yoeddynz

Hannah found an old CD the other day with some photos she for got she had. Some were of Bill's workshop when we went there to drop a OHC head off for some mods. It was for here Victor. I thought I would post them up for the Vaux fans on here.

Bill passed away in sept 07. It was bloody cool meeting him as I had read the Robson Chevette book and Bill was a driving force behind the HS chevettes plus earlier the hot racing Vivas the Gerry Marshell drove. Bill was a very friendly, nice old bloke.

Heres a blurb I nicked from the Marshell website...

Bill commenced his racing career in 1958. In 1966 he read a report in a motor magazine about the new HB Viva. Bored with shoehorning bigger and bigger engines into Minis he wrote to Vauxhall to suggest some assistance in preparing one of the new cars for racing. Fortunately Vauxhall men Colin Wood and Roy Cook of Engineering and Jeremy Lawrence from Marketing persuaded the management of the day to work a little “back door” magic.

The result was the 1967 Shaw & Kilburn Special Viva. A tuned, pushrod engined HB, it was developed and built by Blydenstein in the double garage at the side of his house and driven by him to a sensational debut class win at Snetterton. But capable driver that Bill was, he realised that if he was to concentrate on getting the best out of the car, they would need to get another driver.

Following a very successful 1970 season, in January 1971 a group of London Region Vauxhall dealers decided to circumvent any opposition from General Motors or Vauxhall to racing by forming Dealer Team Vauxhall or DTV.

In 1971 the team switched to the new Firenza body style and a range of specialised racing engines were developed over the next few years with fuel injection and special heads with capacities between 2.0 and 2.6 litres. The final iteration used Lotus LV240 16-valve heads and with a capacity of 2.3 litres developed around 230bhp. The chassis was continually developed too, acquiring a five speed ZF gearbox and droop snoot in sympathy with the 1974 HP Firenza. The car became the stuff of legend, achieving 63 victories and many championships in its long career and earning the nickname “Old Nail”.

Hannah's Victor wagon. Bloody wish we kept it as it was mint and had only done 39,000 miles. Not a spot of rust at all. Another regretful sale...

Cool- cheers for the link.

I've just sent ya a pm with details Bart. See you lot on thursday for tea/coffee. I'll escort you through the wild streets of Blenheim in my sisters old baby blue sentra.

alex

here here to black plates!

good idea!

I looked at your build thread greg and shit- there aint much room for a normal servo is there!

i think with a vh44 remote servo you can only have the one circuit. So its a no go.. I was going to use a remote cv one point but yeah- it won't work with twin circuits. Some cars like old alfa romeo's use twin remote servos. Best you keep the twin circuit too as its a good safe backup.

Can you fit a servo in between firewall and master? You'll have to make new lines anyway which is easy and quite satisfying.

Btw if your pedal feels hard using new master with drums in the back it'll soften/get more travel a bit when you fit rear discs. This is because most calipers require more fluid to move and your leverage ratio will go up.

Yeah the thing I'm trying to do is just keep it at a nice steady temp when its idling about town. Not go up and down like some old cars I"ve had. Plus once its set up I should be able to forget about it. Fan can click on and off happily. I wouldn't as anal about all this if it wasn't a rotary but it is and I wanna keep it nice, happy and in the zone.

My fan is off some V6 Audi from a scrap yard we visited just before leaving Blighty- it rocks compared to some 'good aftermarket' electric fans I have used in the past off ebay etc.

I got two of them. I'll see how one goes but may fit the other in later on.

And get some big stick on pointy ears. The USS Viva....

Pretty cosy. Man you wait till you see the cool little coffee table we just built!!! Made from Rimu, Miro and Macrocarpa. I have always wanted to build a sweet coffee table and so we took our time and really enjoyed making it.

I'll post up some pictures tomorrow as the first coat of varnish has only just gone on.

I've got just the standard Mitsi thermo switch retrofitted into the bottom of my radiator and the fan only turns on when the gauge is about 1/3-1/2 and shortly turns off again, it definitely doesn't come on or switch off too early or late. This is assuming you want your engine to run at the standard 85-90deg range.

Yeah I found one mitsi switch listed that might do the job.

Yowser looks like he has come to the rescue with a cool Jaycar kit that includes a lcd readout Cool- along with the Innovate lambda gauge I want to get in future I could have a whole star trek panel thing going on under my dash! I'll have to set them all into a red vinyl panel of course

yeah i cant stand constant fans. Just the noise alone. The fans cant last long either.

What radiator was your rotor van running? At least you had no worries over heating!

Cool- thats a nice option too- cheers. Hey do Jaycar sell cheap digital temp gauges with separate probe? Like what is built into multi meters.

Nah I don't want the fan on all the time. Only when I stop etc. I have had fans on a switch under dash- you only need to forget and walk away once and......melt down.

Shgwag- 82 sounds good to me. Not too hot. Not to cold. In fact....just right

Mjstar - yeah most fan switches are up high. It seems only a few cars have em down low? Anyway I agree- it could be way too late by time fan switch reacts- unless its a much lower rated one. But I dont know what rating to fit without knowing how much my rad drops the temp. Unless I start mucking about with temp probes in top hose and bottom hose -and i only have one of them anyway.

I think I'll get a bloody adjustable one and then I can set it properly.

Anyone else know of a source for the adjustable ones- cheap- in NZ?

yeah your missing something. My cars got a thermostat and hopefully thats fine. (not test driven yet...) Hopefully while driving temp should be about 85/90 ish. But what I'm wondering here about is the fan switch.

Like this....

http://shop1.actinicexpress.co.uk/shops ... ontrollers

I have used two in the past and they are great. This time round with my Viva I decided to solder a location in bottom of rad for a standard fan switch. Problem is that most available in m16 x 1.5 are top mounted with ranges like 90/86 or higher and fan will turn on too late for. I want to keep my 12A around 85 to 90 - no more. The old Mazda race manual says 70 - 90 is the best range. 90 is more fuel efficient and closer to 70 is better for power.

I spent last night trawling through the intermota fan switch pages and came up with 2 switches that may work;

part numbers 50420 (hyundi lantra), 50434 (mitsi colt and lancer 1.3). These are 85-80c with two wires. Zac- can you get these cheap? Or anyone else?

If they switch on at 85c reading from bottom of the rad then the engine may still be running hot because I don't know what the temp drop is from the top of rad/engine to the bottom. So engine may reach 95+ before fan switches on.

Any idea on what a typical radiator temp drop is?

I'm now thinking that instead of spending money on another switch I should just fit the adjustable type. But I sort of wanted to avoid them this time as I end up with an ugly box with a knob on it sitting near rad.

If I do go for adjustable can anyone on here get them cheap? I have found Supercheap list davis craig ones for $71 but I'd like cheaper...

http://www.supercheapauto.co.nz/online- ... ab=reviews

Keep in touch so I know when to put the kettle on!

ferry departure time change gives the convoy more time to sample my housepatality and coffee!

I pinky swear to bring Viva next time!

plates gone I'm afraid... go find your own old lady to swindle.

Hannah and I would both love to go! But looking at our budget its a no go (start sad music)....... Neither of us have jobs, our savings are getting low and we have some pretty bloody big bills coming up to get truck cof'd, licensed, rucs then the Viva costs too. Once I'm working in Nelson and have saved up I'll be able to go to next years. Plus a job has popped up in Nelson I want so the rush is on to get truck on road so we can shift our house over there! 4 days off from finishing truck is too much.

WHAT I CAN OFFER IS... cups of tea/coffee for the team travelling up to Picton if you can spare 20mins.

We are in the centre of Blenheim about 1 minute from the route you take through Blenheim on way through. I can PM address if needed to you Bart or an easier idea would be that I could meet on southern outskirt of Blenheim and pilot you to our pad for a hot cuppa in the housetruck and then onto Picton. Offer is there. This way I get to have my own mini OS meet.....

alex

yeah she had it all restored. Folder full of receipts. I.ll have a looksie and see what was done to it when next there. I'm taking photos of my cars. And some wurthers originals.

Yeah cool- pm me ya number and I can pop round for a look.

cheers

Your a bloody useful bloke Cam!

Cool- cheers zac. Its m16 x 1.5mm. I'll do a hunt around local places too and see whats on offer etc and by how much they want to rip me off.