Sunday dawned with the knowledge that I had to finish attaching the fuel pipe and start the installation of the wiring loom whatever else happened.  The kitchen table came in handy to lay the pieces out for inspection.  I was surprised that the loom was in so many separate pieces because the overdrive harness is sold as a separate item and had I assumed that this was because it was the only separate part of the loom, but it is not.  I don't understand why that is sold on its own now, oh well.

It took some puzzling because the white with purple looked identical to the white with brown but I got there in the end.  I'm hoping that this mistake was down to the poor quality of light in the kitchen early in the morning.  It turns out that the centre section of the loom is rather small which pleased me as that is all that needs to go in at the moment.

I did actually go into the garage and started by fitting the throttle pedal and the light dip switch.

I was then able to install the rest of the throttle linkage which went well.

I then removed it all as I have decided to install the engine without the linkage in place.  Next up was the middle section of the wiring loom and securing the fuel pipe.  I installed 4 rivinuts and the job was done in minutes.

So having done the list of things that had to be done prior to the engine install I turned my attention to the engine.  It was a lovely day so I took the car out of the garage and carefully slid the engine away from the wall.  It has been a long time.

I started by cleaning off the easily accessible surface rust and then started to look at what I had.

The first thing I noticed is that the sump is only held on with a few bolts.  I found the rest in a tub containing engine parts.

I removed the distributor and realised that the drive gear that should be on the bottom of it was not there.  I knew that I had a few engine items in one of the original boxes that came with the car and recalled one piece that could be the missing part and after hunting I found it and realised that it was.  I'm not sure how to fit it though so that will be a job for John when I see him next.  The whole unit doesn't go together logically, the gear drive has two ways of joining the distributor and I clearly need to know which one before installation and the drive for the rotor arm comes apart and clashes with other parts.  I need professional help on that.

I also removed the housing for the rev gauge and was surprised to see that there was nothing in the engine to actually drive it.  I started to think now and realised that the oil pump that is in a box at my mother in-law's house was supposed to be installed in the engine, I had always assumed it was a spare, thank heavens I never sold it!

I retired to the sofa to dwell on the day and work out a way forward.  The service manual is surprisingly light on information on the distributor, I can only presume people do not take them apart.  It has more on the oil pump and so I feel ok about that.  I was rather conscious that I have not read the engine section of the manual at all, it was rather interesting and left me feeling like it was quite simple, lets hope that is the case.

I now know that I need to check the oil pressure relief valve as well because I can't assume that it is installed.  I am going to lay the engine on the rear end plate and remove the sump to see if anything else is missing and then hopefully install the oil pump and oil strainer, assuming that is, that I have all the parts.  It will be exciting to see what it all looks like when I first remove the sump.  I was pleased to see the rocker arms and valves all looked in order when I took the rocker cover off so hopefully it will be likewise for the sump.

It's Saturday night and I'm in garden having a beer whilst wondering where the week went?  I'm also a little disappointed that I didn't take any pictures of the Orchard Restoration Open Day today.  Well that isn't actually correct as I took loads of the engine bays of 2 Healey 100 cars that were there and kindly had their bonnets up.  There were lots of 3000's as is usual but the 2 100 cars were very helpful.

It was a lovely day out.  A good drive into the depths of Sussex and a few hours talking geeky shop with Healey owners.  It was nice to see the engine bay and realise that they are pretty simple, I really shouldn't have that many issues, famous last words.

I did get some time in the garage and started by cleaning it up a bit.

Before 

 After

Whilst cleaning up stuff I cleared out the rear of the car and tried the tyre into the space for the spare wheel and was delighted to see that it fitted nicely.  One day there will be a lovely shiny spare in there.

The tank in it's final resting place complete with a rubber strip on the underside to prevent metal to metal contact.  I went to the local plumbers this morning and realise that I need to do a little soldering on the tank outlet pipe to get the thing plumbed in, two steps forward and one step back!

I started work on the throttle linkage and rubbed down and painted the rods and then striped and cleaned these lovely looking rod ends.  It was a very nice thing to do.

Started cleaning up the brackets that I have collected for the engine bay and came across this item which attaches on the front of the glovebox tray and then I presume just loops over the inner body work.  Can it just do that?  I mean, no bolts or screws at all?  Feels wild.

I have trial fitted the throttle assembly a few times and am about to go  for it properly tomorrow now that everything in painted.  However, I have been conscious for some time that the rods go very close to the engine so it would surely make sense to fit it after the engine was installed.  Today at the Orchard open day I took this photo which shows how close the rod goes to the engine and made me convinced that I should install it after the engine is in.

I noticed that this Healey had the shroud riveted to the inner bodywork, something for me to pay attention to when I am at that stage as I had no idea it went that way

I went to the Enfield Pagent of Motoring yesterday and came across a stall selling the C45 Dynamator for £125, couldn't resist and thereby spending the rest of the £300 I collected for the 100/6 screen I sold at the weekend, it didn't last long.

I finished the tank and it is nicely painted in black, job done.

I started to dig around the boxes of bits for the throttle linkage and found these, I have no idea what they are for.

This is the throttle linkage, lots of bits and many duplicated which allows me to choose the best.  Lots of rubbing down and painting coming up.  The brass ends to the rods are a work of art, British engineering in lovely detail.

Despite having two complete throttle pedal assemblies I decided to take apart a separate pedal and braze it to a new rod.  My brazing is coming on nicely.  I do however need some new brazing rods now, eBay here I come.

Pedal done and painted along with a few of the rods.   I think I am missing the final link rod to the carbs so will have another hunt around.

eBay action:

I have had some mixed blessings with eBay lately.  I successfully sold the 100/6 windscreen that came with my car all those years ago for £300 and then promptly spent some of the money on 2 tyres that appeared on the site locally in London.  However, the SU fuel pump I bought was the wrong type, oh well.

I now have 3 tyres and 4 really good wheels.  I have 4 not so good wheels so would like one more good one before I send them off for blasting and powder coating.

The two tyres I bought were used but apparently have 7mm of tread on them and the unused tyre I have already has 7mm of tread so I guess they can't be that used.  I think they be a little old though.  All I know is that Longstone Tyres charge £230 each for them or 5 for £1032 and I now have 3 for £180.  If, when the car is eventually on the road I decided that I should have bought new tyres well I can do it then.

It would be good to have the tyres and wheels finished as I can see a time when it would be good to get the car off the trolly.

So I know I have to do two things:

Fit the wiring loom.
Get the engine out, clean it, fit the core plugs, paint it and install it in the car.

For some strange reason I don't want to do either so I am finding other jobs to do, like polish the dashboard.  I saw a a Hundred with a polished dash on a French website which looked lovely and having grown frustrated with the difficulties in getting a paint code for the original blue/silver paint I have decided to go this route.  The main challenge is that there are some substantial scratches in the aluminium from the production process to get rid of.  I have never done this before but know that I need to flat it down then polish with an aluminium polish such as Autosol which I have along with a small polishing wheel acquired from eBay.  I start flatting with 180 wet and dry.  Hours later I have done a small area, and I mean hours.

I get bored of this and got the 80 grit dry paper out and make some substantial progress, then I flatted it again with the 180 wet and dry before polishing.

It is soon clear that I have not got the original production marks out and that I haven't rubbed it down properly.  So, after 6 hours of rubbing, may arms ache, I head for lunch and a few Youtube videos on how to do this properly.  I decided that I need to use the orbital sander with progressively finer grit papers.  I have 120 so I use that to get rid of the production marks which I have now done.  I'll get some finer papers next time I venture out.

I turn my attention back to the tank.  I had to add more brazing rod to the area around the outlet pipe which I did successfully.  I also had one more area to solder and I realised that I was using the oxy-acetylene at too high a temp so reduced the heat and the soldering started to work.

I had a few minutes contemplation on whether or not I should re-do the other solder areas now that I had a better idea of what to do and then decided against it so I rubbed the tank down and painted it.

I ordered a rad from GPI racing a few weeks back on a bit of a whim as I am miles away from needing a radiator.  However, I contacted them directly for a price and they came back to me with a price of £180 delivered which seemed to good to be true and so I ordered it.  A few weeks went by and I emailed them to check on delivery and got a 'it'll be despatched soon' response and then it arrived.  The quality looks amazing.

Back in the garage I fitted the first bit of the electrical system, the starter solenoid.  Then I connected the lead from the battery and felt like I was entering a new phase in the project.

I have no idea why but I then fitted the clutch lever mechanism.

The main thing I did this weekend was to install the heat resistant material and the supplied heat should kit.  I got the self adhesive material because I feared that the fibrous heat panels would actually rattle about if left to their own devoices.

I changed directions to the fuel tank.  I had ordered a rubber bung from China and expected delivery to be weeks away only for it to arrive so it seemed sensible to do the pressure test.

The test revealed many leaks and I have been working on my soldering all afternoon as a result.

I even got to the point of removing the original solder before attempting a repair.

Eventually I gave up and stripped it down to bare metal and then got out the brazing equipment and this was somewhat successful.

Over the past few weeks I have been in the garage a few times.  I started on the brakes and have fitted the brake pipes which were a lot of fun to make.  I kind of liked the puzzles created by the route required, perhaps I'm just a kid after all.

I then went on to the petrol pump which with hindsight was a complete disaster.  I rubbed down the body and painted it, so far so good.  I then started taking it apart when one of the screws came out a few mm then snapped off.  I was a little disturbed by this but got my head round a way forward.  I drilled out the shaft of the snapped bolt and then tapped a new thread when I realised that I would now need to open up some of the electrical connectors that mount on to the bolt.  So I grabbed the drill and went for it however, the drill snagged and the cable was ripped from my hands and wound round the drill and in the process getting detached from the main part of the pump.  Oh well.  I have found a few on eBay since, so I am hoping this will be a cost efficient route forward.







































I eventually got round to deciding that I am going to make the car negative earth.  The main reason is that USB ports will need it.  I know, sad isn't it.  I just think that I may one day want a radio or even a USB port for charging the phone etc.  Anyway, I ordered a set of power cables from Brucom Ltd which are excellent.  A great service from them.







































I finished the weekend by digging out the old windscreen I have which came with the box of bits that is my car.  apparently it is quite rare to get the pillar on it.  Anyway I need some parts for the car so I have to get some cash from somewhere so here goes.