Sid Part II

Here we have, in the words of Sid's owner, news of the latest restoration work performed, on Sid the car by Sid the man.

Sid's engine was removed because it was a bit tired. Winter was drawing near & the car shows were ending, so I decided to look for another engine. 

A friend of mine knew where to find a 1098 engine, in good condition, for £35.00 . The next stage was to clean up the engine, and engine bay & then to paint them both. Out came the paint stripper, and on went the rubber gloves. I removed the engine, along with the wires, pipes etc. Then I masked everything I didnt want to strip down. I got to work with a drill and wire brush attachment, to remove any remaining rust & paint.

When it was back to bare metal, I used Jenolite rust treatment.

Then two coats of paint isolater was applied to make sure there wouldnt be any adverse reaction to the new paint finish.

Then came three coats of grey zinc primer, followed by four coats of clipper blue. It was rubbed down between all the coats.

Finally, a friend put on the four last top coats, thinning the paint between each coat to get a shine.

As I started to put everything back together, the wiring loom fell apart. So, another friend (Dave D) from the EKMM club repaired it using insulation tape, he then re-wired the car. Both of us put the engine back in place. Afterwards I tested the electrics, which were fine. However, the engine would not start.

That Saturday Dave G arrived to have a look. It took us four hours to realise there was a wire broken in the distributor. Also, I had replaced the points and wired them up wrong (easily done!! ). By looking at an RAC servicing book from 1968, we found an illustration of the firing order. At least now Sid is running. Unfortunately, due to very cold weather, hairline cracks have appeared in the fresh paint, oh well, it still looks good and I can paint over the cracks later, There is still a lot more to do on Sid. I would like to thank everyone who has helped me, especially Dave G, and Bob from "Morrie Spares". Of course Sid's original (948) engine will be reconditioned, and replaced at a later date.