Death by a thousand cuts

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As I’ve mentioned earlier the Hornet had many flaws when I bought it, apart from not stopping very well the car was a real handful on the road, so after a few close calls I started trying to find the main cause and to be honest there was no main cause just a lot of smallish ones.

  • It seemed to not like turning right and I found that the left rear wheel had a different offset so it had narrower track on that side, I assume that this wheel was meant to be the spare so I swapped them around.
  • After testing (see Heath Robinson tester below) it appeared that the rear springs had different heights and rates, had them rebuilt.
  • The rear dampers were Armstrong lever arm probably from a Morris Minor, one was virtually immovable the other was the opposite, I replaced with new ones…that leaked out of the box.
  • Long ago some one had cut off a chassis brace making the chassis twist more as the cruciform wasn’t joined in the middle, made a new brace.
  • Moving to the front, the front axle has a bend in it…still to do.
  • Front axle was mounted back to front, putting it the right way around improved things as kingpin inclination is now in the ballpark but not the same on both sides because of the previous point.
  • Front springs like the back ones are odd, they will be rebuilt while we wait for the crankshaft to be built.
  • the front shackles had been modified, they have now been unmodified.
  • The drop/pitman arm was from a different car and was twice as long as original which I suppose was supposed to give it sharper steering, I have found an original and it’s now fitted.

Why I bought an Electric Car

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I don’t know about you but from my earliest days I was obsessed with cars, through my teenage years nothing could hold my attention other than cars (and girls) and my upcoming 18th birthday where I somehow managed to get my drivers licence. How I managed to get any education during that time was truly a miracle.

I have owned cars from every decade in the 20th century except the 40’s and lots from the 21st. However over the years even though the cars were getting better they simultaneously were getting more like an appliance.  Back in 2016 I was still interested in the latest cars and had always hankered after a Golf GTi so I bought one, it was very capable but when 8 months after buying it someone wrote it off for me I was not sorry to see it go and instead bought for 20% of the price a Fiat Panda Twinair which has been a blast but they don’t make them like that anymore, probably not civilised enough.

Our main everyday car for the last 13 years has been a Landrover Discovery. It’s quiet, smooth and I get someone else to maintain it as what lies under the bonnet is quite frightening if like me you find a sea of black plastic where you think the engine is frightening. It’s a very complicated appliance. 

So if I’m going to buy a new appliance I might as well buy one that is efficient, is naturally quiet and smooth and that I can fill up with the stacks of excess solar that our roof is currently producing

Lastly and I think this is the crux of the matter to justify being a Greenie and an old car nut, by driving an Electric Vehicle that has no tailpipe emissions I can justify driving my old cars for the relatively distance that I do.

The Bakes or Lack Thereof

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The very first entry (June ’21) in my workshop diary for the Hornet was to replace the cups and boots on the brake slave cylinders as they were leaking and at the same time I inserted modern oil seals on the rear axles as the rear brakes were covered in oil. As it happened this was a complete waste of time as there were parts missing (parts 6 & 8) so the brakes continued to leak

Times have moved on so now you can use the following instead of the the spring and the two missing bottle caps. Also I have found that the first series of Chevy Corvette rear wheel cylinders have the same diameter and piston arrangement plus they are very cheap I bought some ($17 each for a complete wheel cylinder) and ratted the springs, cups, boots and pistons.

Also the modern oil seals placed in the rear axle tubes had been running on what I realised later were wonky axles so they still leaked and destroyed another set of brake shoes. Luckily Hornet’s very close relative MG has a community that had a solution.

What were originally a weird castellated nut (first pic) that held the rear hub on became a hex nut (second pic) with an oil seal in the centre and the now new axles and hubs (again MG) had a stainless steel sleeve (marked blue) epoxied in place for the seal to run on.

So after about a year the brakes and the back axle don’t leak but the brakes are still crap at their actual job of stopping. To be continued.