I sent an email to Paul at Firestone Wainui and asked about some hoist time, I reckoned on about 30 minutes to clearly mark and remove the assembly, tweak it with a proper tubing bender to get the pump sitting lower in the tank and refit it using enough light to see into the tank as I reinstall it.. I don’t mind if I can’t do it til next week because I’ll use the runabout this weekend and just wash the family car so it looks great when I head to Firestone.. I also asked for 30 minutes to clean down the patch I repaired and spray a couple of coats of underbody spray over the work area to seal it all in and make it look like the rest of the floor too.. famous last words “an hour should do it” may very well come back to bite me in the arse two hours after I start on it  

The only thing for me is that the family car is sorted for the Reclaim the Capital cruise next Friday the 30th.. we’ve been a bit quiet of late but a few of us put our heads together and have come up with a revised route and a few other things along the way that we hope will entice more numbers and form a strong core of regulars.. it’s looking good and with a bit of work on publicity and profile we should have a fairly solid roll call on the last Friday of the month..

A great man who achieved a great many things in his life, Sir Randel shared his home in Hatepe with my family, and John shared with us the stories of his father, told with such passion I feel like I have lost someone I know, even though Sir Randel and I never met.

I want to pass on my deepest condolences to John and his family at this time of loss and to let them know that we are all thinking of them at this time.. my children Stefanee and Jett are both saddened to hear of John’s loss and also wish his family, including Charlie, to know they are thinking of them all too..

hmmm… so… I was driving up over the hill.. yeah??!! and had the sounds on because everyting was humming along, and then she just dead-set died! ridgey didge, she just went BBBBBBRRRRRRRRRR_______________________BBBRBRBRRRRRRRRRRRRR there was no BBBRRR____BBBRBRBR___RRRBRBBR______RBRBRBBR________RBBRBRBBRBRBRBBRBRBBRBRBRB it was just  dead then back to life again.. it wasn’t even up to the regular spot she runs out at it was a couple of curves below.. so I’m a mix of pissed of and veryfuckenangry as well as some toldyoufuckensoyoudumbass.. I kept at 60 and then all of a sudden in the normal spot the same thing happened.. back to the drawing board again I guess..

this time I made it home and got on the blower to Clint for a chat, upshot was the battery was flat and that caused the running problems which saw the car stalling every time there was electrical load required.. Clint said just take it for a drive and get some charge in the battery so I headed back out for a few laps of Wainui and got some life intot he battery and got to see how she was running, she improved the longer we drove but something was still not quite right.. I got home, I sat down on my couch and I woke up several hours later thinking “well I aint going anywhere this evening” and promptly fell back to sleep.. I had done a fair bit of work and was simply knackered..

Saturday morning and she fired up without even a hint of worry but I reset the pressure down to 45PSI and when number one son had arisen we hit the road for some cruising.. immediately the response was an improvement and the car seemed to be so much stronger than before, yet still something was not quite crisp enough to consider the job well done.. but when she had warmed up and all the new parts had settled into operating mode she seemed to feel so much stronger off idle and when stabbing the throttle as you roll on around 40 – 60.. my Sentra aint a patch on the family car  

I’ve been over the hill a few times now and there was an initial worry but she hauls over without a hiccup and is stronger all the way up and over.. though the next thing I need to do is look into a dyno run or three and get some pressure adjustments sorted for a strong mix all the way..

keep you posted

a HUGE thanks to Paul and Cory at Firestone Wainui for the hoist time, the power and the tools.. I was really thinking of what I could get them to say thanks, I didn’t want to get booze cos I respect Cory as a triathlete and Paul looks pretty fit so no piss, lunch for the two of them would be ok but not what I was thinking of.. I am gonna buy a plant for the workshop, a Yukka or the like to put in the corner and be green.. I reckon that’s a good idea! and what about that Clint Torrance of Clints Auto Electrical?? C’mon.. C’mon.. that’s right let’s hear that applause      .. mate, Clint showed up collected the old pump assembly and had the new one all sorted and in my hand without a worry. Another guy wh deserves the Kudos is Clint, thanks so much once again for your help and your wisdom.. I love getting wisdom of those who would share it freely.. Get on the phone and give him a call he’s mobile and he’s better than good, he knows his shit.. call  027-4-4CLINT I stand by any recommendation I have made in the past and don’t even hesitate to call and get him around when it’s something out of my knowledge base and I need someone who knows and gets it sorted first time every time.. he’s busy but he’s got an offsider called Ben who has weaved his own magic on the family car and he can be where Clint isn’t so call him, he’s good!!

back to the floorpan.. I took my time and made sute there was good solid penetration and I perimeter welded the patch in, all the while Stefanee was moving my brass bar along to take the heat I generated as I stitched my way around.. I was eying up the reinforcing strap and something just didn’t look quite right.. I had drilled the hole in the wrong end of the patch and had to plug weld the hole up and redrill in the correct spot.. I stitched in the strap and gave the whole lot a razz with the sander disc and hey presto she looked mint and strong.. Paul came over and had a gander giving me the nod of approval, I was stoked but realised I still had to put the whole driver side interior back in so still had plenty of work to do before I could see if the new fuel pump had solved the fuel problems..

I gave my trusty co-pilot the rest of the day off and returned to Firestone after some lunch and started to put the interior back in.. the whole lot went in pretty quickly and I stashed all my tools and the welder in the corner of the workshop and stood back and admired the work.. I didn’t have any sealant at the time but have secured some from Dale and will lift the car up and wire cup the work area and seal it over with a couple of products.. the job looked good, solid and strong.. the seat is rock solid and felt really good when I sat in the racetech for the first time.. I reconnected the computer and then the battery and turned the key..

Paul and Cory would poke their head under from time to time and see how I was progressing and by th end of the day I was ready to get the welder out and under way.. but time just ran away from me and in the end Thursday was about the fabrication and fitment process and I was ready to weld first thing on Friday..

I followed the instructions to depressurise the fuel system but the new pressure regulator wasn’t gonna let the car run out of gas even with the fuel pump fuse removed and she ran for ages before finally succumbing.. I yanked the fuel pump and the pickup bag was as black as the ace of spades, the ace of spades.. all hail Lemmy, all hail Lemmy \m/ \m/

it felt like a bag of mud and looked like a bag of potting mix it was pretty bad.. I put it aside for Clint to come and collect, bunged up the gaping hole left in the tank and moved on to the next step, floorpan surgery.

My son Jett and I got straight into stripping out the driver seat area of the floor pan and quickly had all the seatbelt fittings removed the footrest and the side trim off and the carpet rolled back over to reveal the floorpans full condition.. it looked pretty bloody ugly and the cracks were even more visible from above, the buckling of the floorpan around the seat mount was pretty nasty I thought.. I chiseled off the sound deadener and cleaned the inside pan using a wire cup on the B&D grinder.. I roughly marked out where I would cut with a texta and then headed underneath to get a clearer view from beneath.. before we closed the doors Jett and I draped the blanket across the dash and secured it by hanging it out the door gap and closing the door.. gotta protect against sparks..

I removed the central section of the exhaust to gain clear access to the damaged section with the B&D and wire cupped the underside spraying off chunks of the black underbody shit I had coated her underside with.. the supporting strap had been torn away from the floor with the spot welds not holding up to my fat arse strapped into my racetech 4009W around Hampton Downs and then Manfeild.. the cracks in the floorpan appeared to be obscured by the strap and there was no way it could remain in position anyway so after putting Jett in the car with the fire extinguisher and some wet rags I carefully chopped it off using the thin cut off wheel and had a look.. it was buckled and bent, salvageable but buckled and bent… 

I cleaned up the rest of the floorpan and gave myself  room to mark out the patch to be replaced.. I ended up marking out a section the size of an A5 piece of paper (that’s the one half the size of A4 isn’t it? well that’s the one I mean) which included all the cracks within it and no less than 50mm from the end of any of the cracks to the edge of the patch.. I really wanted there to be no continuity further down the track.. the shape of the patch seemed to present no diffuculty, just the time to shape it to the floor contour to ensure positioning of the seat is accurate.. I cleaned up the cut outline on the floorpan and packed up the tools for the day.. I would head home to make a rough patch to begin with and also look at repair or fabricate options for the supporting strap.. I had to source an argoshield bottle for the welder also.. Crew Chief had one but he reckoned it didn’t have much but it should be enough to do the floorpan.. I arranged to collect it later on.

I had pinched Cory’s work car at lunchtime and gone home to get the racing wheels, I want to get the ZSs repaired so will run about on the steelies for a while now.. it adds to the scoop having the 185/265 combo on.. I swapped them over and Cory removed the tyres for me.. it does look kinda mean   

the fuel regulator is in position and I have set the pressure at 38PSI operating and will adjust her if I need to once we’ve checked the pick up and pump assembly..

here’s the new radiator hoses and under the engine covers are all the other new heater hoses etc.. and boy that master cylinder looks trick too now that I mention it     thanks to Kevin at Road and Track for the work getting me all the hoses and the new regulator.. it’s service like Kevin, Luke and Bevan consistently provide me that keeps me coming back to Road and Track time and time again.. cheers guys

I went with braided lines from Contour Brakes in Waterloo because they provide certified lines which conform to the requirements of LVVTA here and with the car about to be certed I wanted to be sure I didn’t have to spend the money again because some certifier figured they were inferior ones, they have a pile of numbers stamped on them for identification and I am glad they are there for that reason alone..

it was definitely a straightforward swap but I do think some more care could have been taken lining up the banjo fittings with the hoses movement under cornering in mind, the hoses were harder to fit up than the rubber sheathed ones simply due to the inflexibility of braided lines but it was also to do with the alignment of the banjos on each end, I supplied the original hoses to Contour Brakes so they could get all the details right, but it was a straightforward swap and there’s no fouling or binding at all as the pic show the lines (on the drivers side, but similar both sides) and that’s pretty important       I used about 750ml of brake fluid and will bleed the entire system again because she feels a little spongey at the pedal even though the brakes come on with no delay, just feels a little spongey is all..

you can see the tear in the top right of the carpet cutaway and the hole is clearly visible as well, I can’t get the camera to focus on it so I will take some more shots when the car is on the hoist at Firestone later in the week..

I’ll remove as much of the front carpet as possible and because of a few cable access mods I made to the carpet I can essentially peel back the driver’s floor rug without having to touch the passenger side floor.. I’ll play it safe and weld up the tears in the floor and then stitch weld a new nut and plate over the floor, I will check the four mounts and if need be rebuild all of them for peace of mind.. I am glad to have found the problem because it was creating all kinds of problems in terms of the seat being twisted and flexing under cornering loads..

The family car’s next trackday is Sept 11 at Manfeild so we have some time to get her back to tip top shape for then