Bay to Birdwood Day!

Yesterday was one of the highlights of my year with the Bay to Birdwood run. Now I prefer classic cars, so the B2B Classic is the bees knees for me, but with the awesome weather yesterday the Run was still pretty special. Lots of fantastic cars and trucks and bikes and buses. I've never seen so many bikes in the Run before. I love this era 4WD's I must admit, I could definitely add a Series 1 Landrover or a WW2 era Jeep to my collection.

Landrover S1

WW2 era Jeep, probably a Ford although I can't really tell.

Another Landie, I have a vague recollection of seeing this one on eBay, or maybe in a copy of Australian Classic Car magazine? I can't remember.

You can see my photo album of the B2B run here. I really liked the range of old Okie from Grapes of Wrath style vehicles too. Lost of rusty looking jalopy's.

 Anyway, this post doesn't appear to be related to the Corona build, but I did score an owners handbook on eBay a couple of days ago. Looks like this, not sure as yet whether it is my year or an earlier RT40, guess I'll find out when it arrives.

Gawler Swapmeet Day

Up early, for a Sunday anyway, and down to Gawler to pick up Dad and then to the swapmeet. They hold it at Gawler Oval these days as the trotting track has been demolished and the racecourse is being renovated. It was bloody huge this year, the whole area was full. Wandered around for a good two hours, but sadly nothing Corona related apart from badges which I don't actually need. Did pickup some driver's side interior door handles for the HZ as these are pretty rare nowadays. Passenger ones are dime a dozen, but I found 3 driver's side handles for $5, where in the past I've paid $15 for a rusted hunk from a wrecker. Grabbed a couple of bits for the XR too.

I did forget to mention, some weeks back I scored a mint condition Corona Sales Brochure on ebay.

The sales brochure. Essentially a fold out flyer, spruiking the superb comfort and power.
No pictures of mirrors!

Spring is Here!

And with Spring is a sudden influx of excellent classic cars on the road which has given me a kick in the bum. I've given the HZ it's spring clean and service, and I serviced the XR prior to re-registering that in a couple of weeks. Although the whitewalls on the XR look goddamn awful at the moment, the tyres have bled rubber oil on them, plus I scuffed the left side tyres a couple of days prior to putting the car into storage, I may wait to fix them before getting it back on the road.

Here's a pic of the XR at last year's Bay to Birdwood.

The old Corona sadly became part of the scenery in the shed to the point where I've even stored stuff on top of it. Today I had the battery out of the XR and decided on a whim to chuck it in the Corona and see if it would start. Firstly the battery is way too big, but I sort of balanced it in the carrier and connected the leads. Oddly the Corona terminals are bigger than the battery posts so I had to space them out with a screwdriver. They look like the original battery terminals actually!

Anyway I digress, after cranking for what seemed ages she coughed a few times and then fired! I was extremely happy with it idling quite nicely after it warmed a little. And that's with 4 year old fuel in it. It's strange how a little life has suddenly reinvigorated my interest.

Anyway tomorrow is Gawler Swapmeet, probably the best swapmeet in SA. Many may ask, what about Campbelltown? - but these days I think Campbelltown is filled with either Holden or Valiant wreckers who want top dollar for everything. Gawler still has the occasional shed clearance kind of seller. I'm on the lookout for all kinds of things but mainly door lock knobs for the Corona (they're all broken bar one), and suitable mirrors.
Can anyone tell me what the original mirrors were or at least looked like? Did these vehicles even come optioned with exterior mirrors?

Where to start?

Well life gets in the way as suspected, so no progress as yet. Planning in my head has been happening however. Usually for a resto, I start from the back and work forward. Back axle out, change the bearings, rebuild the shoes and brake mechanisms, oil the diff, change the uni joints, rebalance the tailshaft if needed, rebuild the tranmission, overhaul the front brakes, front suspension, engine recondition, radiator recore, then start on the body. I may start driving it around once the mechanicals are all reconditioned, as it still looks pretty neat. The surface rust will mostly buff out. Oh whilst the motor is out, I'll probably give the engine bay a squirt of paint, but the rest of the body will have to wait. Winter is here already so it'll be a while before further progress.

What's Required?

So, where to start, and what needs doing? Ideally I'd hope to have the Corona completed by Bay to Birdwood 2011. Dreaming? Probably. There's some rust spots in the bootlid and the bottom of the front guards and the passenger door. The rear quarter may have taken a knock at some stage as I can see what looks like bog, but not sure to what extent. Not sure what to do about any of that at this stage either. My spray painting skills are quite okay, but my bodywork is terrible. No matter how much practice I've had, I just can't get rust removal to an acceptable level, so most of these parts I'll have to take it somewhere. Any suggestions?

Rear number plate light is rusted out which is common, but apart from that it's pretty clean. That's it's a one family car is obvious. Oh and Craig the previous owner sent through a scan of the ad from the paper. What an awesome bit of provenance!

The Corona pictured in this ad is the one I bought! The 1000th car sold by John Cahill Motors.

Interior is pretty clean too, although the crashpad is utterly cracked, not sure if it's even salvageable. I might take it to Dash Original and wait for 3 years for them to have a look at it. The passenger seat has some splitting on one of the seams, I'm going to take this to a trimmer, my usual is Jim's Trim is Salisbury, great service and turnaround, but they are a bit pricey.

Bringing It Home

Yesterday my Dad and I went to collect the Corona. As expected it was another ridiculously hot day, but fortunately the aircon is one of the few things that actually works on the Landrover. Collected the car-trailer from Modbury BP, using that interesting computer system they use. As far as towing went, it was pretty unremarkable, easy trip down to Seaford, loaded and tied down no worries, and a lazy trip back. Craig (the previous owner) was pretty helpful, and he said he has a newspaper ad that features the Corona in it, so it'll be interesting to see that. I don't really envisage much progress on the Corona for a few months yet, as life has a little too much going on, especially with the Fringe show coming up.

Backing it down the driveway. I now realise that my driveway is actually pretty steep and narrow.

Dad posing next to his classic case of English automotive design and reliability.

Corona in the shed. XR doesn't seem to mind sharing.

Not surprisingly the brake master cylinder is shot, I had to pump a million times to get any drag whilst coming off the trailer ramp, resorting to the handbrake and then chocks. Anyway, it's in the shed, covered in a few old sheets for now.

RT40 Corona - The Beginning

The other day I won a 1970 RT40 Corona on ebay. Some thought it weird, old friends understood. I've always liked classic cars, having had around 20 or so thus far, and currently still running around in my HZ ute and driving the XR Fairmont when the weather is nice. However the ute is not a practical vehicle especially if we were to start a family. On top of that, although it has never let me down, and thus is probably the most reliable car I've ever owned, its an old Holden and is pretty heavy on the maintenance. The XR is not a daily driver, I don't fancy leaving it at my work carpark day in, day out, rain or shine and doesn't have seatbelts in the back anyway. So I want a new daily driver, possibly for my wife, something with four doors, something tough and reliable, but of course it has to be old. Essentially if it's made after 1980 I'm not interested. I'd always liked the 'shovelnose' Coronas coming close to buying one I saw in a caryard for $799 back in '96 or '97. So it was decided that model, and a four door sedan was what I wanted. I was pretty familiar with the 2R / 12R motor after having one on my '69 RN10 Hilux back in the 90's. So one came up on ebay, was relatively local (SA at least!) I went and inspected it and finally bought it. Family owned since new and is therefore dead original, reasonably neat and complete.

My old RN10 Hilux. Mechanically identical to the RT40 Corona.