Fan problem and New Hood

An update on things TR7 related as I have not properly blogged for a while.
We now only have one TR7, Gill sold her Blue FHC at the end of last year so she could buy a more modern convertible. Sad to see it go, but it has a good new home. It was a nightmare to sell for a decent price, there are some prize "t--s" out there wanting something for nothing, even so called Triumph Enthusiasts from the 2 forums I visit and dealers.

FHC ready for collection on 2nd Nov last year.

The Gold DHC is still on the road all year round.
Recent Jobs

I had to do a little welding in the rear wheelarch/sill area of the DHC where it had "popped" when I scraped the fire hydrant sign on my drive. I took off the electronic ignition as a precaution, not sure what welding would do to this, also disconnected main earth and battery. Happy welded away, then put everything back together.
Upon trying the car I found out that the new type electronic controller of the Kenlowe had packed in, this would not work, even with manual switch. Tested the fan, that was ok, so I removed the controller and sent away for test, the unit apparantly contains a mini circuit board, this had blown, possibly as a result of welding with it connected. Had to buy a new one at £45. So if you have to do some welding, remove the fan control unit!
The vinyl hood on my TR7 has really suffered this winter, the stitching has rotted, with the result that the pieces over side windows has come adrift along with a couple of other stitched joints, letting water in.
Costs locally for fitting are expensive so I took the plunge and bought a new hood to fit myself, having a read up on the method to do so.

Old Hood, faded, stitching loose.





New Hood





I took the plunge on Good Friday, after stripping off the header rail and unbolting hood from the rear the old hood was removed, I needed to put in new frame straps and to re-cover the front header as these where frayed and header vinyl was coming unstuck.
I used a piece of leather for the header, a little thicker than the vinyl but a nicer finish. I managed to find some black webbing strap for the hood frame.


Re-covered Header Rail






New straps to Hood Frame.







The old hood was used as a pattern to locate the rear fixing strip which needs to be encapsulated at the bottom rear of hood, the hood was then placed on car, and temporary fixed to aid location of poppers. Once popper holes are marked, the hood has to be removed to burr over the popper fixings, then hood replaced onto car.


Hood all fastened at rear and poppers in place,




















The next job is to mark out the centre front, then prepare surfaces for glueing prior to stretching into position, I lost the sun at this time so had to wait an hour for it to re-appear. The hood needs to be stretched taught when glueing so it needs to be hot! Eventually the sun came out, and with an electric fan heater in the car adding to the heat Gill and I applied glue to the 2 surfaces then stretched into position.

Waiting for sun to come out to stretch into position.



Hood stuck to header rail, ready for trimming and glueing return under
header front.



Once glued, the front has to be trimmed, then the return glued under the header rail, quite tricky as it has a curve to it. The next job was to re-fit the header seal, this was quite frustrating as when the rivets where drilled out some of the rivet holes became enlarged, I had to drill a few new holes and use some slightly larger diameter rivets.

Finally the plastic hood frame covers have to be re-fitted.



Finished item.

 .

I think it is a good job considering I have never fitted one before, It is not as taut as I would like, however I still have to source some 1/8" rubber strips to go along the 3 rails, to stop the metal frame members rubbing on the fabric, what I took off had perished, this should then make it slightly tighter. It rained heavy last night, no leaks and it also had a run in heavy drizzle today with no leaks.

I have a couple of outstanding jobs to do soon, the tappets still need adjusting, bloody awful job I keep postponing.

I still have the rear bearing with axle end play still to sort, has not failed totally so I keep greasing. I have an engineering machine shop making me some spacers to put behind the bearing race, they tried to laser cut these but as they are so thin they distort, so these will be turned on a lathe when it becomes free.

Paintwork needs sorting, faded badly plus the scrape I did but cannot afford this at the moment.