soldiering on

it is remarkable how tired and exhausted you can be after the entire day in the garage. At least writing a few lines here for the blog helps battling the desire to just go to bed and sleep. Many little things and open tasks were completed – I even forgot to take pictures along the way. The “Electrical check” milestone was a bigger item on my list. Logically, I could not test everything without starting the engine, but I am quite confident that whatever might surface now can be addressed. Lights, indicators, hazard, brake, reverse, horn, heated seats, dashboard aux cables are functioning.

The day started with “clean-up” jobs. While trying to find the issue with the washer motor yesterday, I ripped out the fuse-box and some cabling. Screwing back the plastic caps on the Lucas rear lights causes some trouble – there is a little brass “nut” that is just push through the back of the chrome of the lights. A bit of duct tape on the back now keeps those in place again. There was also a bit of corrosion in both rear indicators using some sandpaper and electric grease took care of this.

I had to take the seats and prop-shaft tunnel out again, because I forgot to put the seat-belt-buckles in. I also had to alter the tunnel a bit as the passenger seat left a huge scratch on the top. Since I lowered the seats by 18mm – the clearance with the tunnel is tights. While the seats were out, I also used my remaining stainless screws and rivet nuts to attach the cover above the rear axle. Cable ties were added under the seats and the speaker panels that now also include the switch for the heated seats are in now.

An entirely self-made problem is the fitting the windshield again. First, my father had a set of folding screen brackets (has we also used the brooklands from time to time). At some point in the distant past, one of the screws on the folding brackets broke off. As there is nobody else to blame – I guess my father just screwed in some none fitting metric screws – destroying the threats in the brackets ☹ What I should have done when I took the car apart is to source new brackets somewhere. But this dropped completely from my radar. When my wife and oldest daughter showed up to help me put the screen back on – I could not find the screws that he used and nothing else would fit.

The reason why I needed their help is because of self-made windshield problem number two. And here I can only blame myself. As the scuttle panel had plenty of additional holes (brooklands mounts, aerial, different rear mirrors and so on) I asked the guys from the paint shop to weld those and to straighten the metal again. Idiot me also marked the four holes for the windshield – to I need to redrill those now. Hopefully, I will find the straight (non-folding) original screen brackets somewhere at my parent’s old home – otherwise I need to buy new ones…

Although it is close to impossible to get the car to the technical inspection on Thursday, I will push on. Getting the front wings back on is also not too hard as I followed an advice from Michael R. He also me a good hint via email for the hazard switch problem– hopefully some P600a diodes will arrive in time tomorrow. The Morgan, MG, Triumph Highland Games that I was aiming for with my restore might not take place due to Covid. Tonight, I need to convince my wife that we need to go to the Morgan Allgäu Meeting 2021 in June 😊

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