Aye I may be slightly optimistic like Its that or i drive my little brother's pink nissan almera to college tomorrow

Oh yeah, I'm changing the oil and filter, I meant another oil change in the future when i do the sump gasket.

Ah, so the water can pass through but slower - better cooling / pumping of the water or something?

Starting it up first time is going to be scary as owt lol

Hey Matt,

I was going to say that port match your exhaust and inlet to your gasket sets.
It will give you better flow than anything else.

When dealing with cars, don't temp to give yourself a dealine. Look at me... I gave myself every year and I fail every time .
Good job I got other cars for me but take time and make sure you fit all of bolts and nuts.

Cheers
Atchi

Would have done but time's ticking on and i just want it drivable again.

Never setting deadlines ever again lol.

Today i got the head back, all skimmed for £30. Me and me mate set away cleaning the block and piston's. I also fitted a new thermostat in the head. Next thing was to fit the head ... so got the torque wrench out ... went to set it to 20nm ... only goes down to 40 :/ Had a mad ride round looking to buy / borrow one but no luck. So gave in for the day as it was pissing down anyway. Tomorrow my mate's going to bring his and get it all tightened down and do the cambelt while I'm at college, so in the evening i will refit as much as i can. Might see if I can get some gloss black high temp paint for the rocker cover or even polish it up. I have some graphite high temp for exhaust manifold. I'll probably end up fitting the last of the parts sunday afternoon (busy most of the weekend) and seeing if she'll start up - pettaw's video will be getting watched again beforehand.

I did take some pics but camera's in the car still.

Well, eventually the head is on and the timing belt's done. Me and a mate were crouched under a parasol, with a lightbulb hung from it, in the middle of my muddy garden, in the pouring rain, at midnight last night doing it

Only real problems we encountered was finding a torque wrench that went down to 20Nm and the timing marks on the crank gear/pully and lining them up. In the end we managed though. Only things left to do are the exhaust manifold, radiator, few hoses, airbox and ignition leads etc. Changed oil filter, thermostat, cambelt tensioner. Cleaned a load of stuff while doing it too.

Am away today but tomorrow afternoon should see it running.... I cant wait

Hey Matt,

You should got in touch with me.
I have all of torque wrenches you need, if you need them again.

I have measurement for torque tubes and so on. So I will be cutting it soon!
So I will need gearshift and so on.

Cheers
Atchi

Atchi,

I will remember for next time like, in the end my mate had one, we just weren't driving all the way back to Crook for it lol.

Aye I have a set of un broken ones just like you gave me just this set has the knob and i think i have a reverse detent bracket and reverse switch

Found a bit of paper in the glovebox my mate gave me with all the spares, it had a peice of paper in with teh following:

TORQUE TUBE BEARINGS
Front 14.5" } INNER
Rear 21" } BEARINGS

Dunno if It's any help?

I'll give you a text once i have the car back on the road, and know i can go places again, and see when i can come and give you these linkages. Maybe a chat about bike carbs too

Well, Got her running again today Took a few attempts. First i left a breather off which resulted in near stalling every time i tried to start the car. Second, i ran out of petrol and finally a plug lead wasn't in the dizzy cap properly so made it run like shit. After all that was done it started fine and ran fine for a few minuits at ~2000 rpm.

Topped up coolant and oil and gave the car a very quick wash before having a proper drive. Feels much better now, free-er revving and I must have reconnected the clutch cable and tightened the nuts in a different place as now the biting point is at teh bottom of the pedal. Feels nice though.

SOOOO happy to be back in it

SOOOO Surprised it's not leaking anything out of anywhere or gone bang lol.

Gave her a full tank so we'll see what MPG i get now. Also see how it starts in the morning. Feel like i owe it presents (or more me presents).

Flocked dash tuesday

Thank's for looking,
Matt

Nice!

I will be busy both Mon and Tuesday. I will be coming home late onThursday as I will be driving around Scotland.
Otherwise, I will be in.

I can show you ITBs I made for Suzuki Swift engines.
Did you ger spare bottom arms?
I will show you how it works with my subframe I got.

Cheers
Atchi

Cheers!

I have 1 spare bottom arm and at least part of a bush. I'll bring them with me. I was thinking of ITB's but now I fancy everything mechanical and get rid of wires so bike carbs. All depends of fuel efficiency really. Still fancy a look at anything like!

Wednesday seems the best time then, I'll give you a text tomorrow when i know if / when I'm busy

Nice work matt!

YEAAAHHH BUDDY! Good news,it does feel good, know exactly how you feel. Makes a massive change don't it?

Cheers!
Starts much much better! Still not perfect but I guess that's just the usual over fuelling on these. Few things left to do: PAS pump is rather wobbly, forgot the downpipe bracket bolt and rocker cover's leaking a tad but can't remember if I actually properly tightened the nuts Apart from that It's pretty good. Might get it some new plugs and leads as they've been a bit temperamental for a while. Is there a running in time with head gaskets? I've been taking it moderately sensible but rain is due tomorrow

Picking the dash-de-la-flock up tomorrow Still need to cut my shiny bit of carbon sheet to fit the shelf at the passenger side.

Might get round to refurbishing the last alloy too this week.

Then it's MOT list time:
Rear lights need a few new bulbs
Need a new rear wiper
New front tyre and I'll get the tracking done at same time
Weld up a bit of the rust
Get a better horn button or fix the proper one

Thanks for looking,
Matt

Air horns. They are the only way.

I took it easy for a few weeks when I did my HG, not sure if there is/was a bed-in period, but I did it for piece of mind more than anything. Mmmm Carbon, the dash should look great, not a fan of flocking myself but they do work with the car.

Klaxon horn I'm fancying

Aye I'm taking it'moderately' easy, It's seen 5K revs up a hill like :/

I never really thourght about flocked dash until i got a spare one and thought 'WTF am i going to do with this?' The carbon will be nice i think, get some stainless capscrews to hold it down

Got a photo from 10pm last friday night of when we did the cambelt, in the pouring rain



LOL

Anyhow, got me flocked dash yesterday and fitted it today

Here's the peice of carbon i managed to finish off but not fit (really should have drilled the holes while the dash was out, bit stuck now lol)



And here is the dash, Got it done at KP flocking in Darlington, top quality bloke!



Taking the dash out, i found some not connected plugs and wondered what they are for, one from the blower speed control with a white wire and two others that came from cigg. lighter



I'll look them up in the haynes if no-one knows off hand

She's in







And a random pic i took tonight



Also went up to see miniswift, gave him a set of gear linkages back and had a good look at his project parts, cut up torque tube, swift/volvo bellhousing TIG welded to join the swift engine to 360 drive train, Amazing stuff!! He gave me a torque wrench too!! I'll have to remember to get all the rest of the stuff he's after!!

Treating the car to plugs and leads tomorrow and hopefully get the rest of the vents in. Seems both mk3 dash's are different, glovebox cut out is different where the curved bits of the lid go through, windscreen vents out my dash (metal ones) don't fit the flocked one and the blow/dont blow slider things are a slightly different design as are the backs of the side vents.

Thanks for looking!
Matt