Monday, January 27, 2003

Slave cylinder rebuild

So having recieved a slave cylinder rebuild kit from Canley Classics, and having no previous experience of working on cars, I set about taking out the radio, dash support, carpet and gearbox cover and unbolting the slave cylinder. Of course what I would do now is totally remove the slave cylinder mounting bolt because the slave cylinder in notched and won't come out with it still in! What I did of course was to try and prise open the mount, splitting it in the process. It still looked servicable so after replacing all the rubber seals I bled the air out and put everything back. I was delighted to find I now had a working clutch! Job done!

Friday, January 10, 2003

Welcome to the blog!

Hi, and welcome to my new blog! I'm Will and I've owned my 1976 Triumph Spitfire since 2001. I bought it sight unseen (and without an MOT!) from Clive Manvers Triumph after Clive reassured me that it only needed a few patches welding into the floor! I paid £1200, which might seem a bit much for a car without an MOT but when it arrived I was delighted to find a brand new mohair hood in the boot, Pirelli P3000s all round and the bodywork in decent condition (although it's a bit rusty round the bonnet seams and could do with a respray!). I set about getting it MOT'd but unfortunatly while I was away at uni, Mum couldn't get it into reverse and mechanic Ken Paris (who owns an immaculate TR4) identified the fault as being due to having no fluid in the clutch master cylinder whatsoever! Once that was sorted and the car had been welded, MOT'd, taxed, insured etc I nervously backed it off the drive and spent the next 25 minutes trying to get it into 3rd gear! Over the next couple of months I used it every day but eventually the novelty of topping the clutch fluid up every other journey wore off and I was forced to become mechanically intimate with the working of the clutch! More next time....