Birdwood trial run

The Bay to Birdwood Classic is next month, and although I'd already entered with another vehicle, I'm considering changing my entry vehicle to the Corona. In order to do that, I thought I'd better check that it would get there ok as the road to Birdwood is extremely windy and hilly.

I needn't have worried, apart for the odd misfire, which I still think is residual dirty or contaminated fuel on steep ascents, and the lack of power when reaching the peaks, it performed very well and the handling was excellent. I'm not surprised they raced them back in the day (well the manuals anyway).

I quickly stopped for a photo at the Big Rocking Horse on the way back.

Seems the cold weld on the radiator has blocked that pinhole too, which is good.

Gawler trip

Following the wheel alignment, The Corona was ready for it's first longer-distance trip. So far I'd not travelled more than 10km from home, mainly as I wasn't too confident on the reliability and I didn't want to scrub out the tyres until properly aligned.

Weather was reasonable so I decided to visit my parents in Gawler which is a 70 km round trip with patches of 90kph along the way. I'd not had it over 70 at that stage.

Trip up was generally trouble free, although at times I noticed a bit of a haze emanating from the front of the car when I stopped. I did investigate but came up with nothing. It managed to keep up with traffic, generally, bit slow off the lights but 90kph seemed quite doable. It did rev quite high by then so I'd not think 100 would be advisable for long periods if even possible.

Here we are after arrival: 

Back to the odd mist, I checked around and found a tiny pinhole in the top radiator tank. Quite vexing given I had that radiator totally rebuilt. Alas that was maybe 4 years ago so warranty would no longer be valid. It hadn't lost much coolant at all so I left it at this stage.

The trip home was pretty uneventful except for a number of misfires along the way. Might need to investigate that. I have since pulled the plugs and leads and so on to find all are perfect. I hope it's not a burnt valve. I used some cold weld on the radiator so I'll see if that holds pressure, before pulling it out for a pro to solder it.

I've also been considering entering it in the Bay to Birdwood this year. Back in 2010 I posted about maybe making it to the 2011 B2B Classic - totally daft in hindsight, only now 4 years later is that even slightly possible. I'm going to do a test run to Birdwood and back on Saturday morning before deciding.

White walls and wheel alignments

Recently I emailed the original family of the Corona. I still had their email address on a scrap of paper with all the documents when I first bought it. They were delighted to hear about it and see some pictures of it back in action.

They sent me this photo from when it was brand new:

The paint was so nice when it was new!

Anyway this pic has whitewalls! Something I was considering doing so on a whim I called the local whitewall guy who came out the very next morning and did them for $90. His price hasn't changed in 10 years I reckon. I didn't want to wear the tyres out more than necessary so I finally had it  wheel aligned. On my birthday or all days.

Saturday cruising

Today we went on our first official outing in the Corona.

Fittingly it was down to Supacheap to buy a small socket/spanner set to keep in the boot. We also detoured past the friend's place again.

The car ran beautifully, smooth, responsive - well, as responsive as a 45 year old 1.5L 2 speed auto can manage, which isn't much, and rode pretty quietly.

Upon returning home I noticed a small coolant leak due to a lack of sealant around an outlet from the water pump (it's a screw  in attachment), which has been fixed.

One of the trans lines was oozing near the radiator, which I since sealed and added a new clamp.

And then the contact points closed on me so it took a good 20 minutes to locate why it wouldn't start. Reset them and we're good again!

Exhausted after a trip around the block

Finally we're ready for some cruising!

Clean, running, interior in, lets go.

Did a few trips around the block, up to a friends house not far away home again, and then to get fuel and then the exhaust blew. Not surprising really given I suspect it's actually the original exhaust from the factory. Whenever I started it in the shed, a shovel full of rust and crap would blow out of the pipes.


Shortly after the exhaust let go. Looks great, sounds awful, runs a bit rough.


Today it went for it's longest trip, running a little rough, down to the exhaust joint near my work.



I knew there was still some fuel issue as when you plant the foot it hesitates and sometimes bogs down, but after some discussion with the exhaust bloke we agreed it's probably the ancient fuel in the tank. I topped it up with a jerry can some months back, but the fuel in the tank is probably 10 years old (last registered in 2006) and the fuel in the jerry can is probably at least that old if not more! I added $20 worth of fuel the other week, but obviously not enough to dilute the gunk.

Anyway, on the way home I filled it totally - to overflowing actually which unfortunately softened the paint under the filler pipe. However within about 5 minutes of driving it was suddenly running smooth! 

More Interior

After the carpet was installed, it really showed how awful the headlining was looking. Initially I didn't think it was too bad, but I gave it a thorough scrub and it was clearly evident that it had significant sun damage. Some of the vinyl had even cracked and come apart on the passenger A pillar. I glued in a patch of vinyl to cover the cracks and then sprayed the A pillar with dull-white vinyl spray. It suddenly looked a million times better and I knew I had to do the whole thing.

Being mid-Winter it was risky, but we were having a sunny day so I bit the bullet and careful masked the whole interior and then gave it many light coats, using two full cans in the end. There was two runs which I managed to spot early enough to clean up and recover with paint. I was pretty happy with the result, vinyl spray can really be hit and miss, but this turned out awesome. To the casual observer they wouldn't be able to notice.

The crashpad in these things are notorious for self-destructing from the Aussie summers. I don;t think I've ever seen a non-restored one in one piece. This one had a huge crack right through the middle about an inch wide where you could see the metal below. It had curled and peeled and was a write off. I have no idea how they repair them. I had started cutting off the worst bits and was going to bog it until I read online about a guy making a new one out of foam and vinyl. They are dead straight with no contours or many curves so I thought I should give it a crack. It was pretty easy actually, make a template from newspaper, cut foam to suit, test, then glue on vinyl, then fit. Although the corners that fold down into the sides of the dash don't quite look right, the rest looks very neat.

 

 
 

Carpet install

Every recent post seems to be 'a couple more things and we'll be done', which never ends up being the case.

The carpet arrived, here's a review.

Rear: The rear was pretty much a perfect fit. The moulding lined up exactly with the tunnel and finished an inch in front of the seam between the front and rear floor. Just enough overhang to provide a clean fit along the sides, I trimmed about 2 inches off each side. 9.5/10 for fit

Front: Front was a reasonably good fit, I've done maybe 5 carpets before from various manufacturers and not one has ever been a snug perfect fit over the trans hump area.It'll settle down a bit and it is cold out in the shed these evenings, so with some good warmth I think it'll be a little more pliable and fit a little more snugly. A fair amount needs to be trimmed from the sides, about 3 inches. Some issues with lining up the dips to clear the steering column. This doesn't line up exactly, but it's pretty close. The carpet doesn't quite reach the factory velcro on the firewall so I'll have to remove that, but it does covers all of the factory underfelt. It did foul on the air box in the centre and has no provision for the accelerator mount like the factory one did. I just unbolted the accelerator mount and rebolted it over the top. Probably about a 7/10 for fit for the front section.

Issues: I ordered loop charcoal, but it's several shades lighter than the factory charcoal. However nowhere as bright as the photos show, that's just poor camera lighting causing that.

There's simply not enough offcuts large enough to cover the outer seat mounts as shown in the last picture. I'm not sure if earlier models have them but they have strips of carpet glued directly to them. I'll have to clean these as well as possible. The only part of those visible is between the seat edge and the doorjam. 

There is, of course, no press studs in the carpet that would attach to the ones in the floor, but I didn't really expect that.

The fouling on the airbox and the not quite right lining up under the dash, was slightly irksome, but I wonder if that's from changes of the models over the years. Perhaps the original mould was taken from a '65 and the '70 has some differences? Not sure...
All up maybe 7.5/10