Looking very good mate!

I did quit a bit of cabon fibre moulding and skinning on my last car, peugeot 206 Where'd you get the weave and resin from?

Thats the best pic i could find of mine

That centre console panel is rather nice too, how'd you get the thread held below the plastic for the screws to go in?

You already know i love the dash, really need to try and sort out the right bits to set up my centre console. Dying to copy you haha

Cheers guys! Always great to hear comments like that! Mr Nimminz, I tapped a thread through the plastic, wasn't sure how it would work at first, but does the job very well! I've now done a mk2 version of the top panel. This time it has two pump switches, and a different horn button (easier to push) and a cig lighter (not because I smoke, I can use it to charge stuff like phones etc.) I left the wiring for the cig lighter in there when I did the first panel, so won't be hard to wire in!

Meanwhile, I went to the shops in Derrick, and came back and started up, to find A LOT of smoke/steam coming from the exhaust. Thought it would burn off. It didnt. Ahhhhh! Panic!!! Got him home ok, as the temp started to creep up. Shed loads of steam, and a tiny amount of oil in it. Opened the bonnet to find a boiling header tank, over flowing.

I found out the next day the thermostat had stuck closed, causing coolant to back up and just boil on the spot, warping the head (as far as I'm aware). No head gasket split, just enough gap to let coolant through. This was confirmed by the removal of the stat housing, bone dry one side, soaking the other side. Guh. A little miffed, as it seems as though the head gasket was only recently done, as it looks pretty much brand new! Still, needs to be done!

Benefits of the head being off is that I could give it a nice good inspection. Honing marks are gorgeous, no cracks (thank God!) and the biggy . . . fully ported and polished head! Winner!!

So I'll give it all a clean, dry out the pistons, skim the head, replace the stat and water pump, put it back together and change the oil. Sods law I serviced him only a few days before! *Facepalm* It'll take a little while to get him going again, as I'm taking the opportunity to do other stuff on him, like fuel cell stuff, new fuel lines, and new brake fittings and stuff. Finally got a new master cylinder ordered, took me ages. I'll also plumb the hydro in since I'm doing that. Got a lot of work to do!

I'll leave you with some pictures.



Sad Volvo


Pretty sure it's not supposed to be that colour!








hmm wet pistons!


Finished and packing up


Also, I'm putting in the larger rad and re-doing the pipe work, which should help keep temps lower, the override-able fans will be very good for that!

I have one thing to add. EFFING FRENCH AND THEIR TORX HEAD BOLTS!! FFS!!

Phew, glad I got that off my chest.

Tsk. Any excuse to take your quick release bumper off.........

heh heh, Yup!! Easy peasy now

unlucky bout the hg. when you get the new fuel lines can you tell me what type as mine are suposidly high pressure ones but it was at a garage and they said it was too soft rubber so im not sure which type to get

I went out to start Fake the other day, primed the fuel system and mine has cracked where it attaches to the fuel rail too :s

Gutting Chris, I feel for you mate! Had it gone prior to you starting then without you realising? (bit of a daft question tbf). Where is it cracked, where the injector locates, or the threads attaching the rail to the head?

frazeb, my fuel lines are pretty soft, high pressure nylon braided lines. 50 quid for 12m off ebay. Nothing fancy.

While I'm getting everything to sort the HG out, I finished off the new switch panel.



Also made some new indicator stalks. The wiper one pulled off a lil while ago, so another thing I thought I could make out of ali! Its threaded inside, and I've shortened and threaded the actual indicator bar, so it just screws on. Want to see what they look like when they're on the car!



Didn't get the taper straight, but you won't be able to tell when its on anyway. I hope.

Oooh, nice knurling

Luckily it's just the rubber hose on the feed side of the rail, but the hose is pretty new ffs, it shouldn't be cracking.

Bah! That's annoying. I thought you were on about the actual head itself though, glad it's not that!!

Had a good day working on the car today. Wired in the dash fully, so everything works (bar the pressure light, can't seem to find where to get a signal from), took off the old fuel tank, and measured up the in-car one. The old "empty" fuel tank ended up having 11 litres in it!! A fair few squash bottles later, and its empty. Also got the indicator stalks on, and seem to suit it pretty well.






(Don't worry, had the jack supporting the tank as I un-did it, the axle stands are taking the car's weight!)





The only downer today was finding that the water pump bolts are a random size and pitch. Grrrr. That and I didn't do any coursework. Woops

that interior is looking awesome mate, you doing ally door cards?

I love that your car breaks and you take as a time to install mods

Hi mate.
Love the gear knob.
Where did it come from?
Cheers Mark.