Bits and bobs

Dan found some time in his crazy schedule to come round again today. He replaced the coil (including the wiring), replaced the points, distributor cap and rotor arm. He also identified a problem with the exhaust, where there is a gap at the manifold, and he is still to replace the fuel line.

Wish I knew what half of that meant!

Dan the man

Dan was here again - he took some wiring off the distibutor to replace it. Apparently there is now no spark from the distributor which is why he isn't firing up when we turn the key - but why there is no spark, I don't know... Grr.

Focus on the inside

Still haven't managed to get him started, so we are waiting for Dan to have some time to pop over and see what he can do.

In the meantime, I am trying to focus on the work which needs to be done inside. With that in mind, I took the family to a big caravan shop in Dereham today to try to get some good space-saving ideas.

We had loads of fun opening and closing cupboards, folding out bunks, playing with switches and dials and pretending we were on holiday (while avoiding the salesmen!)  I'm not sure it really helped in terms of finding things we could use in Bertie, but it did help me to be clearer than ever on what. I don't want - ie carpets, mdf and brown fabric seats. No, no and no!

Rubbish

And now he won't start again.

It seems that the journey yeasterday was more foolhardy than we thought.

He hasn't started since.

V unhappy.

Foolhardy journey?!

Now Bertie is running again we thought it would be a good idea to take him out regularly to try to keep him happy. Tamar was singing with the choir in Thuxton this morning, so Jonathan decided to take Bertie to drop her off. Tamar had to hold the passenger door closed on the way - we still haven't fixed it - which was OK, until the air intake pipe for the carburettor popped out, and she had to use the other hand to keep it in! One bonus of having the engine in the front cab I guess...
Anyway, what we hadn't thought of was that on the way home, Jonathan would be by himself - he secured the door with the seatbelt as well as he could, but had to drive and hold the air pipe in place at the same time!!

More random jobs

Dan came back again today to do a few more jobs. He replaced the vacuum hose, cleaned to spark plugs and removed a spacer plate that was underneath the carburettor. He said that ideally he would replace or rebuild the carburettor to get a more realiable start, so hopefully that will be done soon.

Jonathan and I are watching as much as we can as he works, to get some idea of how it all works - but we do feel rather ignorant.

I've been making a bit of a list of jobs for us to do too - although I sort of wish I hadn't, as it starts to feel a bit overwhelming when I write it all down!

Running

Dan came back today and replaced the solenoid, and Bertie now starts on the key! He also identified several further jobs that he would like to do - or he thinks needs doing, which I guess isn't necesarily the same thing - to bring him up to scratch.

So good to be able to turn a key and hear that engine roar into life.