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?