On the road again...

New banjo bolt fitted, reason it stripped was probably due to an extra washer on the bolt (hidden under some paint).
Brakes need bleeding again now.

While waiting for my bleeding assistant (wife) to become available, I filled the axle with Hypoid 90 (I’d forgotten all about it). Also bolted on the rear exhaust mount (forgotten that too) and started to look at the hand brake issue.

The hand brake was catching on the carpet. Not sure now if the carpet should be fitted first and the handbrake mount bolted through the carpet, or if the carpet is too thick.
I cut away a bit of carpet trim and fitted a washer.
Handbrake is fine now.

My bleeding assistant arrived and was put to work applying pressure to the footbrake while I twiddled the bleed nipples.
“ON…. OFF…” I called.
“ON… OFF…” again and again.

It’s OK now.
It being a nice day there now seemed to be nothing left to do - other than a quick test drive.
Rather than risk my neck, I sent her off down the street.
She came back happy as Larry (whoever he was).


Jemima was back on the road after 21 years.
Now I need to address a few minor bugs and get the MOT.
Tappits, washer bottle, underseal wheel arch, seat belt mount shim, adjust drum brakes again, fill with decent petrol.

It rains and it pours, more brake snags.

I re-fitted the brake calliper only to find that the wheel wouldn’t rotate again due to a pads being a tight fit. This sounded familiar http://campervanman.blogspot.com/2008/06/finally-got-round-tuit.html .

I measured the wire wheel brake disc and found it was 0.3mm fatter than the steel wheel one just removed. So this time I removed the sticky pad behind the pads and gave them a polish on a bed of sandpaper to shave a few microns off the pad surface.

This seemed to do the trick until the caliper bolts were fully tightened. The discs stopped spinning again. This time due to the calliper bolt. Over the years I’ve lost assorted bits but this time I was missing a spring washer – or was I missing something else.

Hanging on the wall were a few bits I’ve painted but forgotten what they were. I had three of these brake things (hose bracket) one was slightly different. One style goes under the bolt the other goes on the bolt extensions. It seems it changed during production. To solve my problem I fitted one odd one under the bolt with a lock tab. Wheel now spins.

Snag was I had to move the banjo brake hose slightly. It didn’t seem to tighten up afterwards. I had stripped the threads of the banjo bolt!
Looking closely I found that the new aeroquip hose banjo was slightly thicker than the original so less thread was available to grip.

So I need a new longer banjo bolt and probably a repair to the brake calliper.

Probably a good job it happened now as it could have come apart on the road.
Maybe I should have converted to dual circuit brakes after all.

The Front Wire Wheels Get Started

http://www.sussexclassiccar.co.uk/ managed to get a set of front wire wheel hubs. An exchange was done in the return of the bolt-on kit. I’m feeling guilty now as I seem to have done too well out of the deal!

Unfortunately I spent the next few weeks either in Stockholm or fixing the fence which blew over in the wind.

Finally I was free to visit the garage and start the front wheels.
I removed the wheel and brake calliper and then undid the main wheel nut.
After a few wallops with the hide hammer it was obvious the wheel hub wasn’t coming off so I referred to the manual which advised a puller.
Darn – I had just taken it back to work.

A few days later the hub was easily removed with the puller. The inner bearing stayed on the stub axle as advised in the manual. The bearings were new so it could stay there and hopefully when the wire wheel hub goes on it will fit. Not sure what the oil seal will do…

The outer bearing was removed from one hub and fitted to the other. The wire hub then fitted to the new brake disc and all slotted back onto the stub axle and tightened.

The split pin is tricky to fit through the tiny hole and I now need a wire wheel dust cap.

Almost there, Now I just need to refit the brake calliper and the new wire wheel.

Easier said than done…