...and then a Princess happened, which was nice.

So, I managed rather spectacularly to lose my log in info and bookmark for this blog, not sure how I managed that but I'm back again now and hoping to keep up the regular updates.

Since I've been gone, the Polo went and died on me, I'm not sure exactly what's wrong but it's a suspected knackered head and/or head gasket at the moment.  I did the only sensible thing and started thinking about what car I could use while he was broken and fleetingly thought about getting myself an Austin Princess.  Did some asking, a little research, then one turned up almost on my doorstep at a bargainous price, I was really rather surprised.  Over the next few weeks I'll update the blog with the story but for now, here's some glamour shots of the old girl.

Oh, and I'm fully aware of the daftness of buying a car five years older than the broken one that has a reputation for being unreliable and isn't exactly frugal with the dinosaur juice around town.  And I'm fully aware of how many shades of brown the new car is... I know it makes no sense, but then if I had to explain it to you there's a good chance you wouldn't be reading this blog anyway.

The above is an 1980 Austin Morris 1700HL Princess 2.  She had her problems, but quite a lot of those were niggles and are now fixed.

Wilhelm Update

I'll be off to a show on Sunday, so there'll be a report on that.  In the meantime, because it's been a while since I've had anything to update with lately, here's a brief update on my own daily driver.

Got some curb feelers to save my wheels.  Everyone seems to call them whiskers.

Then it was time to resolve the weird cutting out issue I was having.  Suspected to be a combination of fuel starvation and weak spark, we replaced a lot of very old parts.

Rotor arm, old on the left.  Pretty worn out.

Distributor caps, again with the old on the left and again pretty worn out.

Next up was the coil.  The old one had a bit missing and was one of two main suspected problem causers.

This was the other problem causer, a very dead fuel filter full of silt and bits of red paint.

Last under bonnet job was to sort out some sort of catch for the bonnet prop.  A bit of velcro does the trick nicely.

So with all that under bonnet stuff out of the way - we later found out the intermittent cutting out issue was resolved, so something we replaced did the trick - here's what's being going on inside the car.  First up was some gold detailing to match the seats.  I now have a Flash Gordon console.

 

The doors are still missing their doorcards, but these should be fitted soon now I've got the last few bits I need.  Window winder inserts were done gold and some green cut glass door knobs used as door pulls.  The door pulls work very well and fit in the original door handle hole but look nicer.

The interior is coming together nicely.  Still need to redo the carpet, fit the doorcards and, eventually, put a new cloth headlining in.  But most of it is done now.

Finally, I refurbished my tailgate badges in a gold version of the original factory chrome.  Turned out well, just need a final polish and clean.

Spotted

Some recent spots from my short travels.  Went to visit my brother and on his street is this Mercedes Benz 300D.

Also while visiting my brother, we popped to the supermarket and spotted this very handsome Fiat X1-9.