Good to go

Becky's now ready for the HCR. I checked all the fluids and topped up where necessary. I even found a couple of jobs to do on Becky. Last night I repositioned the steering wheel as it wasn't aligned when the front wheels were straight and I don't want Tony (my co-driver on the HCR) to be caught out by it. I think I know why Becky lost all that coolant. The top hose wasn't fully in at the thermostat cover so I loosened the clip, pushed the hose all the way in and tightened up the clip. Hopefully, it should be watertight now.

Hot stuff!

The past few days I've noticed that Becky's been oveheating whiile standing in traffic. Just what I needed a few days before Club Triumph's Historic Counties Run. When I got home from work yesterday I let Becky cool down, took the radiator cap off and topped up the radiator. I reckon I put about a litre of water in and ever since she's been fine. I will be rechecking on Saturday morning before I set off. I'll be checking the tyre pressures when I fill up with pertol today after work.

Steering

I've now refitted the steering column bracket and the dash has been refitted. I'm hoping to have another go at getting the old rack out once I can remove the coupling. After that it should be plain sailing fitting the rack from the spares car and then fitting the rebuilt steering column.

Back to Baby Blue yet again!

Work is now progressing on removing all the steering components. The steering column came out with some difficulty. I had to remove the bracket which involved taking the dash off. The real breakthrough came when I removed the top bolt from the coupling and the steering column then came out. The rack is nearly ready to come out once I've removed the coupling which won't come out for me at the moment. At last I was able to fit my new steering column bush. I've also found out that the 1500fwd has solid rack mountings so the poly bushes I've bought are useless but I can use them with Snowdrop.

Insurance

The insurance renewal for Becky is coming up so I phoned Lancaster to see how much it would cost to renew with then and they quoted me the best part of £400! As Snowdrop was insured with Footman James I thought I'd try them and they were able to add Becky to the policy for an extra £89 and better still both cars now have unlimited mileage! Well worth it. Becky's front bumper is now creased so I'll be straightening it tonight.

At long last!

I've finally done some more work on Baby Blue. I fitted the petrol tank that was in the spares car. I've also fitted the filler pipe and vent hose. I just need to connect up the fuel line and I can then put some petrol in the tank and fire up the car once again. I was able to fit everything back in the boot that I'd taken out! Just shows how much space you can save by being organised!

Back to Baby Blue (again!)

I was hoping to trial fit Baby Blue's petrol tank but I've just looked out of the window and it's raining so it's probably not a goer. I was reading the workshop manual and the steering rack seems easy enough to remove. None of this "raising the engine a few inches". Just undo the track rod end balljoints, remove the mounting bolts, undo the bottom pinch bolt, separate from the steering column and it should come out from the driver's side. We shall see...
I've not had chance to do anything with Snowdrop's rear axle and Toledo's axle is giving good service so no rush just yet. I've still gotta sort out the reversing light switch as well.
I seem to be doing less mileage in Becky recently. Since I filled up last Thursday I've only done 100 miles. in the space of 6 days)

Did some work on Becky

I bought a Sony CD player from a mate for £30 and I fitted it into Becky yesterday after work. I removed the original radio and the cassette deck and after an hour it was all done. The radio even has RDS and it will play MP3s as well so I'm quite pleased with it.