Peter Truman

Thanks Kevin for your above and beyond service and may your 2022 year be less troublesome

what's the thoughts on the cam bucket/follower having a drain hole in it, the original Stanpart item was a closed bucket sp was full of oil with the pushrod end fully immersed in it. I notice some go faster aftermarket buckets are drilled so that the excess oil can drain out, experts thoughts on this option please. good or bad?

Happy New Year to you all let’s all hope 2022 will be better than the last, it’s only an hour to go here until 2022, NZ will be there already. It looks like people aren’t venturing out to the civil festivities in great numbers unlike past years.

I'm lucky I've had my Mk2 Vitesse since it was 3 years old, ie it's a late 68 (PDN---G) and I brought it in mid 71, shipping it home to Aus in late 73, but the old log book shows it had 5 owners in those 3 years the original selling garage Robt B Massey of York (demo model), a lady owner in Ripon (looked up her residence nice historical house), Glovers of Ripon, then the M/S Zetland Estate (Olliver) where I believe for a short term it was the young lords daily driver until his new MGB GT arrived (no class!), then back to Glovers of Ripon then finally to me where it still is, but a long way from it's original cooold home to warm Melbourne where it's 38C today. I traded in a 66 Herald Conv for it (JBA37D), I have all the purchasing and shipping documentation for it, plus the original but tatty green log book. It's been converted from a saloon to a Conv with a CKD Conv rear tub, and has had the rear side outriggers & side rails replaced, amazing what 5 years North of England winters can do, all the mechanicals are original, Oh it has an Aus CKD Herald 12/50 bonnet fitted (4 headlight Vitesse style) as the original was damaged by in a shopping car park, not by us! When in England it did 2 round GB tours with us and overseas friends 4 up plus luggage, plus several European trips to all 70's civilized European countries! Whilst now not it's fully original body, it's been mine 50 years and I still enjoy it & tinkering keeps me sane & active at nearly 77 & oftern wondering WHY did Triumph make that part or assemble it that way!

Most of our club guys have re-veneered their dash’s inevitable here with the sun cracking the lacquer/resin. It has resulted in some very exotic timber veneers and great mirror finish’s around the dash centreline better than even RR. Mind you there’ve taken their time. The best dash I’ve had of all my Triumphs and Jags was a 66 Herald 1200 Conv I purchased in 67 it was a dark oak type finish an exact mirror finish around the centre, none of my subsequent Triumphs have been anywhere near as good. My Sprint has been re-lacquered it’s OK but I’ve had to trim/sand back around the cubby door to get it to fit without sticking similarly the RH gauge panel so as it’s easy to remove as the PO had used many coats of marine lacquer.

CV rubber boot replacement suppliers provide a plastic funnel like tool with the boot to expand the boot end over the CV joint, I’ve made similar with cardboard to fit the small ended boot over the rack ball joint suitably greased of course. Ref condom’s went to our club here BBQ at a mates we took the wife’s Jag rather than a Trumpg as it was a hot day, in retribution my mate put a “French letter” on the bonnet Leaper I fortunately noticed it before we drove off and removed it and fitted it over his front gate handle, I’d forgotten how bl**dy slippery those things were, I could feel the lubricant on the Leaper for day’s. I did ask him in front of his wife why he had a “French Letter”

I have a set of Monroe Air Shocks to fit the Spitfire the daughter wants to try playing with the rear suspension, another job to do!

Pete my daughter worked for GMH here in Aus but was assigned to the US GM Development arm she used to travel to the US frequently where they always gave her a Surburban she 5ft 4in and only 6.5 stone one of their tests was to drag race thro Detroit from lights to lights, she didn’t like those trucks and preferred the Pontiac (Monaro) which she spent a lot of time developing. have a Happy New Year and enjoy your holiday

I always ensure there is a hole or jiggler on my thermostats a safety factor, if you don't want/like it after drilling one you can always block it with solder or maybe a pop rivet.

A pleasure to watch your work, well done have a good Christmas break you've earned it.

don't forget to oil the felt pad in the top of the shaft as it provides lubrication to the shaft, mine whilst a lot older is quite yellow from oiling.

well what do you reckon my chances are with a 68 Mk2 Vitesse I've had since 70 and it's never had the engine out or head off, Buckley's and None? If Covid persists I might as a project I might see if I can undo the rear and centre studs!

Like others have said what a superb job your doing and so interesting to see how the door is constructed, and esp with the basic tools your using. on Colins thread re the cuts how did you make/cut that little crescent of the third hinge bolt hole in the locating plate so as to ensure the actual hole was in the correct place Well done keep it up your creating a new standard of achievement for the DIY’er

Wagga it's all about expanding the knowledge and we all start from different base levels, but we all learn, and there are different ways of achieving the same end result, you choose what suits your requirements & capability. I liked the simplicity of you Hazard Switch, but preferred the Battery sourced Lucas option, whilst requiring multiple connections was surprising easily installed using existing Triumph wiring loom connections. Sorry if I upset you, it wasn't my intention. Ref LED and the Lucas Hazard switch I learnt the hard way I'd converted the instrument backlights to LED's (even tried different colours) and with the Hazard Switch mounted under the dash I thought a LED would be better, but it didn't work, eventually the light shone for me & I realised the bulb source in the Lucas Hazard Switch was (-), so I thought this unusual feature was worth mentioning.

My Mk2 Vitesse now has the small tank, which was NOS or CKD here, I had to replace the old larger tank as it was rusty. It does mean I carry a 2 gallon reserve can in the boot. The smaller tank does mean you have to anticipate and fill up frequently with a 6 potter 2 lt engine, esp with the distances we cover in this big wide land! Don't ask me why I had a rusty tank I didn't till I loaned my good one to a fellow club member as his was leaking and he sold his car with my tank still in it, so I inherited a holey one!!

If I read that installation correctly the Hazard Flasher is sourced from the ignition supply ie the inputs to the existing Flashers, where it is normal for the Hazard Flashers to be on the Battery supply eg push/pull Lucas Hazard Flasher 39364 as fitted to various Triumph models. Without the engine running but with the ignition turned on for extended periods as I understand it can be detrimental to any electronic ignition systems. The usual Lucas Hazard Switch when pulled isolates the ignition supply to the normal column indicator switch so as avoiding any backfeed from the battery supply to the ignition circuits. I have fitted an old second hand and hence very cheap Lucas Hazard push/pull switch as available both S/H and new on ebay to both the Mk2's Vitesse and Spitfire's very easily, it's only needed double baynot sleeves to replace the single units to break into the RH & LH flasher circuits at the existing connections into the steering column which are single baynots, similarly the single baynot ignition source into the steering column was diverted to and from the Hazard Switch (where its circuit is broken when the Hazard is switched on), the only new bit was sourcing a battery feed for the Hazard Switch, which I initially took from the light switch and fused it, now with my new 12 fused Bladed Fuse Box upgrade it has its own fuse. The Lucas Hazard Flasher also has its own (uprated?) Flasher Can, as you are using a min of 4 lights not 2. One thing to watch out for with the Lucas Hazard Switch is the flashing indicator light is negatively sourced ie the centre pole is (-) and case (+), so normal LED's won't work, incandescent bulbs are OK, you can get negative LED's from specialists. Attached is a photo of my DIY Lucas set up for the Spitfire when I had it ready for installation, all I had was the switch, the chassis ,can and the outer case was DIY. The case being simple fibre sheet soaked in super glue for strength and is attached by the mounting bolts in the Aluminum bracket which is part of the switch chassis. Please correct me if I'm wrong anywhere

When we brought the wife's X Type Jag nearly 20 years ago the first thing I brought was a high intensity LED red flashing hand held wand like the police and emergency personnel use it has a rubber mount that stands on the roof, it was good insurance we never really broke down, it's now in the Sprints boot as insurance!!

My UK mate (went to College together & shared a flat, best men and married 2 days apart & wives were friends) who now part resides most of the time in WA is holidaying down at Margaret River (wine country) and he has just had to vacate where he was staying Bush Fires on his doorstep, so back up to north of Perth. He couldn't get back to the UK because of Covid so he brought a Big, big House in the middle of a Golf Course, I was supposed to go over to help renovate the garden & irrigation system with him, BUT WA won't let anyone enter across the border esp from Vic & NSW, Oh what a pity, I just had to watch him do all the digging on the phone!!

As Pete said Orginal Dist Caps can last years and can be fixed, on a week club tour here years ago a friends Stag developed a misfire that got worse as we crossed our Great Dividing Range & it was snowing so cold too. We tracked the fault down to the Dist Cap tracking on the inside. It was duly cleaned and painted on the inside with his wife's Nail Varnish, repair still effective to this day!

Have fun and stay safe, and get home safely to that Christmas Tree!

We’re always amazed at the lengths enthusiasts in the UK go to to restore a car correctly we don’t suffer the ravages of tin worm like you do and we in our local club here often remark we’d have scrapped that! Well done and thanks for saving another Triumph

So after all this are you going to make fiber glass replica's suitably insulated! god job you made the poly car port!

Wagger, I assume no reading = no recorded use = no fee, so why complain! Boom Boom, no sir we'll estimate your usage. A few years ago re our Gas Bill here, I noticed we hadn't had a bill for over 6 months incl the high usage winter period, so I contacted our supplier to be advised that I'd changed suppliers, my response was No I hadn't. I asked who was my new supplier, they weren't allowed to tell me. It appears a neighbor down the street had changed his supplier and had put the wrong address on his paperwork and his new supplier only issued bills via email, and as they didn't have my email address we got no bill, and the neighbor simply ignored the bill because it wasn't his address or meter number! At the time we didn't have any of that info and because of personnel privacy laws no one would provide us with who the supplier or the neighbor was! Even the Gas Industry Ombudsman wouldn't provide us the info advising that it was up to the new supplier to contact us, but they did everything electronically ie email and didn't have our contact info, so a stalemate! & if they had sent me a letter I wouldn't have opened it and would have passed it onto the addresse, anyway it appears a letter wasn't in their action list! I could see our gas bill amounting to thousands of dollars, fortunately I personnally knew the State Govt Ombudsman (ex work colleague) who oversees everything so I contacted him we had lunch I told and provided him all the info, he advised the Gas Ombudsman to tell me who the neighbor was and who my new supplier was, it took a further 6 weeks and the State Govt Ombudsman to sort out, including my gas supplier being reverted to my original supplier who advised me to refuse to pay for the gas I'd used on the basis I didn't have an account/contract with the other supplier, that cost me another lunch with my friend!! What would some one do who didn't have my very high level contact. The worlds gone mad! I did get follow up invoices from the supplier, their CEO contacted me under instruction from the State Ombudsman and agreed fair compensation for the buggerizing around I wouldn't be charged, I advised that I didn't expect to see a negative credit comment against me which he assured me wouldn't happen. Another nutty thing I get, nay negotiated a 43% discount on the usage part of my gas bill for paying on time, shows how much their overcharging some users!

My sons second car was an Alfa 33 great little car, but I had to get the gearbox rebuilt, Just Alfa here showed me the selector forks he had to replace they were worn past the wear pads, he stated it's an Alfa thing, the Alfa driver has to hold the gearstick at all times between changes so it goes faster and wears the selectors out, trying to break my 19yr old son from the Alfa habit was nigh on impossible, great little car but it did consume starter motors!

Interesting Wagger re solar hot water systems for about the last 10 years ALL new houses here in Aus have to have solar hot water systems. Also around 40percent of houses old and new now have solar electricity which puts its power back into the grid but the selling rate has dropped from over 10c per kw to around 6 as the power co’s lose income so with time people are/will install batteries and even disconnect from the grid as the co’s increase their service charges to maintain their income, a vicious circle! Then there will be an increase in small personnel gennes for extra back up should the sun not shine for a couple of days. Re solar hot water The down side as my son found out is that it requires the water to be internally pumped rather than direct mains pressure so as to keep the water circulating tho the solar panels which means when you have a mains power failure you have no hot water! Whereas us with the old gas direct mains pressure systems can’t see but can still get a shower, there aren’t roof header tanks here every thing in the house runs at direct water mains pressure.