The Plan

The car was a runner.

I had no off-road parking in Bedford. The DS had not been a consideration when house-hunting in 2004. Now 2014, the initial plan was to give the car a hose down at the barn to remove the dust and rat shit, and then to trailer it back to the lock up in Bedford so that it could be cleaned up closer to home.

Lying on my sunbed in August I had no thoughts of stripping the car in any serious way as there was no space at the lock up. 

Visual Aid: My Lock Up and a DS

Some careful measurements had shown that the car might fit in the lock-up with about 5cm to spare, but it would be impossible to drive in and out anyway as there was zero room for opening a car door. The lock up could only ever be for storing the car - assuming it fitted. Which was far from certain.

In my head I had hoped that, once back in the bright sunlight outside my Bedford lock-up, I would simply wipe it down with an oily rag and then drive off smiling into the sunset. However the reality of what I found under the bonnet at the barn that September - the years of dirt and rat shit - meant this was not how it was going to happen. Much of the engine was inaccessible and, without a more serious plan, the car would always stay looking like a very tatty DS. I owed it to my car to lift it beyond that. I also harboured a long-held desire to drop an original 1968 'DX' engine in the car, to replace the 'DX2' engine it had found itself with

While we struggled to get the car to start, I spent plenty of time thinking about what to do next if, and when, I got it going -  walking through it time and time again. Pondering the variables. Making notes, checking facts and assumptions. Plotting new solutions. It was tiring.

Brining the car back to Bedford meant clearing the lock up to make room. That meant throwing away some things and storing other things elsewhere. THAT meant clearing stuff from the garden shed, which meant throwing some things away and storing other things elsewhere......... the fact was that I had finite storage space and needed to make the most of it. There were also a couple of things in the lock up that were waiting to be sold on Ebay or installed in our house.

Strip Down: Small Barn - March 2015

I explained my storage and dirty engine dilemma to Richard. Richard started to work on me: while the DS was up at the barn I should make use of the space: pull the engine out and give it a proper clean up. Doug had two engine cranes and Richard assured me he could be persuaded to let me use one. 

Richard's nagging started to sink in. Removing the engine wasn't that mad was it?  I could whip the engine out, give it a once-over, give it a more thorough clean and then drop it back in. Easy! I started my research, turning in particular to a three-part video from Steve Hammond I found on YouTube. You can find the first part here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPsreBggsBw.

Watching the videos several times, I typed-out a check list of the removal stages. I cross-referenced this against the procedure listed in the factory workshop manuals and amended it accordingly. In my head I went over the process of pulling the engine out. Seemed simple enough. One of those lists is dated 2 December 2014. So with the car only running from 30 November, Richard must have started working on me pretty early on. 

I made the commitment - verbally and psychologically: I would do it. I would pull the engine. I could also explore the scope to drop that 'DX' engine in........