Valiant

Well, hell. Who would have thought that blocking a third of your radiator would make your car overheat? I obviously didn't think it would. Moved the cooler into the inner guard and made a cover for it up. I didn't take a picture ,you can use your imagination. I dropped the battery tray off to my friends at the truck painters who sand blasted and painted it for me. I bolted it to the inner guard as far forward as I could fit it, re did the battery leads, made a clamp and called it good. Its pretty close to the exhaust manifold but it doesn't seem to be a problem, much neater having the Battery under the bonnet. I pulled all the old battery box out, welded up the holes for the "P" clamps holding the lead and called it good. Cleaned the plugs, put some gas in the tank, primed the carb and got it going. Nice. Went for a very slow drive around the neighborhood, (slow speed driving was when it used to overheat). Result! the temp never went over 180 deg F. I'm so pleased with this! I spent about half an hour creeping around and not a problem at any stage. So that's phase one of the project refresh this out of the way. On to phase two. So to recap. Why did it fuck batteries? Because I crushed them into the bolts in the battery tray. Why did it run out of fuel to the carb? Because I put the one way valve in the fuel pump in back to front. Why did it overheat? Because I blocked the radiator core with a trans cooler. Lessons learned. Here's a couple of pics of some shit Aussie cars. Edit. The exhaust seems to be good, not hitting the floor, the front pipes are pretty close to the ground, I'll see how it goes. Also the smaller wheels and tyres are a great poor mans diff ratio change, it's much better off the mark, a bit shit at motorway speed but I have something to sort that out. . .

Yeah fuck cars. You could start a brass band if the chime business is a flop.

Do you think the problem is solved?

Those photos are so good, is that the game I see in one? The only disappointment is there are no pics of it with Titans.

@moparmuppet, thanks for the tips there, from memory it has a flowkooler water pump, I cant remember what thermostat I put in it, If the problem persists with the cooler moved I'll get one like you recommended. I'm really hopeful that moving the cooler will be the ticket, once I have a battery and go for a drive I'll post the result!

Pretty determined to get this done now. So. as I mentioned in the previous posts dating back to 2010 this overheats at speeds under about 50 kmh which is a huge pain in the ass. For what ever reason I never addressed this, maybe I thought if I ignored it the problem would go away. It hasn't. When I first built the car I spent a lot of money on a 5 core radiator soldered to the AP top and bottom tanks. Made a fan shroud and went to the effort of making the factory fan fit the 383. There just isn't room to fit an electric fan. Anyway because it's automatic I put a big trans cooler in front of the radiator , called it good, and never gave it another thought. Recently I started thinking of things that I could do to solve the issue without spending lots, I had a look at the cooler and decided to move it away from the radiator incase it's causing a restriction. I got it off today and it must flow almost zero air through. So I've cut the mount up and started mounting it inside the L.H inner guard just behind the headlight. Possibly not the best place for a trans cooler but I have a trick up my sleeve on that front that I will share with you later. I'll make a basic shield out of ACM to stop the cooler getting dirty/damaged by crap thrown off the wheel' Just out of curiosity I did the maths to work out how much radiator core the cooler was covering. Lots as it turns out. Just over 1/3 of the radiator core right in the center in ftont of the fan too, it makes me hopeful that I've found the problem. Anyway, that's enough about that. Who wants to hear a sharn? Yeah I thought you might. So here's the story about how I came to own this car. When I moved to Christchurch from Auckland circa 2003 the thing that was foremost in my mind was buying a Valiant, I wanted a VF or a VG most of all (which is another sharn in its self). I'd gone to the bank and organised a loan and was all set to buy a project starter. Anyway every Thursday on the way to work I stopped and brought a copy of the Buy Sell Exchange and went straight to the C for Chrysler then the V for Valiant section, I looked at a few VF/VGs but they were all heavily boganised, I remember one guy with a flat black VG with a 245 hemi doing a hektik neutral drop and then overshooting his driveway because the brakes were fucked on the road test. I wasn't too keen on that one. I saw the AP5 for $500 In the paper one Thursday and ignored it, it wasn't the shape I wanted. It was re advertised the next week for the same price it was a bit of an odd add, not much information etc. My friend Steve saw the AP5 add and went straight to %100 pine. Steve was about 15 years older than me, was a full blown foamer when it came to old Aussie cars. On his insistence I called the number and arranged to go have a look. the old lady who answered the phone was a bit vague about it but I got her address and went for a look. When I got to the house the AP was nowhere to be seen, It was in a garage behind the house, the shrubs had overgrown the driveway making it about as wide as a foot path. The AP was sitting by its self in the middle of a concrete block double garage with almost nothing else in it. The car had been brushpainted with white house paint and was sitting on four flat crossplys. It was in pretty good condition, was totally original, and had been embalmed in white house paint. I knew straight away that I wanted to own it. I told the old lady that yep I'd take it, could she hold on while I went up to the cash machine and got some money out for her. She looked very disappointed and told me that four young men wearing black jerseys had come and looked at it that morning, had said they wanted it because it would make a good street stock and had told her they would be back later that day. Looking back, it was probably Bart and his mates. Anyway I started to panic a bit, no way I was going to miss out and let it become a street stock so I offered her $600 which she declined, so I offered $750, she looked shocked but still declined. I said I'd make it $1000 and get the money to her that day. She said I'd better talk to her husband who was inside. The car had been her husbands mothers car and he'd held on to it after she had died in the mid 80s? He was very attached to the car as I could only imagine. He wasn't coping well with the sale and was basically hiding inside. When he was told that someone was offering double the asking price who didn't want to wreck the car he was as pleased as punch and we sealed the deal. It was then I found out that his mum had owned the car since new, and that he had every document and receipt relating to it from the initial purchase to the present time. I went to the cash machine, got out $500 (all the machine would give out LOL) and told them both I'd be back tomorrow to get the car. Before I left the old fella said "if I liked Valiants I'd really like what they had in the garage attached to the house. He opened the door and there was a Subaru Vortex , I very quickly resisted the urge to say I'd rather drink a warm fish milkshake than look at the vortex, luckily it wasn't the draw card he was referring to. Next to the Vortex was a mint orange and black VH770 charger. I pined so hard it was perfect unrestored about 50,000 miles from new. Dam I pined so hard! It absolutely wasn't for sale, if it was it would have been far more than I could muster. i often wonder what happened to that car. I really hope it's still safely tucked up in a nice garage safe and sound somewhere in Christchurch Anyway Steve and I went back the next day pumped the tyres up, jacked the car up because the old tyres had glued them selves to the concrete floor, and pushed it as fast as we could through the overgrown hedge down the drive. I did have a photo of the day I got it home, it's pretty shitty and double exposed. Anyway that's my sharn about the day I brought an AP5. Heres some pics of all the old documents that I stashed away in a safe place. They make for amusing reading.

Well. What am I doing with this thing. Not much to be honest. Like a lot of people around the country I've had plenty of time to think about things over the last couple of months. One of the things that I've decided is that I want to have the AP5 going and usable when ever I want to drive it. I've got the VG close to where I want it to be with a couple of jobs to do yet but hopefully (touch wood) there is light at the end of the tunnel. As such I've started chipping away at the AP5, doing basic, low cost things that I need to do. There are a number of things that bug me with the AP. When I did most of the work on this I was in my mid 20s, and basically the things I thought were cool then I think are a bit dumb now. I've resolved some of the issues, ie the tiny front seats, but there are other items still to sort out. The Battery got mounted in the boot, I didn't think there was room for it under the bonnet, there still may not be enough room for it but I'm going to give it a try. good bye stuff. Luckily had the foresight to keep the original battery tray which is away getting blasted and painted. /Quick sharn : When I first got this car going the bolts holding the battery box to the floor sat proud of of the tray so the battery sat directly on the bolt heads. I never thought anything of it. The car had a veracious appetite for batteries, I'd fit a new battery, drive somewhere and it would be flat, never dead just flat. I'd check the charge rate, check for current draw, never a problem, keep an eye on the ammeter, nothing. Finally in desperation I made a rectangle of plywood to sit in the bottom of the battery box to cover the bolt heads. Problem solved. I think the weight of the battery sitting on the bolts was enough to knock the plates off the end and stuff the battery. Frustrating, expensive lesson learned. Offending bolts. Next up the exhaust on this was a bit of a fuck up. I was a bit young and keen and chose sizes that are a bit large, It has twin 2 1/4" pipes into a single 3" muffler and pipe going over the diff. It was loud, droned, and hung down too far, I welded a resonator in behind the diff which calmed the sound down a lot but got away with the height due to the big wheels. Now they're gone the exhaust was way too low. I CBF redoing the whole thing so I cut the middle section and raised it up as far as I could without reworking the whole thing, it's picked up about 40mm I'm happy with that. Not the best picture but you get the gist. Lastly I took painted the emblems on the hubcaps with some trusty Tamiya paint. I'll try and keep the updates coming as I chip away at more issues.

You can't time it correctly without a spec card. I think the cam places like Kelford etc can measure it and make you a new spec card. Or line the marks up and call it good.

Have you considered a MX5 motor? They make about 120 hp stock. Are ultra reliable. Already rwd. Have a nice 5 speed box as stock. Can be purchased for sub 1000 dollars. Could be wired with a stock ecu. The days of buying a rusty 5 speed Datsun Sunny for not much are long gone.

Buy a new water pump chances are it's stuffed, it's only a couple of bolts to get off/on. Good work getting it going, now take it for a drive!

What make is it? Have a look at the exhaust outlet and see if it has a gause flashback arrestor that had got blocked with soot.

Really enjoying your thread, I was hooked at 9" and Astrons tbh. It looked like things were going so well, share some pics of where you're up to now, it might be therapeutic? I think everyone who has had a project car has been let down by someone somewhere along the line. It's par for the course.

What size is HS6? I have an inch and a quarter one I can measure for you.

This was so good. He is living in the future! As a certifier what's your take on the gearbox cross member in the picture, apart from being mega fugly. It looks like the two inboard mount holes have been moved out? Edit: Got a link to the gearbox pic source?

I came to the same point I'll look forward to an update in a decade.