Nothing yet, Chris. I'll return the failed displacer to the LOCI spares chap as a matter of course. There is a firm offering recon displacers at £175. Quite an expense for a £15 hose from Pirtek and a pressure test, which is the only repair available at the moment.
The 1100 Club were looking at remanufacturing, having been given access to the Moulton Archive, but that trail has gone silent. Perhaps Paul or MkX knows a bit about the current state of play.
I would have thought that cold cast polyurethane would be an obvious way forward. The stumbling block is splitting and resealing the halves of the barrel satisfactorily.
Anyway, the car is currently up. Having lunch, then we'll see if she's still up.
Chris.
I'm afraid I can't be on any great help here other than to offer up vague hope that remanufactured components might be available at some point in the future.
The 1100 Club is about the best & most proactive club for the ADO16 type. In the last year or two they have reported that they were able to secure the purchase of the tooling held by Earlpart Ltd for front wings and rear subframes. They also reported that they had committed £15K to the 'suspension project', I'm guessing that this might have been little more than a viability study. I'm not a Club Member so can't access their forums, you'd probably have to join to find out more.
Of interest perhaps, the club were on a long run in 2012 and called in on one of the days to meet Dr Alex Moulton, the designer of the Hydrolastic suspension system; www.the1100club.com/lejogAug6.php
Dunlop, who manufactured these components for BMC confirmed that they had long since scrapped all the tooling and had no interest in resurrecting manufacture. Unfortunately Dr Moulton also seems to have been the villain of the piece, having gone on record as saying that he had all the original engineering drawings and documentation but ". . . would not part with them at any price," and that the key components were "too difficult to make." Dr Moulton died some months after this 1100 Club run, I don't know whether his death led to his documents becoming available?
It seems that any number of clubs have been trying to get similar suspension components engineered for years without success so far. I can't help thinking that if you sent a set of original components to China tomorrow and asked them to reverse engineer them they'd be sending crateloads over next week costing £50.00 a corner.
Chris
p.s. Too many Chris's in this exchange!
p.p.s. This was Dr Moulton's hovel, he was an active company director up until his death at 92. I believe when he claimed he would not part with his Hydrolastic source design material for any money that he'd have had a sum in mind and it wouldn't have been a bargain.
Nothing yet, Chris. I'll return the failed displacer to the LOCI spares chap as a matter of course. There is a firm offering recon displacers at £175. Quite an expense for a £15 hose from Pirtek and a pressure test, which is the only repair available at the moment.
The 1100 Club were looking at remanufacturing, having been given access to the Moulton Archive, but that trail has gone silent. Perhaps Paul or MkX knows a bit about the current state of play.
I would have thought that cold cast polyurethane would be an obvious way forward. The stumbling block is splitting and resealing the halves of the barrel satisfactorily.
Anyway, the car is currently up. Having lunch, then we'll see if she's still up.
Thanks for the links, Chris MkX. I do have a problem with the first one. I lived in Yorkshire for far too long to pay £175 for a front displacer with a new hose on it. The ONLY repair which can currently be performed is re-hosing, and I can buy that hose from Pirtek for £15 a pop. The Austin America site is excellent. They clamp their hoses over the spigot, whereas we tap the spigot and screw into it.
All components stripped, cleaned, derusted and painted. An ex-Zetland tech commented on another forum that the main housing was known as a "chicken" in Australia. Here it is basted in silver wheel paint.
High quality replacement fitted. Opportunity taken to replace the inboard driveshaft section. The claw was damaged last year when the hairy rubber spider rubber coupling disintegrated.
These'll do the trick. £16 for two sets from Rock Auto. Delivered in three working days. Impressed. Cups not required. Tube is 15mm, which fits nicely on the tiebar. Just needed the length trimming slightly to allow the nut to run right down.
Other tie bar sorted, so we have a matched pair. Taken her out for a spin and it all seems good. Notable absence of clonks and rattles. Pretty pleased with tthe result.
Oh dear, a whole month passed by. Car's been fine and had a couple of runs out.
Tie bar business has been bothering me. It can't be rocket science to get the right ones, surely? Polyurethane.... it's the future. Bought a kilogram of the two part stuff in 85 Shore hardness and set to.
Two bad. Mixing issue. Consulted Management, as it's obviously cooking really. However, we had proof of concept, so I lashed out an entire five English pounds on a polyethelene block and made a mould with a far better finish. Some people would have been setting up their CNC machines and milling aluminium, but Forstener bits, screws and a spot of welding have done the trick.
Management's instructions were to stop using the chopstick and use a proper paddle.
Re your post from Nov 15th I have the same tap and die set. Must be at least 40 years old, possibly 43 years old. I know I was in my twenties when I bought it. Still getting used.
Re your post from Nov 15th I have the same tap and die set. Must be at least 40 years old, possibly 43 years old. I know I was in my twenties when I bought it. Still getting used.
Yes, it's a nice set. Metric, UNF and Whitworth is a bit of an eclectic mix. Think there's a couple of BSFs in there as well.
Done very little due to the freezing weather, but indulged in a bit of skip raiding this afternoon whilst MrsP was in Tesco.
Took her out for a little run on Sunday, as it was Drive It Day. Padiham to Widemouth Bay was quite far enough. Actually, Dad's been taken ill and Mum can't be left without help. My sister is three hours away, and I'm six, so she's done the weekend and I'm here until Wednesday at least. Turns out to be gastric rather than cardiac, so the old boy's recovering quickly. 95 next time!
Anyway, car ran beautifully and didn't miss a beat. 38mpg was pleasing. Speedometer reading 99996. Didn't see another classic until the A39, when two Renault 4s and an AH 3000 passed the other way, so a bit disappointed really. Half expected to be chased down by Strikey to see who the interloper was on his parish; but no.
Anyway, nice to be at home, sun's out and good to see the wrinklies after 14 months.
These have been obsolete for a long time and not re-manufactured. I might finally have arrived at a solution.
