My first car!

I recently passed my driving test and purchased my first car. It is a 1979 Ford Mk 1 Fiesta. I have always wanted a classic car rather than a newer one, and since asking at the garage what would be best in terms of cost and maintenance, I decided on a classic. I had always liked Mk 1 Fiestas as there are a few in the town I live in so I stared to look at some. This was the second one we went to see and after having a good look around and talk about the price we decided to buy it.

It is a 1.1L 1979 Ford Mk 1 Fiesta

The previous owner had resprayed the car white from the original gold colour.

So far the only work I have helped on, is to service the car and fit new rear shock absorbers as the rubbers on the old ones were perished.

I plan on keeping the car in original condition without any aftermarket wheels or a performance carburetor.

The Mustang

In October of 2012, my Dad purchased his dream car; a 1968 Ford Mustang Coupe. It had just been imported from the USA and he is the first UK owner. This section of my blog will detail jobs that i have done to help him in the restoration.

The car, a 1968 Ford Mustang Coupe with a 302 V8.

This is the first job I did. These are the indicator bezels that the front lights sit in, I took all the surface rust away with a wire wheel then sanded the bits that it couldn't reach before painting it all black. The one on the right is after next to the other side as before.

This is one of the housing bodies from the rear lights before I sanded the paint off. I did these with much the same process as the front lights.

The same real light housing body but whilst I was sanding them down. you can clearly see the difference between the bare metal and the amount of rust and paint that was on this.

Once we jacked the car up and put it on axle stands, we took off the power steering cylinder and I helped to rebuild it under the guidance of my dad. We rebuilt it using a kit we purchased that included all new seals and rubbers needed to recondition it. (The tape at the end is to hold in the grease). We still need to paint this before we put it back on the car.

Whilst we had the car up off of the ground, we took off the strut rods. Here I am cleaning one with a wire brush before painting it and putting it all back together.

Here is the finished product. As you can see I've added new bushes to the end and repainted the bar itself as well as the caps. (The gold disks)

This is the anti roll bar after I rubbed it down and painted, ready to go back on the car.

Garage Work

Since June 2013 I have been working at my local garage just down the road from where I live. My duties are to empty all the bins and give the workshop a sweep up from the weeks work and sometimes to mop up some of the other rooms in the building. After those jobs are completed I then help the garage mechanics with their work.

                       One of the jobs I am able to do by myself is to fit wheels and tyres, I learnt this skill early on whilst at the garage and I am trusted to do the task. Most tyres are straight forward to do as long as you follow the regular way of mounting tyres but some, such as the one shown below, are much harder to remove!

Blown tyre 

Another job I often help with is assisting on MOTs. The tester often needs a hand with things such a shaking the steering, wobbling the tyres and applying the hand brake on and off as they are unable to do so whilst in the pit under the car.

One of the great things about working in a garage is that I get to see and work on alot of nice and expensive cars that I can only dream of owning! Here are a few pictures of some that have passed through the garage.

The Porsche at the front was brought out of storage last year and was in for its MOT and I helped to fit a new starter motor which required the whole engine being lifted up from it's mounts in order for the old motor to be taken out and replaced. The Rolls Royce is a long term resident of the garage with lots of work having been done on it such as an engine rebuild and also work waiting to be done on it.

This Bently was brought in by a customer who wanted it servicing and cleaned up before he was to sell it. I helped by covering the wheels and paintwork with sheets before painting the wheel arches.

The Jensen V8 shown here required a new steering rack and general maintenance.

A Jaguar E-Type owned by the same man who owned the Bently above, it was in for an MOT. I assisted with checking it for the MOT

   At home we have a 1968 Ford Mustang Coupe that we are currently restoring to its former glory. As you can see from the photos below it needs a fair bit of work such as paint but it will get there eventually!

The rear of the car, the stripes are only stickers and don't line up correctly with each other below the chrome bumper.

Front view of the car, you can clearly see the differences in the paints colour between the bonnet and wing as well as patches where the paint has come off.

A view of the side and back of the car.

Update; This week at the garage I was tasked with repairing a punctured tyre. Once you have found the hole or gash in the tyre you can then decide what needs to be done if it is possible to be fixed. This particular tyre had a short nail in it that would come through when in contact with the road. First I pulled the nail out with pliers then put a screwdriver through the hole to check which way the nail had gone through. Once I knew the direction of the nail I then drilled through the hole to open it up and get rid of any dirt in the hole preparing it for the patch. When the hole has been drilled I then sand over the hole with an electrical sander to help the patch stick. With the tyre prepared for the patch, I can then get a patch out and get it ready. I cover the area around the hole and the patch with a special glue called vulcanising cement and wait for it to go tacky before pulling the patch through the hole and cutting the excess rubber off from the patch. I then rub over the patch with a roller to make sure it is in the hole and no air is trapped underneath. Leave the patch to stick to the tyre for a minute and then you are able to put the tyre back on the rim and car. The whole process takes about 20 minutes.

The vulcanising cement around the hole.

The finished product. You can clearly see the are that I have sanded to prepare the surface of the tyre.

This blog will be updated as and when I learn or do new things at the garage or at home.

Work Experience

Work Experience

Thompson Commercials 

For my work experience in year 12, I was lucky enough to be able to go to Thompson Commercials in Boston who are the largest privately owned Renault Trucks dealer group in the UK. During my time there I was placed in the workshop assisting with inspections on the vehicles and changing new vehicles specifications to the customers requirements.

The site from the yard

Every six weeks a lorry must go to a certified workshop to have an inspection carried out, without this the lorry is not allowed back on the roads. The inspection consists of visually checking the truck for any damaged panels or large chips in the windscreen and that all the lights are working on the vehicle, any imperfections are written down and noted. The truck is then put over the pit and the tester begins to check that all the vital nuts and bolts are not loose, the brake disks and pads are not excessively worn, and that no items are broken or missing that should be there. Whilst the lorry is still over the pit all grease points are greased, then tread depths on all the tires are then taken and the fifth wheel is greased and checked. The truck is then taken for a test drive to check for any mechanical faults that only become present whilst driving such as engine or gearbox problems and rattles.

A job card that is filled out at the end of all work completed on the lorries telling the customer what was done to their vehicle. 

The first job I assisted with was to rewire an engine's loom. When the truck first came in the owners were unsure of the problem apart from they knew it was engine related due to the warning light on the dash board, so we used the diagnostics computer to locate the fault and see if we had the parts to be able to fix the problem.

The diagnostics computer and a list of all the faults with that particular lorry came up including what time and who was driving the lorry when it first appeared.

Once we had diagnosed the problem with the wiring loom on the engine we began to remove the loom and see what was the issue. What had happened was part of the loom enters the actual engine at the back near the rockers, and the rubber seal around that entry point had began to leak and engine oil had begun to seep down the inside of the wiring case and short circuit the signals being sent from the engine ecu to the fuel injectors. Once we knew this we removed the whole loom and replaced it with a brand new one from the stores.

      With the faulty loom off and the new one fitted I was told to start attaching it to a faulty engine that they had pulled out of a lorry the week before, so I fitted the loom with the help of one of the mechanics and over the two weeks added more parts, such as a thermostat housing, that were taken of off other trucks I had helped on over my work experience.

The faulty engine with the faulty wiring loom and thermostat housing attached

Another job I helped on a few times was changing worn brake discs and pads. This was quite a lengthy job as it involved taking off the wheels and if it was rear discs and pads then it was two tires per side, and when each tyre weighs more than I can easily manoeuvre, the job becomes all the more challenging! 

 Changing the front brake disks and pads on a lorry

One of the most frequent jobs I assisted with, was the engine timing. This involved taking the rocker cover off and turning the engine over from beneath using a tool attached to the gearbox. Each cylinder has a shim at the top which changes the spacing between the cylinders maximum volume. The shims vary in sizes from about 3-4mm with around 0.05mm of difference between each size of shim.

The tool attached to the gearbox used to turn the engine over by hand and beneath the rocker cover where the shims are placed (Near each group of three large springs)

The last job I helped on was to replace a starter motor that had heated up and blown a part of its casing off, the starter motor is located behind the fuel tank so it required putting the lorry up on a lift and working from beneath the lorry to be able to get at it. After we had replaced the broken starter motor with a new one we stayed under it and replaced the fuel filter and the ad blue filter, this can be tricky as they are not easily accessible, also they are screwed into their sockets really tight so its abit of a squeeze to get at them and replace them.

The hole in the starter motor.

Here are some more pictures from my two weeks at Thompson Commercials

 The engine beneath the cab on one of the brand new lorrys.

 One of the vehicles in the yard, a recovery truck that had its engine break its mounts and rest on the balancing weight at the front of the truck. 

The broken engine I was adding parts to.

The broken engine I was adding parts to.

The broken engine I was adding parts to.

A recovery trucks engine where we had to replace another wiring loom.

The hole for the starter motor to connect to.