johann morris

BRDM, Vehicle electrics, what can you say. One day perfectly good vehicles will be useless because of them. I find it hard to believe that our armed forces buy vehicles that are reliant on electrics. Rick, One step forward, two steps back, The oil pipe was a stupid mistake on my part, my son connected the pipes together and I didn't check them. Still I have made a modified version of the connector and I am waiting yet again for supplies, god this area can be frustrating some times. Simon, Thanks, to be truthful after emptying the oil over the floor I was rather issed off but the worst part is that I know that I can't buy the items that I need locally so I have to rely on the internet. Rely, internet, Ha Ha Ha...…….. Jon

Evening All, This is a long one but where to start. The petrol tank is finished and the new engine is in place, so now on to the electrics. I have an engine, a wiring loom and two ECU's, one engine and one gearbox. The wiring loom doesn't fit the engine, the concept of plug and play has gone out of the window, the wiring loom is the wrong loom for my engine ECU. The ECU requires one yellow plug and one black, my loom has one yellow and one blue plug, that doesn't fit the ECU. As far as I can ascertain, the loom is for a 3.2ltr, my engine is a 3.6ltr. What to do. In a moment of shear depression, I did think about trying to find the correct loom but then I thought, what the hell, I will rewire the whole thing. The Haynes manual is like the proverbial chocolate tea pot, so after a lot of searching on line, I found a wiring diagram for a 3.6 of roughly the right vintage and begun chopping. This is definitely not a job for the faint hearted, it involved altering, and I am not exaggerating, about 80% of the wiring loom, even the colours are different. Eventually after two days of chopping and adding I was getting somewhere but where I wasn't sure. Even the simple items had either more of fewer wires. At last I turned the key, nothing. There was, in the loom, a group of about 10 wires that were all permennant lives, in other words they were live even when the ignition key was turned off, something I don't like, so I cut them into individuals and traced where they went, ignored what I didn't think was important and connected the remainder, just one. After my initial test or failure, I realised that I needed a second permenant live to the ECU, this was connected and I tried again, the ECU fired up along with the fuel pump. I now had two of the main items, a cranking engine and fuel but no spark. When the expert, had decided that I needed a different engine, part of his reasoning was that this engine didn't require an ignition amplifier. I spent hours looking for a wiring diagram that didn't require this amplifier but I couldn't find one, so I rang the expert. Now amazingly he told me to ignore what he had told me and fit an amplifier. This should give you some idea of what I have been up against. The amplifier was ordered and duly arrived. The wiring diagram showed 5 wires, the amplifier had 7 connections and the plug had 7 connections but only one of the wire colours in the plug matched the diagram and that was in a different position in the plug. Again, back to the internet but I couldn't find the relevant diagram. What I did find, was a thread where a bloke had wired in his amplifier incorrectly and attached pictures of the connections and their relevant place in the plug. There's a but, the plug had 7 spaces but only 3 wires were connected. The wiring loom that I have, originally only had 3 wires, of course the colours didn't match but I decided to attach these 3 wires into the plug as per his picture and blow me I had a spark. Today I reassembled the cooling unit into the hull, connected everything up, filled the cooling system, attached a temporary fuel tank and pressed the starter. After the fourth attempt it started, what a sweet note from the exhaust, well for 30 seconds and then the oil pipe to the oil cooler shot off and emptied 8 litres of oil on the floor. Bugger. I have to admit that I have shortened this story so that you don't consider suicide. Jon

Thanks for the reply's, so have I misinterpreted the mvt guidance. That states, that a vehicle needs to be to an mot standard, I assumed that meant, that the vehicle had to have an mot before you could register it regardless of age. If that's incorrect, then happy days and I will start the process tomorrow. Jon

I am going to get my 1944 Morris C8 GS Mot'ed so that I can register it, can anyone one tell me the gross weight. The workshop manual that I have gives a weight of 2Tons 12cwt 1 quart and 14 pounds but I think that that is the unladen weight, is that correct? Jon

It looks like the tank has been repaired previously, if so, the metal underneath that patch is going to be truly rotten and to be repaired properly is going to need to be cut out. As others has suggested try solder first, good luck. Jon

Or just cut the area out, weld in a patch and just to be on the safe side, coat the inside with a sealant such as POR. Jon

Richard, you are good, final drives from a tractor, although considered more of a medium sized model in it's day. I am sure that they will take a bit of adjustment to fit but yes I am glad that some inspiration appeared and if I need another set, I know where to go. Now back to the wiring. Jon

Rick, I can't wait until I have finished these things have to planned. As for the final drives, Well that's what you have to guess. Jon

Evening, There's not alot to show you really, as i have been altering my previous work to accommodate the new, later engine. I took a trip up north to meet Rick, Eddy8men and what a really nice chap he is. The reason for my journey, was to pick up the muff couplings for the steering box drive shafts but oh, how I would love to restore some of his toys. Thanks again Rick, for the bits and the chat. Whilst I was talking to Rick he introduced me to a new word " Imagineering" so I have been doing a bit myself. One of the frustrating parts of this project, so far, has been trying to decide what to do for the final drives. On the way home, being bored at the wheel, I was thinking about all the options thus far and it looked like I would have to sell a kidney to finance the relevant components, then seeing a vehicle on the road and cursing a lot, I had an idea. A quick search on fleabay and low and behold, someone was scrapping such a vehicle 3 miles from where I live. I haven't done any accurate measurements yet but from a tape survey, they seem to match up, almost too exactly and the ratio looks to be 5.5 : 1. Sunday morning, my son and I, took a Land Rover stuffed with every tool needed for a right bugger of a job but ended up only using a couple of spanners, a ratchet, highlift jack and a big bar. Two hours later they were in the workshop waiting to be washed. Jon

Evening All, The petrol tanks in place but not leak tested or finished, as I have been waiting for various components to arrive. It should hold about 70 litres of fuel, so a lot less than the 170 litres in the original tank but I want to put the electrics between the engine fire wall and the petrol tank. This area then gets covered so that you won't see any of it. One of the other items that I have been making, is the air filter housing. I want to use a standard early Jag filter, so although the outer housing looks as it should, hopefully, the modern filter fits inside. These are the best two pictures that I could find of the original item. The inner housing, containing the actual filter. The top cover for the outer housing although in reality, on my version, it's just for show. It's looking a bit like a vacuum cleaner. The complete housing with the outer housing and brackets in place. I can't bolt it in place yet as I need to have the gearbox in place to make sure everything fits. Jon

What else is a Sunday afternoon for. It's really nice to see the project progressing and I know what hard graft it is but how satisfying it will be in the end. Jon

Looks good Mog, the engine that I have is an early engine, so I think that this would be fairly straight forward, new inlet manifold and carbs. It's an option that I can consider if I fail to get the replacement going but it's a challenge now and I have to at least give it my best shot. If there are plenty of old 6 six cylinders around Hoseman, I am buggered if I can find them, unless I want to pay through the nose and then they all seem to need rebuilding. I hate electrics in cars, give me an old school engine any day but I am assured that these Jag engines are quite straight forward, once you get to know them. What I should have done, is found a complete but rusty vehicle and stripped it for parts. Jon

Actually, I am more disappointed at the moment but having exchanged emails with the supplier, he assures me that there will not be an issue. Being a bit old fashioned, I still have some faith in people and I hope that it will all be sorted out in the near future. Looking on the positive side, it gives me time to make some of the other components that I will need, such as the fuel tank. Jon

None of those, however I can confirm that the fluffy ducklings are still on the pond and seem happy. It's the flipping engine. If you go back to the beginning, you will find that I had intended to use a Land Rover 300 TDI engine but others seemed to think that a straight six would be a better idea and to be honest, I would prefer a petrol. I did a bit of research and the Jag 6 cylinder seemed ok, I contacted a classic car specialist who seemed to know what he was talking about and all seemed well. I purchased a 1986 engine and ecu and made everything to suit, hours of work. At last on Monday it was time to sort the electrics and hopefully this week brrrm brrrm. As I studied the wiring components and the associated wiring diagrams I realised that the ecu wasn't the correct one for that engine, further more the wiring loom that they had supplied was incorrect for the engine and the ecu, so I have a selection of random bits. The wiring loom, I could cope with, as long as I have the correct ecu plugs but there is no way the engine and ecu are going to communicate when the ecu requires a multitude of sensors that the older engine hasn't got. The easy way would be to get another ecu to suit the engine but I cant find one and my original supplier hasn't got one. After talking to the supplier he has suggested that he sends me a latter engine which seems ok, as long as all the belt pulleys line up or I am into another load of work. But and here's my biggest concern, will a latter model have a anti theft detection in the ecu and if so…………….. Why oh why didn't I stick to the 300tdi. Really fed up and pissed off, Jon

Evening All, In truth not much to show you but it's taken longer than I would have expected. The fan belt tensioner pully, bought as a standard pulley and then bored out to suit the bearing. The fan belt tensioner in place. I had intended to tension the belt upwards but the distributer was in the way, so I had to modify my ideas and tension it downwards. I am surprised that no one has mentioned that the fan that I have shown in the past, would be rotating in the wrong direction, well, it was only there to test the theory. I couldn't find a steel fan that rotated in the correct direction in the UK, so I had to import one. All the cooling pipes are now in place. And finally I needed two adapters for the engine oil cooler, I couldn't find anything, so as usual, I made them. Then a small set back occurred...……………...

Thanks lowfat and tapper02. It's been such a lovely day that I have been gardening so only one picture today. Jon

Those holes were drilled by hand on a very old Medings pillar drill that my Father and I went halves on, it cost a whole £10.00. Every time I use that drill I think of my father. Jon

Evening All, I think that all these pictures are overloading the system, as it keeps playing silly buggers. However, on to more important issues. One finished exhaust silencer. I have been having problems finding information and pictures of the silencer retaining brackets, the Tank Museums Panzer II is a later model, so the silencer is different. Armed with the information that I do have and some artistic licence this is what I have come up with. On the original tank, where the exhaust exits the hull, there is an armoured cover. This is my version. Over the silencer there should be a heat shield, I have looked at loads of pictures and the variation of the hole configurations seems to be quite varied, so I have settled on this one. In total, 568 holes to drill, bugger. And I am not quite finished drilling holes yet. Jon

Eddy, They are perfect I will pm you. Jon

Evening All, The two into one manifold is all welded up and ready to be assembled onto the exhaust manifold. The cooling unit now looks more like an air conditioning unit and I have completed the airflow tract around the rear of the engine bay. To complete the exhaust I need a silencer, here goes, although silent probably won't be the word. Jon

Evening All, And back to reality. The cooling unit is complete, although quality control, the wife, has questioned my decision of not welding every join. It all fits ok as does the drive belt. I will now have to make the tensioner. next on the list was the exhaust which entailed replacing the stripped manifold studs. Out of the three that needed replacing, one came out ok, the others had to be drilled out and re-tapped. I centre popped the broken stud, drilled it with a 5mm drill before opening it out to 8.5mm and re-tapping the hole to 3/8" UNF. I haven't got any of the original components for the exhaust, so I am making it from scratch, although I will be using flexi pipe to join the manifold to the silencer. First I needed to make two flanges to suit the manifolds. I marked around the manifold flange and then cut the flange out with an angle grinder and ground it to shape. The bolts are there until the correct studs turn up. Then on to the exhaust pipe. I am using sections from a cut up Land Rover exhaust as these are the cheapest source of material. That's all for tonight folks. Jon

A fantastic result from the outside, I wonder if the inside will be the same. Unlike my project, it looks like theirs is a "money is no object" project. The tracks are very nice but different to a Panzer II. If I could afford it, that's the one component that I would spend money on. jon

You are a good man Eddy. Jon

Thanks for the offer Eddy, I will keep it in mind. I have to make a decision on which way to approach the final drives, as this will dictate the drive chain between the gearbox and steering box. What ever I decide I anticipate having to have a reduction box between the two so I am not sure whether any of the original 430 series components will be of use. However, I will need the drive shafts and couplers that run between the final drives and the steering box, even if they have been snapped. Jon