The Jag was feeling a bit sulky having been left alone on the roadside for a week or two and on startup there was a really good misfire. I'll put that down to lack of use and the really grim, very wet weather that seems to have stalled over Edinburgh & The Lothians today. I let her warm up for a bit and the misfire went away, then I set out on the trip to college which was uneventful but satisfying nonetheless. It felt good to be back in the Jag.
The 'Core Skills' classes (Communication, Numeracy & ICT) flew by during the morning, then after lunch it was time to get started. A 2-post ramp was picked and after a bit of adjustment we set up the arms for the ramp, lifting the Jag gently off the ground. My classmates got stuck in by loosening off the 22mm bolts holding the roadwheels, then taking them off completely with the vehicle raised to a safe working height. Both nearside wheels went off to the tyre machine to have their punctures fixed, while the offside ones were placed out of the way. With the wheels off, access to the discs, pads & callipers is brilliant...
Front discs - gubbed...
I went round all the nuts & bolts we'd be removing with WD40 to make our job easier, then went on to do some other tasks while it soaked in.
One of the things I keep banging on about is the lack of rust on the car, and I want to keep it that way. Taking advantage of the fact the Jag was at a good working height all the wee grot traps in the arches were scraped out and gently wirebrushed to get rid of the accumulated mud and crap that will dissolve the car if left unchecked. I was really pleased to find that someone in the Jag's past had filled in the vulnerable leading edge of the rear arch, where it meets the sill, with some sort of hard material that prevents mud getting stuck there. The return lip of all the arches was cleaned out and we found that the original looking underseal appears to be in good nick. My recently applied Tetraseal doesn't seem to have covered as much as I would have liked so that is going to be re-done.
Rear arches - all good. Discs - gubbed... Spot the missing bumpstop.
While my classmates continued the cleaning of the arches, I caught up with the lads who were dealing with the tyres. The NSF was losing air around the rim while the NSR had a sodding great bolt in it. The NSF was already off its wheel, which was being sanded down and smoothed, then coated with rim sealer to make it airtight. Once that tyre was refitted we balanced the unit but found it way, way out. The solution was to pop the tyre off the rim again and rotate it 180°. The reason for this was to put the 'heavy' part of the tyre opposite the 'heavy' part of the wheel. With that done the amount of weight needed to balance everything came down to more sensible levels. The NSR tyre got a puncture repair and balancing that one was less traumatic, it was pretty much dead on first time. I can honestly say though that my alloys have had it. The polished aluminium finish is peeling off like old paint in a wet ruin. Replace, or refurbish? I've been told that a basic refurbishment is completely possible, but I want the polished finish - just because I like it shiny. How to get that, cheaply, will be the challenge. In the meantime I may swap out the alloys for something different.
Back at the 2-poster, the original pads, callipers & discs were coming off. The seized NSF put up a fight and needed a pry bar plus some oaths to come away, while the carrier bolts on the OSF were being awkward too. More WD40 required. The pads on both sides seem to have plenty of meat on them surprisingly so I'll keep them as spares. As we stripped off the rest of the old bits though, we found a potentially very serious problem or two, which is when my plan to have all this done in one afternoon came off the rails...
The team discovered that both brake flexi pipes at the front are f... ff... fffu... broken. They have perished and split. No fluid is leaking yet, but all it would take is one hearty stamp on the anchors to burst them. Which would mean no brakes. Given that the whole point of doing the brakes is to make sure the Jag is safe, there was no way I was going to fit replacement callipers, discs & pads but leave dangerous flexi's attached. For the sake of £17 for a set I'm not going to muck about. Eskside Factors wouldn't be able to deliver until Friday afternoon though which meant the Jag would not be off the ramp today.
With that spanner in the works I took some time out to check the rear discs & pads, They are past it. The pads are pretty much down to bare metal and the discs are close to their minimum tolerance, with a pronounced lip around the edge. I have a feeling that Eskside may be delivering more than just flexi pipes tomorrow. Better safe than sorry though. I also noticed that one bumpstop is gone and the other is hanging off. Easy fix though.
So, that was Anchors - Day 1. Stay tuned for another update tomorrow when we test the callipers, put it all back together, adjust the handbrake and bleed the system before roadtesting.
See the crud on the floor? That's what was left AFTER we cleaned up the rubbish scraped out the arches.
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