1968 Viva HB

c'80-'82 i went on on a business trip with my old man , i think it was somewhere in the midlands and the fella we went to see must have had a dozen or more Jensen Interceptors stashed in a grotty old shed..i was gobsmaked! Many years later i was invited to have a look around Ken Jones' extensive collection (he founded the Gweek Seal Sanctuary). He was a big collector , mostly Jaaags , with them spread across many buildings. It was a rarety for anyone to gain access and he was a very modest old chap.

I thought i had to many cars and parts. Well as long as they do sell but WOW.
Is there some form of system to them or is it just go looking when you need something.
I do like the amount of space though. Pity you cant open a door to work on them.

So now the weather has warmed up a bit and I can feel my fingers a bit of tinkering was on the cards, also now we are down a vehicle It might be handy to get this one back on the road for local duties

Out with the old distributor and in with the newly rebuilt one, the origional for this engine was an AC Delco unit but they were never very good with an advance curve like a drunk at closing time when lockdown ends! This Bosch unit is elctronic so no points to worry about but as they were only used in some of the Bedford CF vans they have too much mechanical advance hence getting it rebuilt with a more suitable advance curve, I also had the vac advance removed at the same time



At the same time I wanted to replace the cam and auxiliary pulleys, the teeth shape on the belt is unusual so these were developed by a good friend and put into production, between the old and the new pulleys there is a bonus weight saving of nearly 1.8kg!


The vernier pulley was just left at the standard setting for now but will need dialling in properly at some point, got the old faithfull timing light out that ive had man & boy to check the timing

Unfortunately old faithfull decided not to be faithfull and doesnt seem to work! I just set the timing up by ear and feel for now but dont think its too far out, looks like a decent timing light is on my shopping list on payday but as I work for myself payday might be a ways off!

Dont panic the belt always seems to run close to one edge of the pulleys, never seen one come off yet!

That was sad to see the last post from George, anyhow found a few sheckles to insure the Viva so it can get a bit more use, it got dragged it from its slumber, think its going to need a wash at some point


When it got put together in the late 80s I put a lightweight bucket seat in for the driver and non matching passenger seat, Im trying to make it a bit more user friendly so came upon a set of nice Recaros at the right price eg free, not sure what they came from maybe Astra MK1 GTE


On inspection they were going to be a doddle to fit as the front of the subframe mounts in a similar manner to the standard Viva seat and the shape matched the tunnel, a couple of brackets on the rear of the subframe and job done



Happy with that, just the passenger side to sort and might even change the seat belts

Do look like gte items , just right for the job!

I'm in a similar position with door mirrors. I don't have them on the Firenza, but I keep putting it on "winter list" for it. I put them on the Sportshatch - I drilled the doors and put riv-nuts in before it was painted so I had no excuse. I'm so used to having them because my daily driver has them that I do miss them.

Oh, they've come up very nicely indeed, I'll have to think about one of those tanks.

The tank was £110 inc delivery, its the 10ltr version supposedly, if you look at the 1st picture with the carb body in the tank thats 6ltrs of water plus the carb??? that said its about the right size I dont think I would want anything bigger as it would take forever for the water to heat up!

In this little lot, I'd think: VEVOR.

Very useful company. I recently bought a disc/belt sander from them at a very favourable price.