Wednesday, December 17, 2014

It's December and It's Time To Work on the Car Again

Dateline 12/13/14 - Winter is almost officially here, but it feels like it's here anyway, so now it's time to get going on the car!  First of all, I've talked to my paint guy and he will have an opening for my car at the end of January 2015.  So, yes, the car is going to paint!  I found this picture of a Mark II on the internet and I just love this color!

Love the color of this beautiful Mark II

So it looks like I've got several months of parts cleaning ahead of me.  I started cleaning random parts on the car, like the brake peddle mechanism (and it is a mechanism with springs and levers!), the power brake booster and the boot lid hings.  Like most things British, the boot lid hings are extremely over engineered and under constructed.  There is a massive spring that goes into the hing that, over time, wears out the parallel arms so that that the pivot holes become elongated.  To repair this, I had to drill out the pivots to get the arms off the mechanism, insert steel tubing into the holes and weld it in.  Here is a picture of one arm in original state (top) and one repaired (bottom)

Boot lid hing parallel arms before and after repair.

Once welded and ground down, the hings were put back together with stainless steel bolts and self locking nuts.

Repaired boot lid hing.  Note stainless steel bolts for pivots

This should last the life of the car!

I have also been looking for sources for weather stripping.  There is a clip on rubber weatherstrip that goes between the front fender and inside wheel well.  Very difficult to source.  I've found several companies that seem to carry it, but all have been out of stock.  I think I may have found a supplier though.  Let's hope.

Also, looking window track weather stripping.  I can't seem to find this from any of my Jaguar parts sources, so looking for aftermarket supplier.  Again, I thought I had it, but they since told me they are out of stock.  So looking some more.

Finally, I did find the weather stripping I need between my new door panels and the windows.  This is a special type of weatherstrip but found a generic type I think I can use.  I've ordered it and it should be in soon.

So, what's next?  I've got milk crates fill of parts to clean, paint and polish.  That should keep me going for quite some time.  It will be nice to get the car back from paint and just focus on putting it together!