jon dent

[tony]

hi jon dent wellcome to the club when do you set off? hows the preperation comming on?:cool:

[Jon Dent]

We Set off on boxing day. The preparation is going well, the car is currently being used on regular basis to try to iron out any undiscovered problems. Over last few days we have repainted the Orange to make it stand out a bit more so it show off our sponsors names (when we get some!) better. The fitting of the rad from diesel has certainly improved cooling due the absence of thermostat the engine never seems to get warm anymore! Th eonly other slight niggles with the car are a small electrical fault with the head lights where sometimes when you switch to main beam it actually switches all the lights off - but i think that we can live with this! Two days after purchasing the car for £45 pounds we drove it down to Devon for the rally launch meeting and it performed admirably with on a slight overheating problem due to an inoperative electric fan. Hopefully the web site (www.thefastandthedubious.co.uk) will be kept upto date on a regular basis and the diary section should follow our progress. We have recently added more contact information so should anyone wish to contact me for any more info / sponsorship etc please feel free.
Jon.

[H48HPE]

Hi

I would fix the headlight problem, it was doing what you describe on my car then one night i flicked from main to dip beam and they went off and didnt come back on again. it needed a new stalk switch to sort it. cost £5. on the old forum people were posting about similar problems and traced the fault to the dim dip relay (i think), another part cheap from the scrappers.

andy

[E_T_V]

I'd certainly recommend fixing the headlamp problem too (roads are often unlit where you are going) I'd add a set of spot lights too, but then I add that to everything!

I certainly wouldn't run without a thermostat though as no only will your engine not get warm, (so will require more fuel and may coke up), but also your oil won;t get up to temperature and so will increase engine wear. They are cheap and easy to change so I'd bung a new one back in (88deg C one if you can get hold of it)

Good luck and keep us posted

[John]

Best of luck Jon, I'll be following you on your website.

[Jon Dent]

Well...It takes a big man to admit when he is wrong, so instead i will blame our team mechanic, Jim! Having read your messages about fixing the headlight problem we decided to adopt a policy of "wait and see" last night the waiting ended and the headlights finally packed up! Thanks for all your support and advice folks - I'll make sure to take more notice of it in the future!
Best Regards
Jon.
P.S. fitted a new thermostat at weekend - running much better now.....If only we could see where we are going!

[John S]

[QUOTE]
P.S. fitted a new thermostat at weekend - running much better now.....If only we could see where we are going!

Briefly, repairing the main beam is extremely simple. It is quite likely that one of the wires has become detached from one of the soldering points around the indicator stalk. You need to:-

a.) Remove the steering wheel - do this by removing the centre cap with a flat end screwdriver and then take the cap off the central bolt + undo with an appropriate size socket.

b.) Yank off the steering wheel and proceed to undo the steering column plastic casing which is secured by (three?) a few philips (+) screws.

You will then have access to remove the left hand indicator stalk. Either solder the wire that has come undone or get a better unit from a scrap car (obviously).

John