Bodywork/Refit - 18 Weeks In

Things are progressing, kind of. In terms of the bodywork it's almost there, however it's been almost there for a while now. All that's needed is to paint the quarter lights, blow in a small area on the boot, attend to a few minor imperfections in the paintwork and then give it the final polish. Oh, and get the panel fit fine tuned.....but Steve is a man in demand and whilst I am busy with the refit his time is spent on other work. This is fine for the moment as I've had plenty to do with the refit and suffered a bit of a set-back.

The good news (of 2 weeks ago) was that the engine started easily and ran, however a leak from the water pump and more irritatingly from the head gasket put a bit of a dampener (excuse the pun) on the special moment. Forward one week and with a new head gasket in hand I was all for taking off the head in an attempt to fix the leak, but a week away and the leak was nowhere to be seen....very odd. However this was short lived, as 24 hours later and with the engine running it had re-appeared - bugger!! So off with the head it was.

Fast forward to today and the head was back on, the only difference this time was I fitted the engine lifting eye to the two longer bolts and I used Steve's very sexy torque wrench that vibrated and beeped when your target tightness was reached. I ran the engine for a minute or two and there were no obvious problems (though I had run out time at this point, the wife's 40th birthday party was beckoning). The oil pressure & battery light were still very bright, I'm not worried yet.

In the intervening weekends I had fitted the lovely new burr walnut dash, supplied by Cliff & Chapman, it is a real piece of craftsmanship....has to be my favourite bit at the moment!!