MOT on the rover p5b. No tax and no tax disc.

I took the rover for its MOT today and it passed with no advisories. Due to its status as a historic vehicle (a reminder of when this country had a thriving car manufacturing industry) it qualifies for free road tax. Its tax disc is marked as no payment made. The EU in another interference in English affairs are proposing to do away with tax discs,our weak government will go along with this as they allow the Germans and others to do more damage to this country in peacetime than they ever did in war.
How long before these parasites want old cars off the road ?

Repairing and restoring.some old leather car seats

The seats in my rover p5b were pretty grim but I had a secondhand set also in very poor condition to practice on.
They had been painted and were very hard and cracked,the first thing to do was rub them carefully with thinners to get the paint off.

The seat back was bad,cracked and creased.

I experimented on another scrap seat and found most cracks were actually in the painted surface and they could be smoothed with fine wet and dry or a wire wool pad.

The front panel of the seat was heavily painted and stiff,most of the paint was removed with thinners.

After much cleaning with an alcohol based cleaner the dye was rubbed into the cracks and then a fine coat sprayed on,the improvement to the leathers texture was most noticeable.

The seat after a thin sprayed coat of dye.I found the dye too thick to spray with an air brush and used a spray gun (gravity feed type) and set on minimum it gave a very fine spray.The seat still has to have another coat (maybe) and then has to be sealed.

Rover p5b featured on another site.

My Rover p5b is featured on this web site. The heading picture isn't very flattering but the article hopes to encourage anyone thinking of having a go at using a classic car to do so.
I hope it does.

Curing the thirst of the V8 in the Rover P5b

The tick over or idle of the Rover had been lumpy for some time and setting the carbs didn't seem to help. I went through the ignition replacing and repairing but no real difference.
The fuel consumption was pretty horrendous and the car would tick over albeit it a bit more lumpy even when cold without choke.
I pulled out the starter valves.these act as a choke on HIF6 carbs letting through a rich mixture. One was pretty worn but on one carb the O ring had broken up completely. I replaced both and although I still have to reset the carbs the V8 now idles slowly without trying to cut out or foul its plugs.

Is the doggy in the window still for sale?.

The shop is now for sale by auction but the business will carry on . Patti will soon have to find another place to sit in.

Patti also enjoys a car ride and is quite content to sit in the van and watch the world go by when we go to an auction or car boot sale .

Bye bye to Lowestoft

I'm trying to get in touch with all customers,suppliers etc to advise our new address and contact details.
They are posted now on the web site ,we are moving to Gorleston about six miles down the road from Loweestoft.

Cricket on the village green.

I'm glad to be leaving Lowestoft.it became virtually impossible to trade there due to the head in the sand attitude of the local council.

Flood damage on east coast

We took a walk along the beach from Gorleston heading south. A few months before we had climbed these steps up the cliffs to the caravan site.
Now after the flood the steps are damaged and impossible to use.

Transit what to do with it?.

I really dont know what to do with my old transit motorhome. I hardly ever use the poor old thing,it just stands outside looking forlorn. I spent a lot of time welding it and rebuilding the engine but just dont get the time to use it.

I guess if I sell it I will regret it but in the meanwhile what use is an old motorhome other than for motorhoming?.

Flooding on the east coast. Missed us this time.

We managed to escape the worst of the flooding at our shop in Lowestoft but it did knock out our phone line and we lost internet access for a couple of weeks.
A friend further down the coast had their bungalow badly damaged,

The old wooden sea defences also took a battering

The wooden breakwaters near Gorleston have been smashed and uprooted even though these are very substantial wooden beams held by huge metal bolts.

Emergency services were stretched to breaking point and routine repairs delayed for some time.We managed to carry on using another phone line and a mobile phone and didn't let any one down on deliveries of tools or orders.

Happily we wont have to worry about flooding in Lowestoft for much longer.

Welding up the wings on a fairway taxi.

The wings on my old fairway taxi bounced up and down on every bump in the road. It seems a fairly common complaint,the inner and outer wings are held together and to the rest of the bodywork with coarse threaded screws and plastic spacers. They rust badly and quickly
I welded the inner and outer wings together with a steel strip replacing the plastic.

After welding the join was ground down and covered with a skim of filler. The wings are much stronger after being welded together. Temporarily the repairs were covered with some black gloss. At a later date the taxi will be resprayed.

Two stroke oil .Is it the new snake oil?.

For a long time now I've been running an old London taxi as a runabout.

 Not long after buying it I first heard of using two stroke oil as an additive in diesels to combat the lack of lubrication in the new 'eco' diesel fuels.

I started using it a few years ago and over a time I tried different brands,mixtures and permutations to see what difference it makes if any.
There is the chance of 'placebo effect' when you convince yourself that something has to be better because you want it to be so I used different drivers and studied reports on other web sites and forums.
The engine especially cold,is quieter,the diesel 'knock' reduced (again mainly from cold). Starting is if anything better and the engine seems smoother. MPG is slightly improved but to be strict the figures are close enough before and after that the difference is not really worth much.
I found any low ash two stroke fuel works fine. I use whatever I can find cheaply (normally Wilko or Asda) and a mixture ratio of 75 to 1 or thereabouts seems to work fine.When stopping the addition of the two stroke oil it seems to take some time and a few refills of the tank for the rattle to return fully,so maybe there is a residual effect of the oil.
The life of filters is unaffected.
The cost is pretty negligible and the positive benefits are worth it. I have now used the oil for many thousands of miles and have noticed no negative results from its use in any way.
Snake oil? Others have reported similar benefits,so probably no.
You can read about the taxi etc here.

Rover P5b,Transit Mk1 and Fairway taxi spares wanted.

If anyone has any unwanted spares or parts for any of the above vehicles I'm always interested in buying,swapping etc. Even parts that are worn can be repaired or restored.

I've been carrying out a rolling restoration on my Rover P5b  for a long time and even a wing like this rotten  one can be repaired or a section cut out to rebuild another one.

My old taxi has clocked up a huge mileage but still keeps going but these days needs a fair bit of attention on a regular basis.Now obsolete so its a good time to start collecting parts for it.

BT get their act together.

Fair play to BT we had a call from them and the line has now been sorted.
One lesson I've learnt is that if you dont get anywhere the first time you try again and again if you have to.
Persistance pays off in the end.

BT do they care?.

For over three weeks my home phone line has been dead and my broadband slow to the point of being useless. BT have lied again and again about fixing it and they deliberately have kept me on hold time and time again on an expensive mobile. Asking them to cancel the contract or give a MAC code means they cut the line or pass me on to someone who is incapable of understanding english.
I thought I'd either accept this or rant and rave or try and sort it.
Trawling through the net you can find alternative numbers and e-mail addresses for managers and directors of BT. I tried contacting some of these. I'm not going to post them on here as if they are bombarded with complaints it is counterproductive but already a rep from BT has phoned and the problem is being attended to.
I'll post as soon as I know what happens.

Black and Decker multi tool. Usefull or what?

I went to a small car boot sale on sunday. In a school playing field near the James Pagett hospital it was a fund raiser for the school. Not a huge turn out but I sold a few bits and bobs and bought one of those muti tools. Looking a bit like the Dremel everyone is familiar with,this was the Black and Decker version.
When I got home I carried on with draining the radiator of the P5b Rover The bottom hose clip was rusted solid and just wouldn't undo. So,I thought (more out of desperation than conviction) that I'd try the new toy and one of its little cutting discs. Small enough to get in place it worked a treat and cut the clip without cutting the hose. The discs are quite fragile and break easily but used correctly they did the job in a few seconds. Five quid well spent.

New Fairway taxi owners forum

If there is anyone else has daft as me,driving about in an old fairway taxi,(although to be honest they make great run abouts and clock up mind blowing mileages without falling to bits)
Ther is a new forum to talk to other owners,swap bits and pick up advice.
The link to it is here.

I'm now listing a lot of the tools I've decided to clear on on the baconsdozen web site.
I've moved and decided to pretty much wind down the business so if you want any imperial or other tools for your classic give us a call.

Elora socket sets,compressors and other bargains.

As it becomes more expensive to buy or sell on ebay I've spent more time at the car boots.
I bought a couple of Elora sockets sets for £10 each. Both were the older Whitworth/AF and metric versions in 1/2 drive. I kept one for a spare in the workshop and sold the other the following week for a small profit and ended up with a £2 socket set that cost £250 or more new!
Last week I bought a small compressor,resoldered a broken connection but then decided I didn't really need a second one so resold it and bought a almost new compression tester with the profit so it was free.
Ebay is dying on its feet as far as I can see but there are tool bargains to be had at car boots and more to be found on places like Gumtree or even in the small ads in the local paper.
I tried ebid but it isn't free as they claim and buyers are few and far between,there is life away from ebay though.

The scammers are at it again.

I've had a few e-mails from people who have received invitations to cash cheques from 'Baconsdozen Industrial' and keep a percentage.
I've directed these people to this page
Worryingly some of these have sent their bank account details and one sent a driving licence. Are people really that stupid?.

Bargains from the car boot.

I did a stall at the car boot (Burgh castle in Norfolk). The weather was poor (this has been a pretty awfull summer) and things were quiet.
I went for a wander round not really convinced that I'd find anything worthwhile.I spotted a huge Record vice laying on the floor at one stall.It was seized but the rust looked reasonably light and the oil and grease was dirty but still should have offered some protection and for £10 it was a potential bargain.It was heavy enough not to want to lug it too many times round the field and when I got it home a half hour with releasing fluid and a blow torch it was soon in a usuable condition.
The next bargains were a couple of compression testers,one in a box with all the adaptors and the other looking little used £3.50p bought the two. A vacuum gauge was 50p and a huge engine starter and charger was another £10.
The starter/charger needed some soldering but seems to work fine.
I didn't sell much but with my purchases considered the day was a good one.

Is that really the time?

I can't believe it,times gone so fast.
We are now doing a few car boots,we normally go to Julies car boot at Burgh Castle,only down the road from us now we've moved.
We started taking a load of second hand bits and pieces but are now taking some tools.We managed to get hold of a few in a cheaper range that the whitworth and AF tools stuff that we sell on the net.These are mainly metric.
We've also bought a load of hardware for the house,DIY etc .Time will tell if this is a seller or
 not.
Meanwhile I've done little real work on my P5b Rover. I repaired a water leak on the back screen and had a breakdown on the way to a car show.

I've spent a long while welding rust holes in the transit and taxi.