Another great old photo.

This photo was sent to me by John Sever (original owner). It was taken in 1968 when the car was only a few months old. It was taken in the Civic car park in Canberra which is now lost to a high rise building. The Gordini still has the factory supplied Dunlop SP3 Sport tires fitted. The number plates are the original NSW plates before the car was registered in the ACT.

The restoration is still in wait mode, you know, the long weight!! According the the company who has my harness it has been put on the RUSH list (ha ha). The panels I sent away for repair have been repaired and waiting for a lick of paint before they come home, hopefully soon. I am also waiting for another parcel of parts from Belgium which include parts for the gearbox, window seals, front and rear screen rubbers, pedal rubbers and axle straps. I bet everything comes at the same time and I won't know where to start.

Time to start on the gearbox.

Its time to start on the gearbox and make the shell movable again. I have cleaned the gearbox and cross member and will start to pull it apart tomorrow for re painting and new rubbers, mounts etc. You will notice in the photos it is fitted with a K Mac rear stabiliser bar which will be removed, also the axle tubes have an amount of daffodil yellow paint on them. This makes me ask the question why? My car has a documented problem with the gearbox going back to its early days (see early posts of letter from Renault Australia). It also has no racing or rally history so why the stabiliser bar? Where did the yellow paint come from? I'll post the answer here when I know for sure.

 Note the K Mac stabiliser bar.

Daffodil Yellow on both axle tubes. Why?

Cosmic Mags and an R10.

I managed to obtain 5 MK1 Cosmic mags. They will need to be stripped of the paint, cleaned up re-painted and polished. One of the mags has a bit of a bump in it so our local mag wheel man will repair that and remove a small amount of curb rash from some of them as well.
As for everything else, well I'm still waiting. My harness was promised to me 2 weeks ago.
After the big sale of Renault and Gordini parts yesterday, it would appear I am now the proud owner of a square light R10. A bit of a clean up, a couple of new front doors, a set of wide wheels, some interior work and a lick of paint all over might see this as #2 son's first car. I think the brakes need an overhaul as well.

 Mk1 Cosmic mags.

Will look great when re-painted and polished.

 One project too many!

Now that its parked in the shed can it be called "A barn Find?"

What to do while waiting?

What to do while on the long wait? Well, how about polish the tappet cover and paint the G in body colour.
In between organising John's auction on the 27th of this month (October) there has been little done to the car so the other night I gave the cover a bit of a polish.
My new panel beater rang this morning so tomorrow I'm taking some of the panels over to have repaired. This could see the project move forward again.

The Long Weight or Wait?

Remember when you were a young apprentice and one of your fellow workers sent you to the store for a "Long Weight"? Well that's what I am experiencing at the moment. Nothing has been done to the car in about six weeks.
My wiring harness has been in Victoria since June and no amount of prompting can get it repaired and returned which is really starting to annoy me.
I had some of my panels with a panel beater in town to have some repairs done, but insurance work takes precedence over everything else these days, so I got those panels back and fitted them to the car for another guy to look at doing the repairs for me. I found this guy through a friend, he runs a small spray painting business about 25 km from town and specialises in building hot rods and the like. He uses an old school panel beater who actually beats and heats the metal back into shape without using too much filler. He is going to complete the work on my panels for me starting after the Bathurst V8 races so I'm hoping to have all the panels finished and painted within a month or two. As for the wiring harness I think I need to get it back completed or not and send it to someone else if its not yet done.

Just gathering dust for the past 6 weeks.

Buy new or rebuild minor gauges?

In my last post I mentioned that I have had my gauges rebuilt, with exception of the temperature gauge. The temperature gauge is with the wiring harness in Victoria (STILL!) so that was not done. The temperature gauge is corroded inside and the fellow who repaired the others said he might be able to put a new mechanical insert into the gauge, this would also require a new sender unit as well. Going on what I paid to have the others repaired and re calibrated I would think this would probably cost in the vicinity of $200.00! What to do?
Ebay France was the answer. I purchased a brand new original equipment Jaeger R8G/Alpine temperature gauge for AU$145.00 including postage.
Used gauges on ebay Fr start at 20 euros plus postage and new ones between 75-99 euros plus post, so this is a good alternative if the old ones have had their day. Speedo's and Tacho's are a different story though. My Speedo cost around $350 to repair and re calibrate and the Tacho about $150. Used Speedo's and Tachos on ebay France start at 500 euros second hand.

My new gauge.

Finally something comes back!

I picked up the instruments today after having them cleaned and re-calibrated. Unfortunately the temperature gauge is not ready yet as it requires a new unit fitted to the gauge body. It should look original but with a different sender unit. If your thinking of having yours done be aware of the cost. There was little change from $700.00 for the four that have been done so far and $350.00 of that was care of the Speedo. I need a scotch after paying that account!