Pushing on

Starting to get faster and better at cleaning, derusting, and then acid etching with the POR15 Prep and Ready stuff. I'm managing to do things in batches whilst painting the stair spindles which makes for good economy of time and relieves the mind numbing boredom of painting undercoat on square spindles. Thankfully only one flight of stairs and one landing.

It seems a shame to have to etch the beautiful shiny stuff... but then it gets painted so not so bad after all

Sheep Dip?

Bilt Hamber. deox-C. http://www.bilthamber.com/
Shameless plug I know but absolutely brilliant stuff for disolving rust. Here's how it works:

1. Clean as much grease / crud off metal bits by hand
2. Use suitable degreasant with boiling hot water (don't inhale fumes) to remove grease film
3. Mix up deox-c as per Bilt Hamber instructions in large recepticle. I used hot tap water with a bit of kettle hot too
4. Sheep dip rusty bits for as long as they need, occasionally agitate with a brush.

The result: Clean and shiny metal bits, black and filthy sheep dip.

Best news is that it's perfectly safe to dispose of down the drain and it has a pleasant metallic tang smell as it works, along with lots of tiny bubbles as it disolves the rust. I have no idea how it works, chemistry was not my strong point at school but I have more things lined up for treatment like the barbeque grill, gardening tools and anything else rusty I can lay my hands on!

Finally a bit more work with a wire brush in an electric drill and shiny bits are the result!

I am starting to worry that I'm finding this cleaning derusting process all a bit too satisfying - I shall be sorry it's over as it is really quite cathartic to just focus totally on these bits of metal and rewarding to know that effectively I'm recycling what would have been otherwise scrapped.

Visit to GD Sports Cars.

I did get the opportunity to visit Gardner Douglas sports cars in October to meet Andy, Meena and the some of the team. Great people, natural problem solvers. Hopefully they won't mind me putting a few eye candy photos here... just confirmed what I want to achieve as this car below that was just being completed by them is pretty much it!

Back online and on the job

Summer most horrible is what I should call it. In short I was ill, am now better, onwards.

Have since learnt from research and talking to others that Jaguar stub axles all had movement from the front bearings and the grooves / wear mentioned in previous post are characteristic of this. Those go onto the gash pile and two more items added to the shopping list.

I am making progress though. Found a friendly local Jaguar independant service chap who undid the castle nuts and pushed out the drive shafts from my rear hubs. Well, I say pushed out... I failed even with about 4ft of leverage with my whole body weight to shift either nuts - after months of wd40 action (was all I've been good for for 4 months). His hammer action air spanner thing undid them in seconds. Luckily not many around to witness my embarassment.

Of course, all the tails I've read about these things being locktited in and needing 10 ton presses to shift them seemed redundant as I watched the first driveshaft fall out of the hub with no help other than gravity...

Thankfully the second lived up to promise and it was suggested I remove myself and return later after the appropriate amount of persuasion had been applied.

Job done and I now have separated shafts and hubs. Time for more deconstructing of UJs.

Others doing this often send the rear hubs off to be reconditioned separately as they have very carefully applied measurements to endfloat to ensure correct bearing loading. I shall think about whether to do myself - after all, it's only a bit of work with a feeler guage isn't it?

Mind you - noting the amount of crud on the UJ shown bottom of photo above, I've had two circlips break on me and hit my forhead so far - maybe I should outsource the lot?

New stub axles required?

Thoughts about brakes. I originally thought about reconditioning the calipers myself but doing a bit more research it's not a massive cost saving and given these are fundamental to stopping I'd feel more comfortable with them being professionally done and tested.

So, onto bath time. Let the degreasing begin.

Mucky stuff. Having tried different concentrations and probably poisoning myself I'm going to do more research as this stuff is still as filthy, and it seems to eat through the free plastic gloves from the petrol station. (I didn't deliberately take them - it was an accidental over enthusiastic grabbing last time the car needed diesel)

I have made a discovery. The best grease removal stuff is white paraffin. Cheap from any diy store, not that smelly either. Dissolves grease with ease and a bit of agitation with a paint brush.

Two posts in the same day... well, trying to get the hang of this blogging site and catching up on bits hit - and it does seem to mainly be hitting things that gets them apart - I got behind with the narrative.

One lone front caliper - not much for several hours work.

Front hub carrier - amazing how much stuff gets picked up and stuck to these things but I guess not surprising for a 17 year old car. I gave the end closest to bottom with photo with a couple of taps of the rubber mallet to get the stub axle out for it to shoot 6ft across the garage in a beautiful ballistic arc and dent the garage door.

Still thinking about how I'm going to clean all the grease and crud off. The Sand / grit blasters I've spoken to don't like grease as it plays havoc with their machines. Researching online there are a number of products that claim superior degreasing capabilities - I have a feeling this will be a trial and error process.

As such this process whilst about getting these important suspension / brake / transmission bits back to their former glory, is also about testing my commitment and ability. Whilst I can lay claim to tinkering with engines and car bits when younger and more latterly arming myself with a mech. Eng degree, I feel like a total amateur who has no right to even be considering playing with this stuff let alone actually building a car.
For some reason these thoughts seem to permeate most just before going to sleep (along with what engine, wheels, colour, under slung exhaust or side pipes, nudge bars, and so on - ad nauseam)

Anyway, here are some more pictures of rusty bits. My iPhone seems to have a differing opinion to my own as to which pictures it will actually transfer onto my PC on any one evening. Given I work for an IT Software company it pains me greatly to admit being beaten by technology.

This was a defining moment - the removal of the first bolt from the first brake disc hub assembly (front right). What you don't see is the socket wrench operator jumping up and down on the handle and resorting to rubber mallet based persuasion to shift ONE bolt.

Good job I've been visiting the gym or I'd be failing the first hurdle of getting these wretched things off.

And the prize for removing five bolts is... Another rusty bit! Hmmmm. This is going to take a while.

The Beginnings

So - my first attempt at a blog and more importantly, my first (and probably only attempt) to build a car. Eh?

Yes, you read correctly. It's not that I'm not satisfied with the motoring industries' worldwide attempts-  they do a magnificent job however doing the daily commute in a mainly hygenic (unless the children have been near) and safe environment is one thing. Experiencing the exhilerating power and sound of a V8, no driver safety aids such as traction control and ABS is another... so follows a diary of my efforts to build a replica of a beautiful machine - the AC Cobra.

I'm not going into the history or story behind it - there's plenty written already. This is about my journey as a car building novice trying to see if I can do the magnificence of the machine justice, and letting family and friends know that I am alive and mainly getting up to good things in the garage...

So the plan is to turn a pile of rust like this:

Into a magnificent marvel of engineering like this:

I hope GD don't mind me posting this photo here but this is pretty much what I'm looking to achieve other than the driving on the wrong side bit.

Looking at the pile of rust I get nervous everytime I walk past it in the garage.

So as you can see I have started - after much hunting around I located a Jag XJ6 series 3 (the requirement for donor parts which includes suspension, brakes and transmission) that I could rescue the requisite running gear from plus it's V5 document to enable an age related registration if and when I get that far.

Armed with two Haynes manuals for the XJ6 from eBay/Amazon it's now time to start cleaning this stuff up.