Little jobs

It seemed to take an age for Saturday to come round. Since last week the posty has been a regular visitor to the house with packages with little goodies inside. Degsy's dash was in the same state as I had left it the week before i.e. in bits.

I started with a trial fitting the choke cable to the ignition switch block. It did not fit. I got the file out and whittled the collar away until it fitted into the carrier on the switch block. It was hard on my hands but I got there. H brought me a brew to keep the brain going. Next was to attach the wires to the new ignition switch. I read the manual and did as it said. However as soon as I put the key in the ignition the engine cranking. That was wrong. I had taken a picture of the back of the old switch the week before. I reconnected the wires according the picture and bingo the switch worked as it supposed to.

Next was to fit the ignition switch to the steering column. With the key out of the ignition barrel the steering lock tag was exposed. Putting the tag into the slot in the steering column provided the position for the ignition block on the column. I had already pulled the original choke cable out of bulkhead. At this stage of the game Degsy had THREE choke cables. The original cable which corroded to death. The second was the replacement for the original and now I had a replacement for the replacement. I pulled out the original cable and in positioning the ignition switch, fed the new choke cable through the bulkhead where the old choke cable had been. It all went together quite well. I eased the wires and threaded them to be less of bird's nest behind the dashboard before reconnecting them to the ignition switch. Then I tightened up the bracket securing the ignition block whilst making sure the steering lock and ignition switch continued to work until the sheer bolts......sheered. The next job was to reconnect the indicator switch and again reroute the wires to reduce the bird's nest. I replaced the dash lights bulbs whilst the dash was out then replaced the dash and eased the wires behind the dash as I screwed it home. I checked all the switches and found that the blower now worked but only on a single speed. I single speed is better than the previous zero speed.

Steering wheel next. Well actually the steering wheel binnacle. That was a faff but still only a few minutes of messing out. Then the steering wheel proper. No problem as I must have fitted it more than a dozen times. This time on dismantling the steering wheel the last time I had remembered to put a pencil mark to assist me in repositioning the steering wheel correctly.

I popped up the bonnet. I disconnected the current choke cable from the carb. After a moments thought I pulled out he cable inner and a snipped off the outer sleeve. I did not remove what was the existing choke pull from the bulkhead as it would be leave another hole. I had two or three goes at routing the new choke cable round the engine bay to find nice clean route. Having found the best route I secured the sleeve and inner to the choke levers. It all just fitted together. It was noticeable that the choke butterfly sat up vertically where the old cable made the butterfly lean over. I think that in leaning over it was also engaging the enriching choke jet.

The tiny jobs left to do was were really easy.
A. to replace the radiator header tank cap [10 seconds]
B. fit new the washer bottle cap. [30 seconds]
C. Vacuum tube [30 seconds]

Fitting the washer bottle cap required me to take off part of the washer feed pipe so water had to be pumped through to make the washer jets work. When I tried the wipers the left one started working properly, go figure.

I pulled out the choke cable turned the key and Degsy burst into life without any hesitation. The engine sounded really "fruity". I had to go out and took Degsy. The engine revved freely and pulled more strongly and even than before. Having run round for an hour or so I checked the end of the exhaust pipe. It was biscuit brown rather than sooty as it had been before. The fuel gauge was telling the same story, fuel consumption is down.

It was a pleasant couple of hours fettling Degsy. There are still a few little items to resolve but the engine works well and that is a big thing.