The last couple of months have been quite up and down for me, but I did a few things to keep myself busy and got a few things under way.
D Rally - 9 June 2024
In early June I went to the D rally in Little Horwood. Um'ed and Ah'ed but couldn't really miss it. Peter's (aka Badabec's) car broke down on the Sunday while he was en route and he ended up stranded in Aylesbury. He gave me a call and Darrin of Citroen Classics let me take, first a fuel pump and then, a coil to Peter and we got him back on the road and to the rally. I bought a few used parts plus collected a pair of part-exchanged regassed spheres with removable, rebuildable dampers.
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| Removal sphere damper - removed.... (photo credit unknown) |
The damper screws down into the end of the sphere. It protrudes a little into the suspension cylinder. these are LHS fluid spheres but you can see the difference in the dampers.
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| Different dampers (Photo credit: Der Franzose) |
Some claim that in their standard configuration these sphers/ dampers give a noticeable softer ride quality while others say split spheres with fixed dampers should give just as comfortable a ride. And so should welded spheres. For me, the benefit of sphere with removable dampers is that you can alter the shimming to adjust the softness/ hardness of the ride. If you so wish.....
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| Removable sphere damper - dismantled..... (photo credit unknown) |
Door Mirrors
Essential at the best of times but especially if you're planning to drive a LHD car in the UK.
My car has the smaller, rounder CIPA 54 type of mirrors. While the mirror 'heads' are stainless steel, the arms are mazak and mine were pitted.
My friend Richard has gone through a few repro door mirrors - as have others. his 'knuckle' snapped off when he tried to tighten it. For that reason i decided to try and save my vintage Cipa's rather than replacing them. I dismantled my mirrors and salvaged what screws and washers I could. That wasn't easy as they were quite rusted together.
i also bought another old one CIPA 54 mirror at the June 'D' rally for its parts. I bought some kits to replace the glass surrounds and I sent my arms off to be chromed. Making the mirrors up is not a priority this summer so all these bits can just go in a box for the time being.
Citroen Car Club National gathering- 13 July 2024
this year it was a 'Festival' not a 'rally'. I could only go on the Saturday. I met some old friends and some new people (hello Colin Smith) . I bought an original ball joint splitter for a song. I think this was 'ex-Len Drew' and sold to me by his son. I missed out on a few other handy tools that he'd had. It's Fenwick tool 3312-T.
It's a hefty beast and it needs to be. It's used on the hub ball joints.
I made enquiries about finding a sprayer for my car and came away with a few suggestions but an overall feeling of gloom and potential debt as far as car painting went. I was told that the painter suggested either delivered only average results, or had a waiting list of several years, or charged an astronomical price or had gone out of business during COVID or now only did high mark-up insurance jobs.
I didn't buy it, but I found one volume of manual 583 for sale. In English. I had no idea there was an English version. I wonder if it's a five volume set like the French 583, or a three volume set like the German version?
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| Out in the wild - an English 583 |
Retirement - 14 July 2024
I retired.
