Whit Monday Test drive

Relieved – this is what I am feeling today. We just got back from the first 100km trip in the Morgan. Doesn’t sound like much – but besides driving it back from Viktor Günther Motorsport in Cologne last autumn – it is the longest run I did ever after the rebuild of C6622 since I screwed up the rear axle. And this was back in July 2021 with just 16km on the clock.

It is astonishing how much time the small details and issues in my Morgan ToDo list take so much time. Looking back, I could have focused more on them last year and I really thought that car is finished once the interior is in. But the long ToDo list shrunk to almost nothing after a laborious weekend.

The new seat mounts including improved routing of the wiring for the heated seats were came in on Saturday. I cut them out from 4cm by 6cm galvanised square tubing. The have an odd shape but believe this is a fabulous change of older Morgan’s. They get screwed into the original holes between the Crossmembers of the chassis – which are 43,5cm apart. The total length is 57cm and the upper part extends 13,5cm back over the rear crossmember. This is also the distance the rear screw for the seat runners gets moved back. The runners in my car have a travel of 12cm and for my seat position – the seat is now in middle position of the runner – which add stability.

My first iteration of these seat mounts was with 5x5cm tubing with a total length of 52cm. Initially, I was concerned that moving them up for just 1cm might take too much space to the steering wheel. But as I also removed the shims for the steering column and build a new dashboard – this was not an issue at all. Speaking of dashboard – it took two more attempts to get the dash (almost) right. I made it slightly smaller – with just 21cm width in the middle section where the instrument cluster resides. This in turn now only has a 13cm (high) and 26cm wide cut out.

A light swoosh on the lower left towards the stalk cover generates enough clearance for the wiper stalk – which I could not get fitted before. Instead of applying black maple vernier – I just stained the (expensive) beech plywood black and gave it a few coats for clear lacquer. Not as nice the one I had professionally painted – but good enough for now.

After our drive new items have made their way onto the ToDo list.

• Wheel alignment
  By far worst problem. The entire front of the car shaked and rattles as soon as you drive 50km/h plus. It it not so bad on acceleration – but as soon as take pressure off the gas pedal it is back.
  Camber, Castor and KingPin incline cannot really be changed as the GoMog page on this topic clearly states. Therefore, I really hope that the toe is causing this and will this have checked again (I don’t trust my “home grown” garage method)
  
• Brakes
  I bleed the brake in Sep2022 – need to check the entire system again.
  
• Electric quirks.
  Quite annoying is the fact that the dip beam doesn’t function anymore. I checked and tried to fix the Lucas 4-way light switch (part no 34382). After cleaning it, it worked on the bench – but after got it back into the car it stops working again. Same applied for the electronic part I used to replace the Voltage Regulator. Both the temperature and fuel gauge are not working correctly. I quicky reverted the old-style voltage regular. The revived the temperature gauges – fuel remains a problem.

Due to a business trip – this all must wait until next weekend – when I also plan to visit Horst from the Flying Squirrel Racing team to talk about a potential participation in an exciting event.