IanS

How long is a piece of string question. I took a leisurely day fitting mine to my exmo.

Trailers still some time off but looking at the rules so far new build will have to have IVA and its not clear about repairs. Best get a pic of you, your trailer and a dated newspaper to prove that trailer was in existance before the IVA came in. I have a pic of my boat trailer with my son then aged 5 now aged 25

My donor was built in 83 and I purchased it in 96 with the original engine (carbs and leaded head). I finished my build in 97 and have run the car for around 60000 miles since then. Most of this mileage has been on unleaded, the valve gaps have not moved. So you will find that a lot of the old heads are perfectly useable on unleaded. Ian

You asked about cost. In 1995 these kits cost around 1500 to 2500 depending on options. Stainless put it in the upper half, things like a hood and side screens or optional colours added up. Ian

I understand that longboarder has more day to day contact with the aftermarket side of things so I would go with his take that they might be a bit short. I was just passing on the standard build info. I have coil overs on the back of my exmo. They come from the trailing arm shock mount to a bracket vertically above bolted to the side of the boot / wheel arch. Ian

Exmo as standard used the donor (sierra saloon) rear springs and shocks. As the suspension could lower enough (when airborn) to unmount the springs the kit included 2 lengths of rope to be used as straps limiting the suspension movement. Exmo also had optional rear coilovers and then did not need the rope. So i would guess that sierra rear springs are still available but doubt very much that yours were ever cut down you just need to fit the straps. Ian

Sierra axle is a bit wider than the dolomite so you could have the wheels outside the arches. The ends of the sierra subframe will stick out beyond the body.

On an exmo which has the same rear end I found out that the rubber fixings needed to be crushed otherwise they wore away quickly. Ian

In the rear wing fiberglass of my exmo I used stainless 3mm pop rivets with a dab of sikaflex to keep out water penetration from behind. Fitted in 1997 and still going strong.

Polyurethene sealant eventually softens when immersed in petrol. I found out the hard way and tend to only use epoxy now.

Could he be on about front wheel arches. The 2 styles are normally called cycle wings or clam shell wings. To the best of my knowlage both styles can be made to fit, just a bit of head scratching about bracketry.

The top mount of the coil over is vertically above the bottom mount. Robin hood supplied an approx 18inch length of 2inch angle iron per side that bolts to the side of the boot/tub. It has a slight bend in it to accomodate the kink in the side panel. I will attempt to get a picture later this week as this shows better than my words. Ian

The shock mount is plenty strong enough for coil over mounting. This was an option from Robin Hood on the Exmo and series 3. I have done over 60,000 miles in my exmo with coil overs mounted here with no problems.

My reaction is that the fuel and temp guages are hardly calibrated so putting the needle back near the empty and cold positions should be OK. That is unless the fuel guage is one of those that stays showing how much fuel you have even when the ignition is off. In which case I would temporarly wire it to the sender and let this drop to the empty position and energise with a 9V battery (they are designed to work with a voltage regulator of approx 8V). this will set the guage to approx the empty position so that you can allign the needle

If the fuse is ment to be 10A and a 15A fuse blows even with the main load (the side lights) removed then the only conclusion that I can come to is that some where the loom has rubbed through its insulation and is shorting to the body. Tedious stripping of trim to expose the loom coming up as putting a very large fuse in and looking for the smoke is not the best way forward. Ian

My Pinto ground to a halt with an output of less than 0.5psi The replacement from the local motor factors hapily pumped petrol up about 8 feet so it was about 3.5psi Ian

The Rad supplied with the exmo kit was from a mk5 2l cortina, the hose on mine looks a lot like yours and might even be the part Jim has on his list.

Must have to pass SVA. The list is shortish. Light switch. Rear high intensity light switch. Screen demister switch ( could be always on ). Horn switch Some way of testing brake warning light (hand brake switch normally used for this) Indicator switch Hazard warning light switch main/dip switch Wiper switch. screen washer switch. Many of these are normally on the stalks. Guages only a speedo is required. lights. Main beam warning. Hazzard warning (normally in switch) Rear high intensity warning (often in switch) brake fail warning (often activated by float switch detecting loss of brake fliud) Not required but normally fitted Oil pressure Ignition

If you have a voltmeter try checking the voltage from the wire part of the earth connector to the battery. As longboarder says start at the battery to chasies (measure whilst the starter is working) and the battrey to engine also with the starter going. Then check each earth like headlamps whilst they are on. A perfect connection is imposible to achieve but anything more than 0.25V is a bad connection. Less than 0.010V can be taken as a perfect joint.

Will try to get to meeting after september when work allows. Ian

One thing to look out for is the prop shaft. Robin hood suggested that you shorten the standard sierra prop shaft by removing the center section between the 2 UJs. This left the prop shaft with a UJ at the diff and a rubber donut at the gearbox end. These donuts need the prop shaft to be straight to better than 1 degree or they let go. This has happened to a lot of early robin hoods. The noise is reportedly loud and the dints in the transmission tunnel not very nice. I have never herd of one actually coming out of the tunnel but a tow home is not nice. From the Exmo and series 3 on robin hood supplied a prop shaft with 2 UJs. If you have the donut get a replacement prop shaft........

You have the wrong engine in 850 A series. You realy want tradition so use the original austin 7 750 sidevalve

As a rule of thumb the caliper normally only just clears the outer edge of the disc.

What type of pads do you have at the front. I have seen some cheep pads that glazed up just looking at them and then were useless, binned them and fitted ferodo ones, problem solved. Or am I teaching grandmother to suck eggs??

Las time I had anything like this it was the idle stabilastion sticking. I am not sure if this is fitted to the Carb DOHC, There is an air bypass control on the injection version that can do things like this. The stabilisation was a stepper motor on the throttle stop of the carb and if it is this try getting it wound up to give a fast idle then unplug the motor. Otherwise You are already looking at inlet manifold leaks. Fuel pump problems?? Try putting a spare can of petrol on top of a shelf 6 feet above the car and connecting direct to the carb this way you know that you have plenty of petrol at about 3psi.