Patrick Taylor

Does that mean that if I have a little toot I can claim to be tuning up? Apologies to those trying to have an adult conversation about 3-phase electricity, while those of us whom a colleague once referred to as the belchers and farters are messing about in the back row...

The language no longer incomprehensible: Duolingo is my friend!

I was probably being over-sensitive; but thank you.

In what way? It was historically an independent nation before being conquered, has its own language, church, national teams...

I'm not sure there will be many offers, I'm afraid -and those that do exist will be cut from scrap cars and may be no better than your existing header rail. In the past, Bond (and no doubt Triumph) owners have made small welded repairs to each hole in the windscreen frame and then ground to whole lot flat. I would be surprised if you didn't find more corrosion when/if you remove the screen: Bond removed the Triumph rust proofing from the bulkheads before adding their unique windscreen pillars -and didn't replace it afterwards. I bought a ten-year old Equipe in 1980 and it was as rotten as a pear...

I was once given the Welsh equivalent of that sticker by an ancient garage owner in Brynamman: 'Mae gen i teigr yn y tanc'! I stuck it on the back of the minibus I was driving and it is only now (having taken up learning Welsh in Lockdown 3) that I fully understand what it said...or (more precisely) how it said it. Happy days/Dyddau'n hapus

Isn't that 'Harwich for the Continent', with the added graffito 'Frinton for the incontinent'? Hat, coat, door.

This will come as unwelcome news for all those who have nice chrome GB letters riveted to their rear ends...

Well (and I'm tempting fate in saying this) in 27 years of driving the car -including several when she was my daily driver- I have never needed the big red triangle that lives under the boot floor.

That's OK -Bond didn't fit ABS to the Equipe, although it may have been possible to buy Bond-branded Hush Puppies with vibrating soles to achieve the same effect (this story will be confirmed on April 1st)😁. However, they were the first car manufacturer to fit a breakdown warning triangle to their cars...

So can you change to Dot 5 simply by putting it in the reservoir and bleeding it through? I have a dim memory of needing to fit new seals throughout first?

There's enough non-standard on a Bond without changing the accelerator setup 🙂! I still haven't found out what the right cable is, so have put the old one back on and the new 13/60 one which doesn't fit, on the shelf with all the other Herald bits that should fit and don't! Even the Newton Commercial carpets are a bit sketchy fitting into the front footwells, and as for the way tunnel, footwell and rear carpets all overlap (and are not hidden by the front seats, well, I'm off to a DIY shop for an metal extrusion to tidy it all up!

Thanks for the advice; no, it isn't cut, so I'll do as you suggest...

I've got all the Newton Commercial carpets fitted except the one for the driver's footwell. How have folks fitted the accelerator pedal? I have spotted Tippex through the bolt holes onto the underside of the carpet and was intending to have the bracket on top of the carpet, with the bolts going through & into the floorpan. Or should I cut around the bracket? I don't really want another unbound hole in the carpet -the handbrake aperture is bad enough!

Guy tells me they may well be Bond's own panels. I have bitten the bullet, made up a template, removed staples where necessary and cut the hardbaord/foam backing. Just waiting on a staple gun and 4mm staples so I can finish the job. Fortunately all the adjusted parts will be hidden by the rear seat/cappings, but it all looks promising so far...

If you really want to go left field, there's the really quite rare convertible 2-litre Bond Equipe, which combines the heavy steering of a Vitesse with a front end that goes light at speed, fibreglass bodywork that looks perfect but hides swathes of terminal rust and such a low public profile that wherever you park Joe Public feels impelled to ask 'Worrisitmate?', thereby starting a ten minute conversation, come rain or shine. Oh, and such low resale values that any money you put into restoration might as well be burnt. Don't ask me how I know all this 😄

They are Bond's own; I think they were based on GT6 frames, but reworked.

The 'ground' (underlying wood) is mahogany, with walnut, or black walnut as the veneer. I removed the brittle lacquer, but it took some of the veneer with it, so I filled the missing parts and used iron-on veneer, which gives an instant tack. Then coat upon coat of Rustin's Plasticote. I also did the dashboard; photos show after and before (posted them in the wrong order!).

Thank you for that: after 40 years of running Bonds I thought I was well-informed, but have never seen the document you refer to 🙂. I think 'similar' is the key word here -the part looks the same as a Triumph one, but perhaps isn't. My car is also a 1300 (registered March '70), so you'd think they would all be the same. I'll take the rear seat out (again...) and see what's what. Hopefully any cut'n'shut will take place where it is hidden by the upright seat cushion; but there's a bracing strut from B post to wheelarch to accommodate, too...

If they are different, that might be a possibility; the seats look the same as HerVit ones, so I would think they come from somewhere in the Triumph warehouse. I'll do some checks -it looks like I may be able to adapt the ones I have; but I'll drop Guy Singleton a line first...

Yes, I'm beginning to wonder if they are. I had a trimmer do some repairs to the front seats, which were unique to Bond, so might ask him to see what he can do. But if these are Bond ones they are the first parts (other than the bodywork!) which are not from a Herald/Vitesse/Spitfire parts bin!

I am replacing various parts of the interior on my Equipe GT4S, including the rear quarter trim panels that go either side of the back seat. I ordered Herald/Vitesse saloon ones, but these are too long: the top edge is 700mm long, whereas I need ones which are 600mm along the top edge. They look identical to the normal ones -have a recessed cubby- but are shorter -so what are they off? Not a convertible (they have the wheelarch cut-outs). Oh, and yes, I've thrown the old ones away... 😥

Ah, OK. The Mk3 Spit engine in my Bond from the same era feeds the oily fumes into the manifold via a flashback arrester. Same principle, different method.

Your first pic shows a hose to the rocker box breather, but it isn't there on the video. I'm not sure what the arrangement is for a Stromberg, but does it need connecting to the inlet manifold? This will affect tickover (although SU's run better with it disconnected!).

To a Bond enthusiast, the prototype is genuinely priceless: none were known to survive, and I have only seen a couple of photos of it, taken in the factory. What it is worth is a different matter. But I doubt there is another one on the planet, so if two people want it, who knows what it might fetch? The 2-litre Equipes are rare, but then they always were: fewer than 2500 were made. Many have succumbed to terminal rot over the years but as yet they remain a very niche car. There are better ones out there for not much more money -for the time being, at least.