Wot, not another '79 Targa resto thread

[PeterK]

So, a multitude of minor progresses since my last musings.

No.1. My hazard and indicator lights weren’t working, but had been previously. Also my parking brake warning light is not playing. Both come from the same fuse, but I knew that was OK, as no LED indicator/warnings on my fuse panel (one of Jonny’s).

Peruse a wiring diagram and muse a little over tea. The lights all worked, as when I set or unset the alarm they all flash. Pulled the hazard switch to check for power (both ignition and constant) and discovered one feed spade terminal was not fully pushed on. Pushed fully on and hazard and indicators now all working as Mr P intended. That was easier than expected.

Not sure that I have seen the parking brake light working since I wired my seats. Probably knocked off a connection, so will check when I replace my carpets. We’ll call this still pending.


I started stripping my CIS for cleaning and replacement of inlet tract sleeves. While stripping, I noticed that some injector sleeves wobbled very little and some wobbled quite a lot. I believe that the injectors are relatively new, as I saw a sales post by someone I believe to be the PO to the PO. He was selling a set of injectors that were replaced when he thought that they were faulty but his new ones made no difference, and so he was presuming that the old set for sale were fine. There was much RTV or silicon sealant around the injectors and above the injector sleeves. Now this maybe due to the PO of the PO searching for leaks, but as I don’t know what ‘normal’ feels like for injector ‘wobble’, I decided it was worth £50 to replace them all. When you’ve spent as much as I have so far, what’s another £50 while you’re in there



While waiting for the new injector sleeves, I primed the headlight vanity rings


wire brushed the gearbox cross-member and engine & gearbox mounts.


Then rust treated


And painted


In full transparency, they were going to be black, but just as I started spraying them with Hammerite, the spray nozzle broke off and the can continued spraying. I sloshed the paint on as best I could, but today decided it needed another coat and only had silver. So, silver it will be then.



I need to pressure test the fuel pipes, so I bypassed the engine completely

Just need a bucket of petrol now and I can run the pump to push fuel through the pipe that I have played with (or refurbished if we’re being pretentious). By adding some restriction at the end of the return line, I can gradually build pressure and check for leaks.




With the CIS system, I had my new inlet tract sleeves, but it was fairly obvious that everything needed a good clean. What started as a simple clean soon went downhill.

First I saw too much oil and carbon inside the inlet tracts, so as I was replacing the sleeves anyway, off came the inlet tracts for a squirt of EGR cleaner (it’s the best carbon cleaner-off-erer stuff that I had available), a rinse in the parts washer, followed by a clean with brake cleaner. Unfortunately, the inside of the airbox and the rubber pipe thing that joins the throttle valve and the CIS air thingy were equally yucky. Time to split the airbox. Took all of the screws out ….. and then realised that the two halves were epoxied together. I put all of the screws back and did my best gyno impressions, reaching into all the nooks and crannies through the inlet tract orifices, etc.



It was a bit of a struggle getting the plenum / pipe / thingy back on the top, but I managed eventually




Time to replace the injector sleeves. These are retained simply by peened over edges


So, first I dremeled off the peens


and drifted out the sleeves



Comparing the old and new sleeves, I don’t know why I bothered



With new o-rings fitted, I first pressed then drifted the sleeves fully home and re-peened (if there is such a word)




All ready for refitting of CIS to the engine now.

[deano]

Was wondering if you have tried the Bilt Hamber Deox-C ? It removes rust like magic .... I use Por15 metal prep after that and then paint....

[PeterK]

I use Fe-123 from Rust Buster. Then clean the salts and residue off, and I'll normally paint with epoxy primer, but just Hammerite this time.

[911SE]

Very interesting thread, thanks for sharing

[PeterK]

It’s been a while. Sorry. In my defence, I was distracted by several days work (yes, I know that I’m supposed to be retired, but sometimes ….), plus I have been flitting between different things, as time and parts permitted. I also was awoken at 2:30 by a chirping alarm. Believing it to be the 911 alarm, I trudged out to the garage only to find that it was my BMW X1 daily.

The battery was sooo flat that I had to work out where my emergency key was to get into the car and open the bonnet. Considering it had started fine earlier in the day when we did our weekly shop, I was a tad surprised. I put the charger on it and went back to bed. In the morning the charger showed that it had failed to charge the battery. I reset the charger and, thankfully, was granted special dispensation to use SWMBO’s car to go away for a couple of days work and then went hunting for the issue. To cut a long story short, starting with an initial 62 fault codes showing up, and when I got the car running, all of the dash lights and tacho working then going off, then working for a few seconds before going off again (and repeat annoyingly), I finally started narrowing things down. With half of the rear removed from inside the car and about 2 hours later ….. I believe that the trailer PCB and the park sensor control units both sitting in 3 inches of water in the well behind the rear wheel (including an inch of ice – told you it was cold), may have been the culprits messing with the CANbus. I took the two units apart, dried them and cleared the mould growth away, and touch wood, no codes today. Anyway, back on topic …..


… and in no particular order…..
Fed up with the froot being in the way and at risk of further damage, I risked SWMBO seeing what I had bought since she was last in the garage and enlisted her assistance in lifting it onto the car.

[

The front wings are bolted on (with most but not all of their bolts), although without any sealing muck currently. Really must finish mounting them sometime. Pretty happy with the fit as a first fit. Fitted the latch and added an emergency release while I was there. Excuse me if I don’t include photos of that.




I recently got lucky and scored myself a set of original carpets from a 3.2, in good condition. The carpets I had recently fitted were slightly coarser weave, so the next step was to remove them, plus of course, the seats.


Then fit the replacement carpets and bolt the passenger seat in again.


The driver’s seat hasn’t been refitted yet, as I wanted to address the auto heating system sensors. First I had to remove the auto unit to get access to the sensor plugs (not sure why I didn’t do this before I fitted it).


When I probed them (oh err, missus), I was looking for about 1.8KOhm resistance at 20’. I got open circuit at the rear (sensor came with the car but was just dangling down, unused and without any place for it to be fitted in the flapper box). The front (bought from here) gave 13 Ohms – a bit low.

Luckily, the front sensor turned out to be a duff connection (user error fitting it).

I cut off the rear sensor and checked it.


Still open circuit. I checked the cables and they were sound (no bleed to ground or cross wire).

As the sensors are just thermistors, I scanned ebay to get suitable replacements. As mentioned, I wanted 1.8 @20’C, but found the choice was between 1K and 2K @25’, so they would need resistors added to get them correct. Speaking with our resident sparky guru, I enquired whether he would a) go with the lower rated thermistor and add an additional resistor in series, or b) go with the larger and add resistor in parallel. We discussed the merits of each, then he said, I’ve got 1.5K thermistors, so I went looking with RS and Farnell. Regarding the difference between 1.5 iand 1.8, Jonny said he would just select a hotter or cooler temperature on the selector. Simples really. Sometimes we just over-think things.

RS didn’t have what I needed, but Farnell did. They’re cheap, but as I wasn’t ordering a bucket-full, there was a £10 picking charge, so I bought 5. Plenty of chances to try stuff without worrying about damaging one.


When they arrived it was cold in the garage, and testing one of my new thermistors showed 3kOhm, but that was almost exactly the same reading as the in-cabin sensor. Result.

I drilled out the centre of the sensor


added shrink sleeving to the legs of the thermistor


stuck the thermistor into the mounting and sealed the base


I wanted to use epoxy but only had JB Weld (contains metal, so probably conductive), so I potted it with resin


I tinned the ends and attached it to the original loom (what a nice saving against buying a secondhand replacement)


and fitted it into the flapper valve. I tested it again, and all was expected. Flapper valve refitted and auto controller bolted back in place.




My new inlet studs arrived and got fitted


followed by refitting the CIS assembly


Having reconnected all of the wires, tightened the rubber inlet tubes, etc, and with new seals fitted, in went the injectors



My car came with race headers and no heat. In a move opposite to most, I’m reverting to original, so on with a NOS fan


Add heater pipework and by close of play today, my engine looks like this


It still needs the flywheel and clutch fitting and to be attached to the gearbox. I also still need to test the fuel pipes and I’m (still) waiting for the long engine bay seal to arrive. Other than that and the exhaust box, it’s all ready to go back in (I hope).

[PeterK]

It’s been ages since I did an update, mainly because I’ve been working and doing garden chores for SWMBO. I’ve done 2/3 of bu$$er all, but here’s what I have been up to.

I decided to paint the mirrors (one had needed repair that I only noticed when I tried to reassemble them), and various parts that I couldn’t find when I painted the shell (fuel flap, and torsion tube cover plates). Should be simple, but it’s always that last coat that gets you. I was clearly rushing without regard to the low temperatures. Having used some heaters to warm the parts, then turned them off (paint fumes and naked heat do not play well together), I didn’t think how rapidly they would cool. End result – a couple of annoying runs. Plus, I had not drained the compressor tanks recently, and the second mirror was treated to a nice spray of water droplets. Hey ho, leave them a couple of days, sand, reprime where necessary, re-sand and put away until the weather warms up.
I then decided to do a bit of a tidy up, as I won’t be spraying for a while.

This was before !


As a further ‘it needs doing sometime, so it might as well be now’ activity, I decided to fit my Odyssey battery. I had to make a bracket / stand, but it all fits quite neatly.

While I was in the area, I thought that might as well get back into some fabrication. First you make a CAD template


Can you tell what it is yet ?

Get the cutting and bending tools out


Cutty, cutty, bendy, bendy and we get to


And add switch



As the main terminals are large and, aside from the starter cable, all power cables are small eyelets, I decided to add a power post


When the switch is turned off, the big terminals cut the feed from the battery, and the W terminals (upper) will route the alternator to earth, via a chunky resistor. The Z terminals will cut the ignition circuit.
It mounts onto the front two wing bolts, just nicely clear of the fuse panel, but suitably out of the way. Just waiting for some rubber post boots to arrive before I can complete it. I have loosely fitted it, ‘cos it was in the way.





Another ‘I really must get around to it’ task was fuel pipe testing. I added a longer length of hose to the pump inlet and dropped it in a fuel can. I put the fuel return line into a second fuel can. In the engine bay I’d (ages ago) linked the feed and return lines together. All that was left was to add power. Whirr, whirr but no fuel flow. Quick bit of checking – the large ring terminal goes on the larger fuel pump terminal, right. No, wrong. My new pump has the terminal posts the other way around. Remake the terminals and much better.

I ran the pump and did a check about – no leaks (well, none evident, anyway). Time to increase pressure. I looked around for something to use as a restrictor and the only thing that had a M14 thread that came to hand was my compression tester. The good news is that I can get over 4 bar , the less good news is that as the connection was not great, I got fuel spraying everywhere.

Time for Plan B. I’ve some brake pipe clamps, so tried that. I could fully block the pump, so did a quick scurry around while it was running dead-ended. Great news, no leaks. I then loosened the clamp to give a very small flow and scurried around again – still no leaks. Result.



With a little time left over today, I spied the engine on the stand. Needs to come off for the flywheel and clutch to be fitted, plus of course the gearbox.

Time to dig out the engine hoist. It is incredibly dusty and dirty, but it still works.


I lowered the engine onto my pallet trucky thing


And took off the spider engine mount. My patched and painted (pre-'74) heat exchangers are on, but I really want a pair of SSIs - anyone got any to sell to an impoverished restorer ??. Anyway, now I can fit the flywheel and clutch.

[911hillclimber]

You are working harder than me!
All looks great progress inc getting the Boss' hands dirty.....

Stop working, stop slakin', get it done.
Soon you can drive it!

[The Garage Bitch]

I am impressed by the K Vehicle Restoration PLC ethos

It is rare for the Chief Executive to leave the Boardroom and experience hands-on life on the shop floor.

Gawn yirsel Sue

Kudos

[PeterK]

First time in 3 years mate.
I reckon she was just checking out what bits I had bought

[The Garage Bitch]

Noooooooo

Never

[rhd racer]

TV in the garage?!! That’s just toooooo posh!

[PeterK]

Left to me when a friend moved back to Oz many years ago & before TV broadcasts were digital. I put it up there to have dual computer screens when I need parts views, etc. Also thought that I could stream music & rock videos while I work.
Never used it though - been videoing everything (not yet edited a single minute yet and have well over 2TB of recordings). Have to use earbuds when videoing to avoid copyright issues

[rich73]

Looking great. Tempted by a sheet metal folder like yours, currently using a piece of angle attached to the bench to hammer against for my folding. Fine for steel but presume it would end up looking a mess if I tried with alloy.

[PeterK]

Looking great. Tempted by a sheet metal folder like yours, currently using a piece of angle attached to the bench to hammer against for my folding. Fine for steel but presume it would end up looking a mess if I tried with alloy.

Once I worked out what I could use to clamp things effectively (that took me a while - clearly I'm a bit slow on the uptake), it has been great.

[PeterK]

Awaiting a crimping tool for flag terminals, but otherwise, the cut-out switch is wired. To ‘kill’ the ignition, I will wire the switch to cut the feed that runs from fuse 11 in the front, to fuse 22 in the rear - this wire also supplies the power to the CDI, etc. Wiring is ready, but currently just looped past the cut-out switch.



While awaiting the much-delayed long engine seal, I could still play with the clutch. New spigot bearing (old one looked and felt fine, but while the clutch is out …..)

For the ’79 models the spigot is (gently) drifted in, although later models have a bolted in version.

Then clean the gearbox (again). There was a lot of oil from the Exxon Valdez engine and also soooooo much rust-proofing wax on it, that it took an age, but there’s still plenty of wax left of on it.


After Jonny had regaled me with his horror stories about clutch forks, I bought a new one. The old one has no evidence of cracking, and is probably fine


… but I’ve got a new one, so it was fitted

Anyone want to make me an offer for a clutch fork ?

I also replaced the Omega spring, although the small retaining circlip disintegrated on removal, so something else that’s ‘in the post’.

This is the ‘before’ photo !, and the eagle-eyed will notice that it was also taken before I fitted the clutch fork.


Moving on, clutch fitted


I have also refitted all of the tinware, but no photo, so use your imagination


I have also refitted the Electric aircon hi-power blower. It was previously trial fitted, but then removed to give me access to play with more wiring. Now that I am (hopefully) past wiring behind the dash, refitting the blower both reduces the risk of me damaging it and frees up yet more space.


Running out of reasons not to fit the front wings for the final time.