling on such a short drive? Doesn't roll as much as it used to but doesn't seem overly stiff either. Arrived at Murrys Mufflers and was shaking with excitement. I just love the first drive of a cobbled together car. Man I'm looking forwards to driving it home later!