My 2000 Restoration and more...

New Brake Fitting

2009-01-31T09:34:00.000-08:00

Brake stuff arrived yesterday, so decided to put it on today. Very easy nice trade over, nipped up the bearing and new split pin whilst at it. I love working on my 2000 sometimes, everything comes apart with ease and is not a corroded piece of wank I want to burn after a few hours. Takes about and hour to convert the car to new brakes. These lovely race pads wont fade in the Alps! Me n Pat will be safe until Royboy tries to keep up!

Heres the standard MkI 2000 setup.

Jeeeeeeeeeesus, look at that new disc.

EEEppp, bit thin on the old disc there. No wonder I only had one good punch of the brake per journey.

Nice shiny new bigger caliper with room for a fat disc and sexy pads.

Tadaaaaaaaaa, new setup attached to the vehicle, simple trade over, just need wheels!!!

Polybushing and Brakings Upgradings, to a higher stoppings capabilitings.

2009-01-30T09:03:00.000-08:00

Upon realising my old rear bushes were stuck in, and theres no real gain from having nice suspension unless it can move properly, I got some superflexes sent up for my wagon. They were a bit of a bitch to fit whilst on the car but weren't to much hassle. The boring bit was torching out the old ones with a paint striiping gun. Was nice n warm in the winter cold though!

High-tech diff lifter there. It's the Broomojack (Pat.Pend.)

Oh yes, I decided a 3.45 diff was more my cruising level, should return a nice mpg on the 10CR/Classic Le mans Trips/Rallys etc. Im glad I did this as my original 4.11 was hanging on by magic and rust. I got hold of a new hanger, painted the bodywork above it with waxoyl, then cleaned and painted the hanger, then waxoyled it to hell after installing.

Some dickcheese decided rather than putting a small patch in the wheel well they'd pour in a pint of filler over the sieve-like metal. That was chopped back to fresh good stuff and repaired up.

I also remembered something the other week, my MkI brakes are shite. I mean made of cheese and wood shite. I was coming down a fairly big hill at about 60 and I managed to stop for the traffic lights before hitting the car infront. But after that, bearly anything, very little brakes.

Deciding I'm rather allergic to dying, I thought it best to upgrade the brakes. Looked at a few options, Jag, MkII 2000, Hi-Spec, Wilwood. Couldn't really justify the massive extra cost of the Wilwoods, Jags very heavy, lots of pissing about, Hi-Spec don't do a kit and wanted me to send them front suspension leg and would be pricey, and MkII 2000 more pricey than Triumph Stag.

I settled on the Stag setup as its a period mod (which I like), it's fairly cheap and a bolt on direct replacement. Also, you can get better pads for the Stag calipers (same pad type as MkII 2000/2500/PI) than the early MkI 2000 setup, and I like my Mintex M1155s. I know theres no greater pad area, but there's more piston area and chunkier discs and if I'm trammin' down some mountain pass with my old man in front with his nice brakes on his Spitfire, I wanna stop!

Apparently according to Mr C (he needs his identity protecting), a caravaner (uuuurgghhh, see), with my mods and new braided hoselines these are shit hot at slowing me down.

Water wings mod.

2009-01-30T08:19:00.001-08:00

No no, not turning it into a James Bond stylie, drive on water car. That's for another day.

Triumph in their infinite and logial wisdom decided that all the water gatered on the roof, should run down guttering above the windows and down into the wing, thats right, down along the gutter onto bare metal, which then runs into the bare metal sills and drains out.

Well Mr 2000 body worker-outerer, YOU'RE A FREAKIN GENIOUS, YA MORON!

In case you suffer from mental retardation, the blue arrows show where the water runs. Luckily after this pic was taken I painted all the bare metal here. Unluckily, my photos hard disk killed itself along with some resto pics, and all my racing pics I did for some people. But I'm sure you can use your imagination if you want to guess what it looks like.

So heres my fix, open the door, drill a small hole in the gutter where it meets the wing joining flap and fill it full of sealer, then using a thin screwdriver, shape it all into place.

This is now how the water runs, to the front of the car, where, below the front of the bonnet, it runs through drain holes, onto the back of the lights and down into the front valance. Ive painted all inside there now and waxoyled, so not rot should set in. Again Mr Triumph bodywork designer, if there was an award for Captain Spackypants Retarded Design Of The Year, you would have got it for this work of pure excellence.

Heres how it looks from the outside, no different from normal until you take a shifty peek.

More sealing and rust prevention, boring I know, but I hate rust now.

2009-01-30T08:00:00.000-08:00

After spending wads of cash, you like to make sure you dont have to do it again, even if you have to fork out a touch more. All along the sills were painted, but I decided to put some seam sealing along the sill/floorpan joint so water has less chance of getting trapped up there and making rust. AAARGGGGGGGG RUUUUSTTTT!

Whilst under the bonnet making brum brum noises, not like yam yam Roy noises, but engine noises, I decided to use up some old spray can of conifer to blend in the inside of the nose cone. Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah I know no-one will see it, but I know its there and if it's unpainted and I'll see it in my brain when its raining and Im doing a 100 and then I crash cos Im thinking about itttttttttt.

Looks nice too, also painted inside the front valance and along the sills with black waxoyl paint.

I know the car will weigh eleventy million more tonnes now, but it'll be fiiiiiiiine. Wont rust!

Spray work and paint.

2009-01-30T07:42:00.000-08:00

Most of the spray work was done whilst I was in Canada hooning about and eating too much. I wanted for a green similar to the conifer original. Whilst not a total originality freak, I wanted to keep as much as possible like it should be. The car should be green, so it's now a shade or 2 lighter than Jag racing green. Looks a treat in sunlight.

Car outside before my MkII doors were found.

The boot lid had some corrosion and had to be fettled, but is still straight and opens slick with its original spring setup.

The bonnet had a few high spots and needed 5 layers of paint removing before spraying.

The underneath is clean and rot free. Never seen one so clean.

I painted inside the nose cone as Ive seen so many rusted through due to lack of paint. Mine is nice and solid, so wanting to keep it that way!

Doors, prepping and suspenders, oooh errrr missus.

2009-01-29T18:17:00.000-08:00

My bodywork was done at a friends workshop, as bodyman Pete, seen here, was in the middle of a business reshuffle. So when that was sorted, my mates Dunc and Al lent me their Disco and trailer to move the car to South Yorkshire Triumphs (notice the 's' there Mr BMW lawyer, now f**k off). This is where the prepping and spraying was to be done, nice clean booth to spray in.

I had started some prep work at home and after removing a small amount of paint, found some filler, and under that, a nice dink in the nose cone. Rather than throw another god knows what at it with a new nose cone, and loads of time I decided such a small imperfection should be welded up and smoothed out.

The wing work needed smoothing in too.

After deciding which doors should be saved the prep work continued. The rear doors had new metal work installed in the corners and the front doors were scrapped. After 3 months waiting and looking the best door I could get were off a mkII in Sheffield at Spitfire Graveyard. They were removed from a car less than a few hours of him getting it in. Suprisingly they were better than some South African doors from my usual source Triumphland!

Then, I decided to take on a project a couple of weeks or so later, building a PI which came with, yes, of course, some sexy new doors. Bollocks, already had the others done up!

I decided new suspension was in order so fitted some new KYBs, 475lb -1" Springs at the back, and 200/400lb -1" Springs at the front.

Shiny new body bits, paint and waxoyl.

2009-01-23T11:24:00.000-08:00

Whilst leaving my car in the care of Captain Bodywork, I would nip in everynow and again to engage in preventative measures. Measures which will prevent future occurances of severe bodywork rot. The insides of the NOS sills (which had been in Petes loft since before I was born!) were painted, leaving room for the welding of course, the shell was painted inside the front wings everywhere. I went a bit OTT really but I didnt want it to rust again!

All points where welding had occurred was cleaned and painted. Once home the car had a gallon of waxoyl sprayed into the sills. Rust through that British weather!
AAAAAAHhhhhhhhhhhh, I can see it now, clear blue skies, a scorching day in the alps, the sun beating down on my lovely panel work as we twist around the passes, and my buddy Roy in his MkI GT6, sliding over a cliff as my waxoyl drips along the road behind...

Fantastico magico!

Disassemble?! DEAD?!

2009-01-23T10:59:00.000-08:00

Any hooooow, after some disassemble I decided this wasnt going to be a short easy fix, and brought in the big dawwwwwwwwwwg on body workin, my mate Pete of South Yorkshire Triumphs. Nice guy, no bull. After showing him the situation, his professional diagnosis was, 'Its fucked.'

We agreed a price to work around and set off buying parts at Stoneleigh early 2007. He pointed out the parts, I stuck the wonga. I bought one wing off a chap I feel sorry for, I just stood at his stall until he agreed a lower, by £25 price. After standing around and haggling aloud to myself, his words were something along the lines of, 'If I sell you it will you piss off?!' I took his kind offer.

I got some nice NOS arch repair panels for inverting, new wings and some repair parts from earlpart. The chopping began and revealed the car was in a right state bodily, but I couldn't let the old girl go to the scrapper, she weren't dead yet!!!!

mmmmmmmmm, 4 sills on one side, the last one was'nt even welded. They guy who'd done it was such a pro, he'd managed to put it on using chewing gum, air, gobo and black paint. Fandabby doozy!

Broke an air chisel getting it off.

Hello, my first post be here.

2009-01-23T10:49:00.000-08:00

Well, here's my first ever blog post. Ive read a few, enjoy some and thought I'd make my own to help any other sad person who wants to improve their 2000 or restore it.

I bought my 2000 in 2006 as a run about when my GT was off the road and after spying the MkI on the Levis Twisted Jeans ad. I got it off the good ol' bay and thought something along the lines of, if it rusts scrap it.

After driving my baby for 7 months I'd fallen for it. The seats were lovely, comfy driving position, engine pulled well, could get my mates in and put stuff in the boot. Was awesome. Apart from *makes silly thunder noises* THAT DAY, the day I went to my mates house a few miles down the road, a long road, a bumpy fast road. When I got to my friends house I couldnt open my door, and had to giving a rugby nudge to open. The sills were seriously fudged...

And the wings...

And arches...

And screen seal...

And carbs...

Door seals...

Regulator box...