So, thought I'd finally admit that I bought the 340 from Suffolk... first time I've ever bought a car without looking at it, and thankfully, it largely seems to be a good'n.

Someone's reversed it into something, or it's had a bit of a nudge at the back which means the back bumper doesn't quite sit right and the metalwork under it's a bit bent, there's a scrape on the door and a few little scabs of rust (but not many, really). Apart from that, it seems to run right - has 90% of a service history (nearly all at a volvo dealer, too), and is probably cheering my neighbours up no-end.

Anyhow, here's some shots of it...




Being GL spec it's a bit luxurious coming from a DAF 44 / Minor / MZ... I got in it after a night shift and was sat shivering waiting for the engine to warm up so I could have heat and then thought..."Hang on a minute! I've got heated seats". Oooh, so snuggly and warm. Nearly went to sleep in the car rather than getting out and into the house when I got home

Hopefully over the next few weeks I'll at least sort the rust scabs so they don't get any worse, and I'm treating him to a proper service at an actual Volvo dealer. I think the belt tensions not right (my DAF 44 experience there), and there's a couple of other minor little faults that will probably make me weep and never go to a dealer again...

Still. He's very pleasant to drive, and my other half who'll most be driving him seems reasonably happy. Bit big by our standards, but pleasant and eats up the motorway miles.

Anyway...just for good measure, here's some of the rest of the fleet...

My beloved minor. I've barely driven her for the last two years after the failure of a bodged restoration (why I barely trust any garage anymore), she went up to have lots of work done at the one place I trust, and I was gently informed that the transmission was shot, and the suspension knackered when I collected her. Having no more money I brought her home and drove her until her transmission expired (unfortunately in Ireland, while on holiday). She came back, and has gone back up to the specialist for the rest of the work I wanted done before...




My Daf 44 - how I got into this strange CVT nonsense. Great fun to drive, or it was until 50% of the engine died and the rear brakes started binding... It's currently at a garage after new condenser/coil/plugs/points/cap/leads/rings/head failed to sort the fact that one of the cylinders, despite having fuel, spark and air declines to actually go 'bang' and make the car move. It think the garage I farmed the head-swap out to failed to set the inlet/exhaust valve clearances, but still, it should do *something*... Still, if you want something done right, you should do it yourself...



The MZ (aka Pirate Charlie), a perhaps overzealous response to "is that your boyfriend's bike"?



And this is my mum's, currently stuck in Wales, Enfield EV:



So yes, that's me. Hello! Anyone else in the Slough region?

Welcome to the forum officially.
Glad youre happy with the 340. Theres a wealth of cvt knowlede on this forum (a lot more than at most Volo Dealers anyway.)
Always nive ro see a new 300.

More info on the Enfield please!
Looks amazing.

Aye, I bet there's more knowledge here

In this case though, it's a time issue. I can just about hold my own doing maintenance on one car and one bike, much beyond that and I start to run into 'I don't have time' and jobs get left...and we all know where leaving jobs undone ends...

And since every garage I've tried around here has sucked worse than I do at car maintenance (seriously), I thought I'd try a dealer

As for the Enfield, it's an Enfield 8000, as produced in the UK in the 1970s. They're EVs running on a 48 volt system (iirc), with a top speed of around 60 mph and a range of up to 90 miles (on a very, very good day). Sadly, we got hers, got it charged and MOTd (discovering in the process that it does, indeed, need new batteries) and then the floods of two years ago hit and it got semi-submerged. The insurance company declined to repair it (saying it wasn't worth it) and so it was written off (

It went down to a 'specialist' in Wales and we've had a few issues with that, hopefully they're being resolved over the next few weeks and it should be back on the road sometime next year. It's quite entertainingly terrifying to drive. Acceleration's great up to 30mph and then it all rather goes downhill :-/

Still, it's not stopped me wanting to build a EV with a CVT, but that's at least a couple of years off.

There's more pics of it here: http://pyoor.org/wordpress/photos/album ... ld-ev.html, including a shot of the receding water (which was about half-way up the door when we arrived, but we were rather more concerned with trying to save what we could of my mum's furniture).

Thats quite possibly the most origonal car ive ever seen.
Not saw one before.
Looks like a mini version of Wayne Campbells car in Waynes World.

A cvt conversion would be awesome.
With a capital A.

Hi Kate,



I was going to ask how you were getting on with Chester, but you've beaten me to it and on the whole, everything seems to be going well enough.

(I, on the other hand think the Enfield looks awful. The style of the car itself is very nice - It's that AWFUL Rover grille that's stuck on it's snout that makes me... )

Rich

That Rover grille came pre-attached. When we get it fixed it'll probably be unattached...

It's actually quite a famous little Enfield, it was on Tomorrow's World back when it was a nearly-new car working with Southern Electric, although because the BBC guard their old footage as though it were the national reserve, I'm not allowed to see that clip of it

pyoorkate wrote:That Rover grille came pre-attached. When we get it fixed it'll probably be unattached...

It's actually quite a famous little Enfield, it was on Tomorrow's World back when it was a nearly-new car working with Southern Electric, although because the BBC guard their old footage as though it were the national reserve, I'm not allowed to see that clip of it

We'll all be driving them in the future then.
Tommorows World never shot wide of the mark when it came to emerging technologies.

Well, when I get to the promised land I plan to locate a DAF (44/55/66) in need of substantial renovation, dip it, have it repaired and e-coated, and then stick an electric motor in to drive the CVT. I've not quite got to the mechanics of getting the vacuum adjustments to work on the CVT with an Electric Motor, and will need to do some fairly hefty revision of engineering, I think, before I do.

But that's the plan.

The choice of the DAF is because it's way lighter than the Volvo, although the 1.4 Volvo's CVT is probably somewhat more resiliant than the dinky little 850cc DAFs and might be a better choice.

'course I'd quite like to throw it all in the body of a Moskvich, but then we're getting silly.

Was this the ebay variomatic? Looks like a good one! There's a 360 on ebay breaking with colour coded bumpers that's the same colour as yours on ebay at the mo

Hi mate and welcome.
Just saw your car under water.This brought back terible memories of what we call here in Belfast ,the great foods of 2007.
We got the whole ground floor of our house destroyed by food water. Seeing ever posession you own going down the street
on the back of a skip lorry is soal destroying.My wife and son and i,sat looking at four bare walls for months.luckly we were insured. Good luck with the car.
Cheers Mark.

Wow, an Enfield 8000! I've been told the total production ended at 106 cars, so there you are... a rare classic that's totally en vogue as an added bonus As much as I like the variomatic, it would be the first thing to go once I'd build an electric DAF. Just stick the motor in the space that's left, make it direct drive and put the batteries in the engine... but that might be a bit off topic in this case. And I may be just plain wrong.

I've read your exploits on the DOC forums and I sincerely hope Chester saves you the problems you've encountered with your 44's. I admire your courage for taking a variomatic to a Volvo dealership. Even back in its home country the knowledge has largely been lost.

They actually seemed really pleased to have a vario to play with. Gave me a massive discount, a brief list of advisories, and then told me it's the best one they've had in for ages. They also gave him a wash and polish, and he looks *way* shiny now, especially compared to my faded 'zed and the ratty DAF (when it comes back).

*smiles cheerfully*.

I looked underneath after the 'underside is very rusty' advisory comment, although I didn't bother getting him up on ramps - there's a couple of spots there that need some rust killer on, but I couldn't poke a screwdriver through, so I'm happy. I'll have to have a proper grovel another day...

I also changed the manky heater hose that was porous and dripping coolant onto the clutch bellhousing...



to:



Anyone know if I need to do anything specific in terms of bleeding and ensuring there's no airlocks? The coolant looked nicely non-manky though.

Annoyingly, after I chucked the new radio in I noticed that you need the radio out to get to the heater control panel, so I would surmise that, for the winter at least, the heater will remain on 'hot'. It appears the control cable needs to be fixed somewhere on the inside of the vehicle, as the end attached to the control valve appears to work perfectly...

Still, that's all marvelous.

Now all I need to do is find the missing bit of my Morris Minor to take up to JLH, and I'll be happy*.


* Despite previously deciding it wasn't at my mums, I'm now concluding that it must be at my mum's, because I've been through the shed and the attic and can't find it. I do, however, deeply miss having a garage. Again.

bleeding is easy, fill coolant to max, run engine with heater at max and keep refilling to the max in the expansion barrel.

selfbleeding system

after running it like that for 15min, drive a few miles, put the car away and when it's cold top it up to max

Ta, that's what I thought when I read it, just wanted to make sure I wasn't suffering from my occasional Haynes Misreading Syndrome*.

It's a bit scary in there, after the MZ, the DAF and the minor. Many tubes and wires. Meh.



* Or of course, the Haynes BOL syndrome, which I've encountered on many occasions

--
Kate WE