Aston Martin Rust Oration

I went into town to do the last of my Christmas shopping today - what a nightmare!

Fortnum and Mason’s was heaving so I left in a hurry and cut through Burlington Arcade on the way to the Apple store for a hard drive. As I came out of the arcade I spotted a beautiful white 1978 V8. Got chatting to the owner and discovered that we had been close neighbours for over 10 years when we lived behind Madame Tussaurds - and I had never once spotted his car!

All the very bestNigel

Classic car restoration is most definitely not a winter sport - epecially on the frozen steppes of Befordshire!

Thermal underwear, heavy pullover, woolie hat - and that was just for inside the workshop.

Once again I over-estimated what I would be able to get done in three days.  I did achieve quite a bit- but there are still no wheels on ROJ.

My first job was emptying the sludgy old oil from the rear dampers and refilling with EP90 - a very tedious procedure that involved using a syringe to inject the oil while pumping the lever arm back and forth.

Once filled I put them on the car - but the left hand side damper proved problematic as one of the mounting bracket retaining nuts needed cleaning out and retapping - of course it had to be the most inaccesible - sitting on the cold garage floor has probably given me piles.

Malcolm pointed out on the Oscar India that the Watts linkage bolt is obscured by the diff mounting bar metalastic bush - and this shows in this photo of ROJ’s mounting too.

The second job was to fill the diff with LS oil, and I would have fitted the brake calipers - but decided that the mounting bolts were too badly corroded - will order new ones after Christmas.

Instead I fitted the windscreen wiper motor and attached the mechanism.

 

Next trip up i shall be trying a different approach to fitting the rear running gear. Malcolm attached the axles to the differential then lifted and attached the whole mechanism in one - I shall try to fit the differential first and then attach the axle , Dedion tube and Watts Linkages as a second operation.

The brake pipe I bought via ebay has disappeard into the ether - the seller has a very strange idea of customer service - after having packed the pipe so badly that the accompanying tools bent it, he said - ‘we’ve never had any problems before’.  I don’t care, I have a problem, sort it. So last time I buy from them. Annoying because i now need to order more pipe from elsewhere.

My son Angus came home from Glasgow School of Art this weekend, which has brightened the house up considerably - we had been enjoying the extra space and absence of loud music at all hours, but missed his charming smile and very quick wit. Sadly he is still not interested in helping me rebuild ROJ.

Came across a great blog on classic aircraft the other day - problem was it was in what looked like Swedish - still the photos were spectacular. There was even a video clip of a 747 coming into land at Kai Tak in Hong Kong - an experience I know only too well.

Imagine if you will all those magnificant flying machines and my consternation at suddenly coming across this magazine cover!

 Malcolm - you are not alone!

 It then reminded me to post some photos my friend David took while we were in Marrakech:

Pissed off with Fleabay

I’m cross with myself again. I have had some really good experiences with ebay - and some real stinkers. Well last week I bought a pair of replacement bumpers for Stephanie’s Escort (Both cracked - long story). Delivered by courier on Saturday, and the rear one was the wrong type. So I looked on ebay and there was a rear bumper near Heathrow. Great, cheap too. So I bought that and off we went to collect it. Got stuck in traffic so took 3 hours! Got home to find it was not an original Ford part, and had been modified. Grrr. I now have two rear bumpers that I will have to put back on ebay, while still looking for an original.

A roll of brake pipe and flaring tools looked like a good deal, so I bought that too, but when it arrived the pipe had been crushed by the tools in a rather shoddy package. Sent the pipe back for a replacement - nothing. Seller claims not to have received it.  Double grrrrr.

Oh well I’ve got a couple of days off before Christmas so I hope to get up to the farm for some Aston therapy.

Another fun weekend on the farm. But stupidly I forgot to take some photos of the work I was doing… so close your eyes and imagine.

Well no, don’t close your eyes until after reading the blog.

Friday evening I stopped off to see a friend who has a lovely old Aston in his garage - and found a DB9 Volante in the lane outside. DB9 far too cramped for my taste - I like the grand tourer comfort and style of the V8.

I spent most of Saturday under the parts car in the barn, as I need parts of the handbrake and brackets for ROJ. Foul job. After the Barn flooded last time there is all sorts of … well you really don’t want to know what’s under the car now. In the end I didn’t get the bracket off and will need to drill out a bolt next time I’m up.

Saturday evening usual pilgrimage to Ye Three Fishes in Turvey for a steak and stilton - cooked to perfection - bled all over the plate the moment I cut into it.

Sunday I spent riveting the bulkhead panel behind the dashboard into place and bolting on the fuel filter bracket. I also riveted the headlight cowl retaining ring back into place on the side of the car that Billy repaired for me.

The rear shocks came off again as I will replace the oil in them (EP90 is apparantly recommended) and refit those next time round.

My tool of the month is a 24 inch breaker bar from Halfords. I could have done with lt years ago for taking apart ROJ - but it works a treat on the spares car.

Only one more weekend to play before Christmas…..

I had forgotten that this weekend was bonfire night…

I got up to the farm to find a HUGE bonfire being prepared (it was the best yet), and Saturday night we had a BBQ, bonfire and fireworks - Karen brought one with a price tag of £99.99, and boy was it spectacular! It was very civilised sitting round the fire drinking beer and watching the pyrotechnics.

Either side of the fireworks I spent the time in the garage happily bolting bits together.

I debated replacing the original lever-arm rear shock absorbers with new Konis, but decided the car would not be driven really hard enough to justify the handling kit - so the old shocks went back on (they still need painting).

Of course the lovely shiny new brake servos were a joy to fit.

Having stripped down and cleaned the brake calipers I painted them with special caliper paint. This was a mistake. They now look horrible. What was supposed to be gold paint turned out to be a sludgy brownish gold - thank goodness they are inbound brakes where they won’t be seen. The paint was awful to use too.

One of the reasons brakes sieze up is a build up of rust/dirt behind the rubber seals. This pushes them outwards so that they tightly grip the pistons. The grooves in which the seals sit have to be cleaned out carefully - a fiddly job requiring the use of dental tools.

I shall not fit the new seals and stainless steel pistons until just before the calipers are fitted to the car, I don’t want them seizing up in the meantime.

Well I missed my deadline of the rear wheels being on by autumn - but I’m getting there.

As predicted, there was a dearth of interesting cars in North Africa - although Malcolm would have been in Renault 4 heaven..

Of course second only to the Aston Martin, one of my favourite cars is the hunble Land Rover - and the desert is just the place for those.

We had a fascinating trip over the high Atlas to the desert beyond - slept in a Tuareg tent, and even met a Tuareg with a PhD!

In the Middle East politics rules everyone’s lives, and to a certain extent it is very similar in this part of North Africa -there are tensions between Morocco and Algeria over the siting of Al-Quaida training camps in the southern desert. There are tensions with the Western Saharan separatists. The Moroccans claim the separatists are supported by a number of communist regimes who want to see the Western Sahara as an independent state - carefully omitting to mention that they annexed the country back in 1975 with the help of guess who - yup, the good ol’ USA..

The majority group in Morocco are the native Berbers, but the King and many in power are Arabs - so there is a certain amount of racial tension too.

We arrived just after the government elections, resulting in five women being elected and one of these with a ministerial post. An amazing change in political attitudes for this part of the world. The Moroccan’s have 36 different political parties, but only 28 engage in the elections. The prime minister is drawn from the majority party - but the parliament is one very large coalition. We were at the Royal Palace in Rabat when King Mohammed IV was meeting his new PM Abbas El Fassi for the the first time.

Of course politics is what I’m involved in now - but years ago I worked in TV and the film business - so I just love visiting famous movie locations - Ait Ben Haddou was where they filmed a scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark

Now back to putting the brakes back on the Aston….

When I discovered my office in Queen Anne’s Gate was just around the corner from Lord Brett Sinclair’s house as seen in The Persuaders, I donned my double breasted and got my assistant to take a quick photo.

I’ve been having great fun watching all the old episodes of The Persuaders on DVD - and location spotting. Noting down all the places I will need to take ROJ to have it’s photo taken.

I am surprised by how good ‘The Persuaders’ still is - rather than being dated, it is more like watching a period piece. Even the acting isn’t too bad.

The odd little mistake does creep in now and again.

In one episode Brett Sinclair appears in his Peer’s robes saying he is off to a state occasion in the House of Lords.

His robe and coronet are those of an Earl (which Brett was supposed to be) but instead of them being his parliamentary robes (crimson with three white and gold stripes) that he should wear to a state occasion, he is wearing his coronation robes (crimson with ermine trim and three rows of sealskin spots). Only ever worn at the time of a coronation.

So, in the early seventies we got a new Monarch - who is it? and why were the British public never told…??

No work for a while

Won’t be able to fit the new servos for a few weeks - off to Morocco for a bit of a Sahara safari - doubt if there are any Aston owners to cadge a lift from there.

Er… boot hinges. Exciting?

Well no. But deeply satisfying after having had a month of shear cr*p at work. You’ve heard it all before… not respected.. blah blah… apply for your own job. …blah blah… a year’s work - oh but the CEO thinks we should do this… blah blah……

Therapy came in a box of tools and an old Aston Martin… and boot hinges!

Originally the hinges had four large plastic washers either side of the springs and held in with split pins. These discs had long ago been broken or mislaid. So a rumage through banger-man’s bins unearthed an old plastic bumper, and a plumber’s saw created just the right things.

The new springs are a bit vicious though. They were deadly to fit, and so strong that when I open the boot I’m going to have to be very careful not to get chinned by the bloody thing.

Because of the lousy week at work I hadn’t actually planned what I would do this last weekend, but in the end was very productive - the boot springs, the brake calipers, and under sealing the rear axle tunnel - plus I got to take the farmer’s quad bike for a burn round the track. I felt much better coming home last night.

We had a bit of a “I’m so miserable at work” session in the pub until Malcolm wanted to join in - ‘You don’t count’ we cried, ‘you work for yourself!’

I’ve sent the brake servos off to be renovated - this is the before shot:

The last trip to the farm had been just a jolly - bonfire, BBQ and Santa Pod.

That orange thing had to be the coolest car at Santa Pod!

And this is my neighbours’s lovely Alvis - he usually keeps it tucked up inside.

Made me smile (hard to do at the moment…)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/magazinemonitor/2007/09/the_friday_challenge.shtml#commentsanchor

An American company has launched the first commercial ‘flying saucer’ cars - they avoid calling them hover cars, but I suppose they are the closest thing to the Star Wars land speeders.

Will this be the future for all cars? Will the Aston Martins of 2010 float down to the Côte d’Azur?

See the BBC website for a news clip. http://news.bbc.co.uk/