Yetchh's MKIII zephyr "Spethial"...

[yetchh]

Window out after breakfast, stripped after lunch.. not to bad..

 

 

 

 

 

prime tomorrow..

[yetchh]

rust proofed and cleaned..

 

 

Masked..

 

 

Key coat.. my mate who's a prof painter did the initial then got me to do the rest.

 

 

I ended up getting a white epoxy with the veiw to leaving it till I'm ready to do the rest of the car.. 

 

 

 

So my sister had decided that since I have a bench seat that they want to use this as a wedding car for the bridesmaids, my mate bought his buffing gear round to show me how good the paint would come up with a proper buff.. I was mildly impressed..

 

 

 

 

He's gonna give the primer a buff too to bring it up as its a medium sheen at this point but he reckons he can get it a bit more glossy.. stoked with how good it looks..

[yetchh]

Put the rear window in, went a bit cray cray with the sealant tho, as discussed it's bostick 5615 mastic..

 

 

Whoops..

 

 

Front window ready to go, just need to get another tube of mastic..

 

 

Had a small fail with the rear window, as the rubbers are original and 50 years old they're kind of weak and when I tried to do the cord method when installing, the first hard bit it came to split and the cord pulled right through.. doh!, can't really tell anyway and when I finally paint the whole car I'll put new seals in.

 

[yetchh]

Front window is in, although I had the opposite with the mastic this time and wondering if I put enough in.. was a good 8-10mm bead but hardly any spilled out the sides, either that or my skill level went up a notch. Time will tell I guess..

 

 

 

Also while in the back I discovered some of this..

 

 

Which is gonna need some attention, bit of a strange one tho.. it must get fairly humid behind the back seat as that's the only place I found it..

[yetchh]

Rust killed it

 

Epoxied it, with a paint brush.. comes up surprisingly good.

 

 

 

 

 

And wait for it..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Almost ready for the wedding.. bought another prop shaft for it a while ago and changed all the unis over from my reco'd bent one, and guess what? Rumbles still there gosh darn it plus other unpleasantries.. wondering if maybe the snub nose is bent.. anyway got two weddings to do so there will be assorted pics..

[yetchh]

Looks great from 5m

 

 

 

[yetchh]

Fuck photobucket and it's mass photo reproductions, in deleting what I've thought to be the duplicates of photos turns out they were originals as you can see from the missing photos..

 

Anyway, here's some official wedding pics from #1 wedding

 

 

 

Must try and get the proper b/g shots.. 

[yetchh]

Not much to update other than in trying to find a voltage leak spent an hour trying to find a fuse box only to discover there is no fuse box.. fucken poms.. Turned out to be in part an old switch the previous owner had installed for spot lights and also the shit stereo that was in there.. 

The only thing I've done for the last 2 1/2 years is the old man's funeral.. Figured the cops wouldn't pull it over in a funeral procession.. (reg on hold) 

[yetchh]

Double post.. Might as well write a list of things to do

-Re-core radiator (unless there's a drop in replacement) 

-Balance driveshaft 

-Sleeve clutch slave as it leaks

-Fix a small spot of rust at the bottom passenger a pillar 

-New exhaust 

-Get wof then drop springs @Valiant

[yetchh]

Been a while, last time I drove this was during lockdown last year.

 

I start it every now and then otherwise the clutch sticks on. The clutch has been the bane of my life since I bought this car, now it'll lose its fluid in about 2 months so I bit the bullet and had the clutch master/slave resleeved and new seals at Canterbury Brake and clutch (their quote was literally half the price of safe r brakes which was $2-250 per item. Would defo recommend. 

 

Last year I was at @RUNAMUCK's place for a meat and was commenting on the nice custom radiator in his datto. That led to this

 

Custom mk3 zephyr radiator for a fucken good price, doesn't fit quite like the original but nothing a couple of spacers won't fix. Just need to clean the system out before I mount it. 

What I thought was bad rust at the bottom of the pass a pillar turned out to be just some light surface rust from when the front screen leaked, treated that. 

That leaves just one thing and I can get it another wof ready for the drive up to golden bay. If anyone has a good hook up on exhaust fab that would be great (I have zero time, and I'm out of mig gas) 

[yetchh]

Finally got the chance to get the zed out of the rust hell hole that is New Brighton. I was gonna wof her down in chch but it was too much of a mission so I decided to trailer her up to the bay as I was down for the school hols, it also meant I could free up some space at my mums (47 and still haven completely left). 

 

Despite my best efforts this time with the tunnel house I couldn't get it to stay dry which isn't ideal out in Brighton, there would always be light moisture on the car, even with a car cover, so pulled her out and pulled it down

 

Mum can now park her car back there... 

[yetchh]

Loaded up the trailer and some tools/car parts and left earlyish on Monday, 

 

 

 

Used a full tank of gas to get to Ruiwaka from Chch, 14.6l/100 but such a sweet towing rig, barely ever had to put my foot down to get over any hills, thing just purrs over.. between that and the trailer which tows fucken excellent I hardly knew it was on the back. The V6 shits all over the d4d. 

It's amazing how a zephyr brings out all the barries and stories of yesteryear, had 4 barries out of 5 stops which is a record. 

 

In her next place of residence, gonna clean up all the running gear for the next wof as Brighton has dealt to it somewhat. It's also managed to creep under the paint in some spots so will have to fix that to, I don't want it to turn into another creeping project, so will make an effort to do the bare minimum. 

[yetchh]

Pulled the diff and associated hardware out yesterday, was pretty painless as pretty much every nut came off with little to no effort bar the u bolts putting up a small amount of resistance, very grimy which is also to be expected after almost 60 years, guess that helped keep bolt threads reasonably lubed.. 

 

 

The housing had some fairly bad surface rust on it but should be all good with a clean up, I'll change the pinion shaft seal reseal the head, I'll prob have to do the axle seals as a can see evidence of a leak there. Also might have to put a new brake line in as its fairly rusty too.. 

 

 

[yetchh]

There are numerous topics on converting from lever arm socks to telescopic and even a guy on trademe that sells a bolt on kit (it looks very weak with the bottom shock mount hanging off the leaf spring plate) but I think I'll just recon these and see if I can in some way make them offer a little more resistance. 

 

 

I'll get this driveshaft balanced as the other one I had was apparently permanently out of alignment. Hopefully this one will be better. It was also fairly soft in the back which made for a nice ride but if there was a couple of people in the back it dropped quite significantly, will talk to a mate of mine in chch who is a major zephyr Barry and see what I can do spring wise. 

 

All in all its good enough to leave under there, a couple of bits of very light surface rust that I'll treat with Lanolin, and clearly the exhaust has seen better days. 

 

There is also a fairly large amount of side to side movement in the diff and the bushes feel fairly soft, would like to upgrade to a harder compound rubber in the bushes as opposed to urethane although apparently superpro bushes are a lot better quality than nolathane. (any experiences?) you can also see below where the 16s I had the center moved on have been rubbing against the inner gaurd might just leave them off for the wof but I think it has lots to do with the lateral movement.. I will also be lowering her finally @Valiant..

 

[yetchh]

Bit of an update, took a bunch of bolts and stuff down with me to chch to be cleaned up and plated which worked out mostly good bar the bit where some bolts for lost including one front eye bolt and two handbrake return springs, bit if a cunt especially the eye bolt, also after telling the bloke what I wanted plated some bits got missed which isn't a biggie just a bit annoying that this shit gets missed, also ended up having to have a new driveshaft made as apparently reputable companies have stopped making the smaller 1850 uj's and they all now come from China and have too much radial movement so i either take the risk or for double get a new one with the larger v8 uj's (*sigh) cost me but I seemed to be having bad luck with the things.. Got a lowering kit from chamberlain's and a full set of superpro bushes, bought some more paint and other bits and pieces.. 

Stripped the diff and gave it some rust treatment, 

 

Spent a few hours splitting up the springs and getting them back to good metal, had a fair amount of wear which would go some way to explaining their performance.. 

 

The antifriction pads had seen better days, can only find these particular pads in urethane which seems to be a bad choice for such a high wear environment, have ordered a 250mm rod of 50mm uhmwpe to make some better ones. 

 

 

[yetchh]

Started painting bits, initially I thought of left my gun in chch so thought I give a reusable spray can a go, bought a jacquard youcan from the warehouse and had a crack.. Was a bit of a pain as I constantly had to clean it and could only put a small amount of paint in it or it would lots pressure too quick (takes 100psi)and splatter paint instead of spraying, good for a small job. Managed to spray one set of springs, brake drums and saddle plates, then found my gun.. Suffice to say it's waaay quicker and cleaner hah. 

 

Coat of epoxy then a coat of satin chassis paint.. 

 

Gave the head the same treatment, 

 

All came up looking good, especially the dampers when you look at them before. 

 

Also decided that while all this was out I'd vacuum under there, should really have had it steam cleaned but meh, scraped 60 years of dust and crud from around the arches.. 

 

One side... 

[yetchh]

Wire brushed the housing and gave it two coats of epoxy and two of chassis black, came out looking way better than I expected, 

the axle seals are about 200mm down the tube and a cunt to change, it was recommended that i upgrade bearings which are slightly grumbly to sealed units which cures both problems, these run a full floating hub which makes it very easy to change in the future without having to pull off the entire assembly, for now I just packed it all full of grease.

 

rear drum cylinders have seen better days so I'll prob just sleeve them and forget about them for the next 60 years.. well, 35 anyway...

 

 

 

I still need to buy a set of spring rubbers but to be honest the factory ones are still in pretty good shape and at $200 a set for new ones I might just bang em back in, also priced up two handbrake return springs from the UK at $12 but the $60 shipping killed it. If anyone has a hook up for these springs in NZ it would be much appreciated (look like this)

Also after a front eye bolt if anyone has a spare lying around..

up to date, bit of work for something that isn't seen but since I've spent almost nothing on this i think she deserves it

 

[yetchh]

Hi, yes still around.. Been slow as I've been waiting for things to arrive that either weren't in the country or painfully slow to access over the break (no surprise) but things are back on track now I have everything. 

Got the above cylinders sleeved from cbc, $75 each when  compared to a new cylinder at 200-300 and still prone to corrosion, it's a fucken good deal and I can't recommend them enough. Also finally found a spring eye bolt from a mate in chch, got the new rubber dust boots for the hand brake actuator and two new springs for the handbrake return.. 

In the mean time I set about putting the leaves back together but before I did that I had to make the aforementioned antifriction pads, que a trip over the hill to this guy Alex's place armed with some cake, a 250mm rod of uhmw plastic and the best of the factory pads which resulted in some new pads to install.. 

 

Top guy that.... 

 

 

 

 

 

[yetchh]

That meant I could finally put the spring packs back together.. 

 

Dob of 11fc to keep the pads in their place, 

whoops, a bit blurry..

 

 

Ready to assemble with some silicone grease for max slip, 

 

1st one turned out to be a bit of a cunt but once i figured out that trying to put it together without the bolt in, things went a lot easier, just clamped them all together and hold it with zip ties

 

 

 

Job done. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[yetchh]

After putting the head and axles back in the housing I made some new brake lines and changed the oil in the dampers to 30wt, definitely stiffer.. 

 

After changing the oil and putting them back together and in the car I've since discovered thay are still pretty soft, I can do some small adjustments to bound and rebound buy putting a 2mm shim in place of the one you see below and also tightening the nut on the end of the small spring buy 2-3 turns. The other option is to buy a set of adjustable valves from the UK but that's £70 each without freight so if be expecting 400odd landed, maybe not.. 

 

New lines

 

It was at this point I discovered the lowering blocks didn't actually fit, the loading pin was too small and the the opposite side the same.. 

 

Que another trip over the hill to Alex's armed this time with an actual cake.. 

 

End result.. Thanks man, they fit perfect.