November Ramblings

Just a few rambling notes about November activity. After having the Gold DHC on the road most of the year I have recently given it a rest in the lock up. It has done very well this year and has been mainly ultra reliable.  It completed  the HCR and another trip to Wales and a trip to Scotland and La Carrerra. Also drove to loads of near and far events plus a lot of daily drives to work. 
Mileage since 10th Jan 2009 is 8326 with no major mechanical breakdowns - so I think it deserves a rest.

While most of Club Triumph seems to be getting excited about the RBRR. I have offered my services to Andy Dann as co-driver for the RBRR. We are more excited to have got in at Tetra Rouge for the Le Mans Classic 2010 after missing out 2 years ago - so can't wait for this.

Recently we have had a wheel bearing failure on Gills FHC. Annoyingly the replacement wheel bearing was caught up in the postal strike so had to wait 2 weeks for it thus keeping the car off the road.

Offending wheel dissassembled.

New bearings ready.

Inner bearings in.

Outer bearing in.

After replacing bearings and  torqueing up, then re-fitting wheel all was ok.  Must get round to a 4 pot brake upgrade for this car next year as it has all the other upgrades such as lowered and uprated suspension -electronic ignition - Kenlowe fan - sports manifold - KN filters and uprated needles and also a Rover SDI servo therefore just needs 4 pots to stop quicker.

Away from cars I recently spent 5 days on our boat with my father.  Passing through Tesco's at Northampton for supplies on the way to the boat I found that this must be a Triumph hotspot as I spotted 2 Triumphs in the car park:  a yellow Dolomite 1500 and a blue TR7 V8 which looked a bit of a beast.

Dolly.

TR7 beast.

Here are a few  hopefully atmoshpheric Autumn like shots taken around Braunston on the Grand Union Canal.  Braunston is a busy canal junction with canals heading for London - Birmingham and Rugby. Also  with further branch canals a few miles away leading to Oxford and Leicester.  There is a large boating community resident there.

Working boats.

Peacefull Mooring.

Braunston Manor and Church.

Converted windmill.

Canal Service Area!

Fungi.

Busy Junction.

Finally its good to see another TR7 in the Norfolk area as one of our Triumph Kleptomaniacs has just taken delivery of this Gold TR7.

Master Cylinder Reservoir

When I fitted the uprated master cylinder and servo some time ago to the DHC, which is sourced from a Rover SDI, it had a rectangular reservoir which sits level when fitted on the SDI, but is inclined when fitted on the TR7 bulkhead, thus all the fluid is at the cap end and it is virtually empty at the other end. I did not have a serviceable reservoir from a TR7 at the time so stuck with the one supplied.

SDI Servo and Master showing fluid level at cap end and low at other end.

I found a correct TR7 reservoir recently for next to nothing on fleabay, so today gave it a good clean up.

TR7 Reservoir.

I then removed the SDI reservoir and fitted the TR7 one, this I managed without getting fluid everywhere, I simply removed the 2 screws, then with a shallow container under the cylinder and an old quilt cover to soak up any fluid, quickly pulled of the reservoir allowing fluid to run into the container, handy these plastic Chinese Takeaway containers.

Reservoir off.

TR7 Reservoir fitted.

I was not worried about getting fluid on the paintwork in the engine bay as I use silicon fluid, after bleeding the brakes I ran out of fluid to top the reservoir fully, unfortunately living in a small country town none of the local garages stock silicon fluid, however there was enough fluid for a quick spin around the lanes in lovely Autumn sun. As usual my planned 5 miles turned into 15 as I got carried away!

Topping up gear box oil

I have had a bit of a gearbox oil leak for a while, this is in an innacessible area near the top of the box, and drips onto the prop and is sprayed around tunnel area, not too worried about this, not excessive, and it spreads under the car and forms an effective rust barrier.

Today I decided to check the level. With the 4:2:1 extractor manifold fitted access to the filler plug is difficult, with only a couple of inches swing on a spanner or socket. So, eventually with grazed knuckles I got the filler plug undone, there is no gearbox dipstick, so as I could not feel wet oil in the filler hole I presumed it needed some oil. Trying to fill from underneath is impossible without a pit or a ramp due to manifold and exhaust, so I ended up removing the gearstick/handbrake console, attaching a pipe to the oil bottle, feeding this down past the gaitor into the gearbox filler, and asking the missus to lie under the car and tell me when the oil flows out of the filler hole, thus indicating full.

Had to remove all this to top up the gearbox.

After putting it all back together I took it for a spin along some local roads.

I spotted a group of guys in a field, with a digger, TV cameras where there, I thought it might be the Time Team! also saw some old military vehicles too, so being nosey I stopped to find that they where unearthing a dump of 2nd World War US Air Force scrap from Metfield Aerodrome from where they used to fly Liberators to bomb Germany. This was all dumped in an old sand pit during the Yanks final days at the airfield.

Digging out aircraft scrap, note large manifold to left and bits of fuselage.

Aircraft Oxygen Tanks.

This is only 1 trench, they expect to dig a few more, a barrel from a Gatling Gun

can be seen on the left of the soil mound.

This was segragated from the rest of the scrap dug up, couple of round things could be bombs, and in view is a machine gun belt with a few live rounds still in the belt.

Talking to one of the guys, there has always been a rumour since the Yanks departed that at one of the Suffolk Airbases they dug a massive pit and dumped in complete Indian motor cycles, complete Willys Jeeps, complete aero engines, which they could not transport to the states, the local aircraft group hope to find this one day.

2009 Mile of Triumphs - Sunday

Sunday was the Mile of triumphs convoy run from Fleggburgh to Great Yarmouth sea front, 198 Triumphs followed the route through Filby and Caister to the seafront at Yarmouth, the cars measuring out at around 3/4 mile nose to tail along the front, I think this was the best ever attendance.

Cars lining up for the convoy.

Nice blue saloon.

Some Norfolk Club Triumph cars in line.

Overall view of the convoy start.

More Norfolk members.
Triumphs at the seaside.
Line up along the sea front.

After the Mile convoy there was an option of a scenic run along the Norfolk coast, into the broads, then back to the showground for a Funkana. Norfolk area took the run, with an excellent tulip diagram route, stopping at Waxham Barns for coffee and snacks.

Blue sky at Waxham Barns.

Waxham Barns.

2009 Mile of Triumphs - Saturday

This weekend was the 12th running of the TSSC Mile of Triumphs event and what a fantastic weekend it was, Saturday was the car show, 193 cars, mainly Triumphs, sun all day long, no wind so nice and hot, great to meet old friends and make new ones.

This event is excellent, whilst it is run by the TSSC Norfolk Area, cars from all the major Triumph clubs where in evidence supporting East Anglia Childrens Hospice.

Nice colour on this TR6 Ex Chatterton saloon, Winner best 2000/2500.

All gathered around for prize giving.

Nice Spit, Doolyroo fresh from 10CR in the backfround.

Ted, Norfolk Club Triumph winner of best TR catergory.
Vitesse with Rover V8.

Unusual Hillman Imp police car. Jim, Norfolk Club Triumph winner of best GT6 Catergory.

My Seven.

A couple of small saloons.

Neil Bishops TR7 V8 and Stag.

More Norfolk Club Triumph Cars.

Henham Steam Rally

With the show season drawing to a close, today I took a trip to the Henham Steam Rally near Southwold. Nothing was organised with Club Triumph so as I have never been to this before I thought I would give it a try. Usually we get free entry if showing the cars, but today I had to fork out £8-00 and park the TR7 with the public.

The weather was very good, hot and sunny, and there was a lot to see, with 2 or 3 marquees of crafts, a selection of boys toys, eg: Radio controlled planes and boats, small scale live steam locos and tractions engines, some marvellous Meccano Models.

The bigger stuff included Steam engine demonstrations such as log sawing, threshing, and stone crushing. Surprisingly there was not a large amount of the big Traction Engines and Showmans engines, it was mainly the smaller road engines, however what was there was interesting, I do like the smell of steam and hot oil. There was a couple of sections for cars, one for vintage pre 1960 cars, a lot of Wolselys, Rileys, Humbers, a couple of Jowetts, and an area for post 1960 cars with a fair few Triumphs on show belonging to East Anglia Practical Classics Club.

I have never seen as many classic tractors as at this event, lines and lines of them, they dont do anything for me, but there was a lot of old farmers swarming over them, all saying "thats right boy"

Also on show where a large amount of hit and miss engines, early static semi diesel engines, all powering pumps, generators, etc.

I also looked around a selection of military, classic bus and commercial vehicles.

Heres a few pics.

Ransome and Jefferies Road Tractor.

Vintage Section.

Mk1 2000, Big Rover, and Yank Tank.

Steam Lorry.

Aveling Steam Tractor.

Southend Albion Bus.

GTR4 Dove

Early Case tractor

Sawing Demonstration.

Nice Triumph 1500.

Another Tax Exempt 2000.