Mjit

I've never seen inside one but guessing it would be a bit of compressed, bent metal which would be a pain to re-create... but what about tweaking the CAD model with a little internal recess you could stick a little high power magnet into instead? Probably a lot easier to engineer and just as effective.

Well you can see why he only did the body design, not the suspension set-up!

There's not classic lowering block but it does look like there's something odd in there. The spring box lower plate should just sit between the lowest and second lowest spring leaves (it's basicually just a flat piece of metal with a hole in it that sits over the other end of the spring locator 'peg' you can see poking out below the spring in Colin's picture). Yours seems to have a piece of old rubber or something in there too, which is why you have such a big gab between the lower plate and the top of the diff. The only piece of rubber around there should be above the top leaf/under the spring box lid. And I don't think that's goinig to change the ride height, as the spring eye bushes are attached to the end of the lower leaf and that's going to be in the same position with/without that pad (classic lowering blocks go below the bottom leaf).

What happens if you try putting the car (engine/handbrake off) in 4th and push it forwards? What SHOULD happen is the car moves but with a lot of resistance and everything from the wheels to the crank rotating - but you wouldn't have an issue if that was happening. If something's gone seriously wrong inside the gearbox I'd expect it to not move, or make some horrible noises doing so. If it moves/the prop turns but with more resistance (due to spinning the cogs in the gearbox, so not a huge difference) than when out of gear it would hint towards a clutch issue (somehow the input shaft isn't connected to the flywheel). If it moves/the prop turns but exactly the same as when out of gear it would hint at a gear selection issue (no matter where you put the stick it's not moving anything inside the gearbox, which stays sat in neutral). When you say "I can select any gear without depressing the clutch pedal" do you mean you can just slip the stick easilly and freely in to any gear/between any gears, or say you can't go in to 4th but if you slip in to another gear it will then go in to 4th? Engine off you should be able to do the latter as most gears will be near enough to slip in and sync. themselves. A few will bulk first time though as they happen to fully align tooth-to-tooth, but picking a different gear will jiggle things enough that when you go back to the first gear it's no longer quite tooth-to-tooth and will jiggle thenselves in. If it's completely free and you can slip in to any gear at any time I'd be looking at the selector forks - could be something's wrong there and while you can move the stick around to your hearts content it's not actually shifting things inside the box, so not actually meshing the gears.

Don't know if it's different on the 1/2/3 but on the IV/1500 the trim is in no way structural! It's literally just a shiny strip of metal riveted to the top of the windscreen frame to make it look nicer when the hood's down. The hood 'pins' don't clamp to the trim but just pass through it and in to the windscreen frame proper and clamp to that.

I wonder how many old men sat about in pubs back in the 60s/70s making the exact same statements about new cars, but in that case referring to our cars. I mean if your car nostalgia was pre-WW2, maybe even pre-WW1 I'm sure things like all cars having the pedals in the same order would make them 'all the same'. And as for being robbed of the true driving experience and involvement, well "Never mind this new-fangled synchromesh for me it all went wrong when they took control of the advance off of the steering wheel!".

Looking at it it's the same as the boot light on a (at least Mk2) big saloon. With those the whole bulb holder/lens/chrome frame fit into a special grommet which in turn goes into the bodywork, and everything pushing against everything else holds it in place.

Worth adding some bracing to the shell pre-dip even if there are enough drain holes, in case it's just the filler/chicken wire/paint holding the A posts or something together. In the worst case it could result in the tub just foling in on itself. And for drain holes I seem to remember a few years ago someone on here getting their chassis galvanised and adding extra drain holes. No reason you can't add some strategic extra drain holes to your tub pre-dip and you can then decide to either keep them or plug weld them when it comes back.

Actually with a Trackrite you're actually measuring the scrub angle of a single wheel at a time, not as a pair so I don't think you ARE meant to adjust both sides? They certainly don't mention that in their own "How to use a Trackrite" video on YouTube! (But then all the YouTube videos seem to start with cars with correctly set tracking and just go "There you go, the Trackrite shows the tracking's correct!") I'm actually wondering if the issue is that I've been getting the car 'settled' by driving back and forth while holding the steering wheel in the 'straight ahead' position and just releasing it for the drive over test. Perhaps to 'settle' everything that should be back and forth hands off, so letting everything go to the 'pulling slightly to the left' position, and THEN set up the Trackrite/drive over it hands free - both lined up with the tyre (so 'pointed slightly left' for a d/s wheel with too much toe in to drive down its centre line) and with the body (so the same toed in d/s wheel will start on the centre line but roll off slightly to the left of it). Assuming it's dry again tomorrow lunch time that is

So my 2000 has always had a slight steering pull to the left and as I needed to replace the track rod ends I thought I'd give my Gunson Trackrite another go... Car on basically flat, reasonably smooth, solid surface concrete car park. Drive back and forth in a straight line a few times to settle everything, then with steering wheel centred pop zeroed Trackrite in front of/in line with the d/s wheel, then drive slowly over not touching the steering wheel. Jump out and shows a little bit of excess tow in. Tweak d/s track rod length and re-test and showing more or less zero. Check p/s wheel and also showing zero. Got for a test drive and...steering wheel now offset to the left and steering still pulls to the left! Just retested with the Trackrite and still getting zero on both front wheels. Driving over I can see the steering wheel rotate to the left as I go over the Trackrite, if I wobble the Trackrite with my hand it slides easilly and smoothly from side to side, and pushing the car over I can be sure the Trackrite's in line with the wheel and I drive over it in a straight line. What exactly am I doing wrong - or are they just another Gunson tool that should stay on the shelf, like the Clickadjust?

Funny this getting reserected now- I've litterally just placed an eBay order from some 10ml syringes for my next trunnion oiling session, trying the system from the Feb. 2021 Courier.

You mean the seemingly unbtainable standard GT6 Y pieces? No, just some standard plastic plumbing Y pieces from the local DIY store. Not original but hidden out of sight and cost pennies rather than an arm and a leg!

On my 2500S I just have the 2 relays. Not sure what the/your Vitesse has but the 2500S is means to have a pair of dipped+main and a pair of just main, but I've replaced that with 4x dipped+main with all 4 either dipped or main when the lights are on.

I've done something similar on my Spitfire, but rather than hacking the heater box about I went for adding some plumbing "Y" pieces into the screen vent hoses to feed both the screen vents and dash eyeballs. Takes a bit of squeezing in and the plumbing "Y" pieces needed a bit of sanding to get their o/d down to match the hose i/d but just about fits behind the dash. Only issue is that just highlighted how asthmatic the aging blower is so on to trying to source/fit a modern motor/fan - along with wiring in a hazard switch to the dash and turning into a Covid hermit which means I'm actually back 3 steps and trying to get the starter motor to turn over and bring the beast out of a 9-ish month slumber...

If you're really lucky the veneer will be fine and it's just the lacquer that's peeling...and it will all peel off cleanly. Having done this some bits will peel of easilly/others will stick like s**t to a shovel - and no matter how careful you are trying to use a heat gun to soften/separate it you'll end up with some singed veneer/some that comes off with the lacquer. Or you'll try to sand the lacquer and end up sanding through the veneer somewhere - played that game too. Either way you'll probaly ending up with a reveneer job at which point it's eBay for a good length of "American Walnut Veneer" (non-burr for original look + easier to work with) then follow the instructions at https://www.frost.co.uk/how-do-i-re-veneer-my-cars-wood-trim/ - for the original/non-gloss finish at step 11, rather then "Polish the veneer to a high shine" you go over it with very fine (0000 grade) steel wool, lubricated with clear wax polish. Having done this on a big saloon: While not technically difficult by god does it take an age, working through all the sanding steps! It's hard to clamp some of the curved dash parts evenly so tend to get the odd area that doesn't stick - but you can usually work some PVA glue in with a craft knife and just clamp those areas till it's all stuck. For gauge holes I found cutting through the hole, across the grain first, then lots of cuts from the line to the edge with a craft knife, then roll/fold then in to the hole from the front with your fingers, before finally filing them from the front through the hold till they dropped off worked OK. Sanding curved panels, especially those with thin areas around gauge holes is a real fiddely PITA, especially trying to alternate grades of sanding by 90 degrees! With the Rustins just really slap it on rather than trying to brush a smooth surface as you would with paint. It flows and self levels really well - and you'll end up sanding loads of it off anyway so might as well get to that point sooner rather than later. Try to give the Rustins a week between last application and sanding so it's fully cured. Try to buy a roll of veneer, or failing that multiple (and more than you think you'll need) sheets from the same auction so it's all the same bit of tree and all the same colour.

The Moss catalogue has it as FH116000.

I can confirm that yes, this CAN be done. The early light does cover the later holes and you do need to drill some new holes for the earlier mountings. The correct lights for a 1500 are just little buttons. You can see them either side of the GB sticker in this photo:

Fog Lights At the back I know a few people have replaced one of the reversing light bulbs with a red fog light LED, so still looks standard. At the front one of my many (many) daydream jobs is to find some suitable modern fog lights and fab. them into the Mk IV/1500 chin spoiler. Daytime Running Lights The easy option would be to fit some 'halo' headlights. Well I guess the REALLY easy option would be to rewire so your sidelights via an ignition-switched relay, so they came on as soon as you turned the key in the ignition. Actually if you did that you might be able to use the now-unused 'sidelight' light swiitch position for your fog lights (either using the sidelight position for headlights/headlight position for headlights+fog lights, or sidelight posiition for fog lights only/headlight position for headlights only - I know in the big saloons the fog light position gave fog lights on/headlights off, which was scary as the fog lights did diddly squat on the illumiination front the one time Ii tried them in actual fog!).

No, M reg is fine for '74, would just mean registered between Jan. and July 1974 , new registrations just coming out once a year, in August back in the day. The "first registered" issue is probably down to shit record keeping at the DVLA and it getting miss-typed when they computerised everything/nobody noticing in the years since.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/185329982606 An admittidly tidy looking Spitfire Mk IV...for £16,995?

Yes - but I found it wasn't really a matter of choice, more flick o/d 'in', touch metal spoke of steering wheel, swear and stop touching metal spoke, flick o/d 'out' and think .oO(That will be the wires up the gearstick shorting then)Oo.

Do you have the 'sprung button' on your car? Parts 106388 and 22G2286. It only seems to be listed for the non-o/d gearbox but have a feeling it's on the o/d version too - certainly replacing the equivalent part on my big saloon made a huge difference to the gearstick feel.

A special spanner most Triumph parts will sell you that has a 1" 'handle' with a 1/2" drive hold in it...that I've never worked out how you're meant to use! Thankfully hand tight (with the special, stubby spanner) is tight-enough. Easy he says! Had to work through all my pairs of circlip pliers to find a pair that would go small-enough to fit and still squeeze enough to compress the circlip. And as for "shake the plunger out"... Done 3 recently* and 2 of them would rattle back and forth quite happily...but one of the O rings would catch somewhere inside and they were buggers to get more than 1mm of the piston to expose past the end of the solenoid body! * Done 3...to discover it was an intermittent inhibitor switch 😒

Check you're getting power to the O/D solenoid. Engine off/ignition on/in 3rd or 4th you should be able to hear the solenoid make a faint 'click' when you flick the switch on/off. If no click try a more direct 12v feed to the solenoid. If you get a click with a direct feed but not via the switch change it so your direct feed goes via the switch. If you get a click from the switch but no drop in RPM when driving it's probably the solenoid seals that have perished, so it's switching in/out but rather than changing where the oil flows to engage the o/d the oild just flowing around the seals. I'd have to hunt for the 3 different sizes but you they are just 'O' rings and you can pick up oil proof ones easily on eBay in packs of 5, then replace them (straight forward - though disassembling the solenoid piston is a bit fiddly, first getting the tiny circlip off and second getting the piston out). If it works for both it's probably the inhibitor switch on the gearbox that's at fault. You MIGHT get lucky and find it just needs tightening or a shim adding/removing but I'd just replace it as they are cheap and don't last forever. If it works direct but not via the switch, it's probably the switch so replace it. If you get an electric shock, it's the wiring. If there's no click, even powered direct you're probably looking at a new solenoid. If everything works and clicks wire a tell-tell bulb across the solenoid, so you can see if it's still getting power when you're driving and flicking o/d on/off. If that's working then you probably need a recon overdrive - probably just the oil pump but o/d units are very much marked "Here be mosters" on my DIY map.

Don't you need to wind them up, rather than down to reduce ride height (OP said too high)? Winding up will compress the spring, making it shorter and so lowering the car.