3 Jan 2022

Look at that, almost without any notice we have started a new year, 2022. 

Lets hope it's gets a whole lot better that 2021 and 2020.

So late last year (2021) I was able to commission an awesome artist, Gavin Thomson ( @gavin_thomson_cartoonist  and https://m.facebook.com/gavinthomsoncartoonist) to create a fantastic new logo for the Count and it's travels around Australia (not that one can travel too far around Australia at the moment, some states are open to each other, though there are Covid testing requirements and State entry permits and some States are even closed completely still).  The cartoon is inspirational and comes complete with a nod to the legendary intrepid adventurer Mr Phileas Fogg from the Jules Verne novel "Around the World in 80 days", it's absolutely brilliant!

2 Dec 2021

 It sure took a long time and to say that the old Bluebird sewing machine behaved itself would be an overstatement, though finally the Drivers seat upholstery has been done (well at least until the vinyl splits again on the base).

It wasn't exactly as envisioned, though it'll do for the time being, though both the seat base and the passenger side seat faces will both need to be redone at some stage. No hurry just yet though. Just like the paint job on the car, it looks ok from a distance.

27 July 2021

 Well look at that, the last update was March 2018, that was certainly some time again wasn't it. So in reality I would guess that no one even looks at this stuff anymore as it has been so lacking in updates. In defence of it though, things have been a bit on the strange side, not much travelling or anything was done it the Morris in the latter part of 2018 and early 2019 and following some travel overseas in later 2019... well we all know about COVID19, yes COVID19 and here we all are in latter middle 2021 and we are still going no where and doing nothing here. Lockdown number 5 is officially over tonight, though with the usual post lockdown cautions of distancing, masks and limits on persons at work or in cafes and restaurants and while it may be tedious, it does work.

Anyway on the car front, not much has been happening. The Count needs the front seat upholstery repaired as it has split with age and given it sits outside most of the time and the upholstery was done way back when I first got the car it hasn't done too badly, so that will get a shake up with something a bit different. Have bought a 1955 Bluebird sewing machine for a grand total of $50 to try and do this with, so hopefully it will do it and hopefully I won't stuff it all up! Collecting the machine though did require a half day trip to Geelong, so at least that was a bit of a drive for the Count.

Former Federal Woollen Mills, North Geelong

East Beach, Geelong

The mighty Bluebird, '55 like the Count

Have finally managed to do something about the gearbox and now the diff as well. New custom made gearbox was made up for the Count by John and Ben Needham in Melbourne. It now looks mostly original, though is a smooth case box, from a later 1000 car, with the old Series 2 tail so that there was no need to modify the floor of the car, and swap the handbrake lever, to put the remote change in as it still has the original Series 2 shift. The internals have been updated as well and it is basically running as an 1100 box now. The gear ratios are hugely improved and make it so much more usable.

The last two weekends have been taken up by having fitted, then removed and then refitted a reconditioned 4.55 diff as well (so hopefully there will be no leaking of an oil anywhere, though have a spare new pair of rear brake shoes just in case). It has to come back out following the initial fitting as on filling the diff, with the hard to come by correct oil, it commenced flowing back out of the pinion seal just as fast as it was going in. Long story short, whoever had assembled the recon diff at the place I bought it from, and I might add at considerable expense for freight, had fitted a hub oil seal instead of the correct pinion oil seal, which unfortunately was never going to hold oil, so thus the removal, repair and refit. Annoyed? Yes, yes I was indeed. The response from the supplier when the problem was identified?

    "yes it does look as though the seal in there was a half shaft seal. I can only apologise!"

Well yes seem to be that is the least you could do. I guess on the plus side we do now know how to change the pinion seal in a Morris Minor, no it isn't a fun job.

Now where were we with that upholstery...

 

I am sure that it isn't supposed to do that...

... and back out again

Slight size difference between the half shaft seal (fitted) and the correct pinion seal (to be fitted)

Gearbox had to be removed again as well as the speedo drive gear was fitted in the wrong place and needed rectification, did get a whole new batch of mount rubbers while out thought.

14 Mar 2018

Certainly has been a long time between posts. The Count has been ticking along well, just doing short runs here and there, much as a second car. Hasn't been on any long runs or seen any sights really.

The only really new thing is that it has redeveloped the overheating coil thing it started once before, though this time it really went to town.

So here we are, the Melbourne traffic got to The Count and it's decided to give up on the effort of running. I'd guess it's the coil as it has broken down from over heating, which itself underlines other problems, but you get that. The RACV have informed me its location is too dangerous to inspect so they're going to tow it. It's never been towed while registered before, only trailered unregistered, new experience. Can make it all the way around Australia but Melbourne traffic kills it. Oh well who needs dinner anyway...

29 Dec 2016

Off back to Melbourne this morning, not a too hot day for driving and with the "air conditioning" (read quarter vent windows) operating hit the road at 0730. There was a bit more traffic today and managed to build up a bit of a line of cars behind me along the Bruce highway, though they weren't stuck there for too long as they only came along as I neared places that I could pull over or at over taking lanes. That said it was good to get to the Hume so I wasn't holding anyone up from there on.

Was a quite drive and again not too much traffic, it is always good at this time of year as there are no road crews blocking lanes with maintenance along the way, so no delays. I stopped briefly for fuel at Gundagai and thendecided as I have often passed the mid way point of Tarcutta, well midway between Sydney and Melbourne (where Canberra should have been built, except there is not enough of a water supply there for it to have been), and have never actually been able to get a picture at that point I should stop and remedy that situation.

 
It really is a shame that the red reflector from the boot emblem managed to fall off the car on the Parkes trip, actually surprised that it managed to last there that long actually, I notice it missing every time I walk past the car.

Anyway as you can see in that pic the sky had clouded over by this time and by the time I made it to Albury there had been a bit of rain, though not too much, mind Albury must have had a bit before I reached there as the ceiling at the Lavington petrol station had fallen through and dripping still as I had a bit of lunch. After the refueling and then the lunch break, for the first time in a very long time and for the first time on a long trip, the Count refused to start!

Luckily I had parked the car out of the way, which saved having to push it anywhere so it didn't matter how long it took to rectify. It was surprising as I had only refilled the tank not more than 30 minutes previously, then started it, moved it and parked so I could have lunch and when I came back plenty of fuel and plenty of power, just no spark. I tired he leads (have a spare set in the boot) and checked the rotor (electronic ignition has been fitted), but still nothing. The electronic ignition module was warm to the touch which was a bit odd, but I resorted to calling the RACV ( I am a member and have top cover roadside assistance, which I have for just such a situation, though have never used it before.

Had a few conversations with various people while I waited for the NRMA man (RACV had passed it on as I was in NSW, less than about 10 kilometres from the VIC border) which was interesting. When the NRMA man arrived he touched the coil and recoiled in horror as though he had just stuck his hand in a fire, it was very hot to touch, so we definitely had a problem. Mr NRMA announced that there was noting he could do (yep looked at nothing else) and went off to call a tow truck to take it to an auto electrician. This was taking some time and as it had taken so long I tried to start the car once again, it started! I called the tow truck off (the Count has never been on a tow truck whilst I have owned it) and drove to the auto electrical place and even though they a\were very busy they had a look at the Count for me, though to be honest they weren't too sure about it as they weren't used to working on something as old as the Count. After various tests and lots of electrical sparks it was decided that anything could be causing the problem so we'd just go for the most obvious to start with and we installed a new coil, I say we as I did a fair bit of the installing of it. Once in the car started and I was away, blind faith and ignorance that the problem was solved.

To be honest I am not sure that the old coil would not have kept me going all the way home, but the new one certainly did and I had good cause to test it out as I had to stop quite a few time from the border onwards. It started to rain and while it was never all that heavy it certainly was necessary to use the wipers, which have never been fantastic on the Morris, even by the limited standard of their nature. The passenger side wiper decided that as a rare treat it would wipe more that half of the windscreen pane that it clears (usually it only does half of it) and started wiping the whole screen, though it seems it became a bit too enthusiastic as it started wiping right to the side of the screen and managed to dig itself into the windscreen rubber, which stopped the both wipers completely. I had to stop and pull it back a number of times to "reset" it's sweep, though by this stage it had a mind of it's won and decided that it would be more exciting to wipe the A pillar rather than the screen. I finally managed to re-position it on it's spindle and it went back to wiping just half of the passengers screen again, though at least it was working.

I had been warned that the storms in Melbourne has been quite intense, but never had much along the route. Just near Euroa though the police had closed on lane and had lowered the speed limit to 40, so even I had to slow down! There was some minor flooding over the highway though the police were still waving the cars through, so off into the water we went. Unusual situation driving through water that at times we up to the sills of the car (the Count is by no means a low slung vehicle), not able to see the road surface and feeling the water flow tugging at the wheels, while the water is hitting just under the floor of the car. All was well though, no great drama, and if it was at all dangerous the police would have closed the road all together, so happy they had not!

After that there were no further incidents or delays and finally managed to get home at 10 minutes to 11 pm after the 0730 start for what should have only been a max 10 hour drive at 80kph. It had started out so well too, oh well it happens sometimes...

26 Dec 2016

Off to Canberra again today for a post christmas family catch up. 0730 departure as had to stay and watch the Doctor Who christmas special on iView this morning before I could go, Some things are just too important to miss 😁

Was just the usual trip with not very much traffic about, which is always a plus. Went through Holbrook on the way up to refuel and to see what changes the bypass has made to the town, from what I could see not much has changed at all. The submarine casing of the old HMAS Otway is still there attracting visitors, which I suppose is what it was placed there to do, so that must be a good thing. HMAS Otway is one of the old Oberon class submarines of the Royal Australian Navy, it was built in Scotland in 1965 and was commissioned into service in 1968. Otway was decommissioned in 1994 and sold off for scrap with only the fin having been donated to the town of Holbrook. The town managed to buy the upper casing (everything you would see above the waterline when it was surfaced) from the scrap metal merchants that won the tender for the metal scrap of the whole casing, and installed it in the main town park.

Other thanks that it was dry and to be honest if you hadn't know it had rained so much relatively recently you would have not realised it had, everywhere was so dry and brown, it's amazing how much difference a few months can make to the landscape...

4 Oct 2016

So left Canberra this morning for the drive back to Melbourne. Canberra was not terrible exciting visit this time, but I guess you get that sometimes don't you.

The drive home was, as usual, slowly done at 80 kilometres an hour, though the good thing about the Hume Highway is that it is duel lane all the way from the Barton Highway to Melbourne. That means that it doesn't matter if the car is slow as there is ample opportunity for other drivers to pass will minimal disruption to their pace. Mind you do always get those that come speeding up to the back of your car and then seem to wonder why they have to slow down, they don't seem to look more than 10 feet in front of themselves sometimes. It's a shame that the Barton Highway from Canberra out to the Hume Highway has not been duplicated as it is still mostly one lane in each direction, it really is just a glorified "cattle track", not the sort of "Highway" you would expect leading you to the capital city of a country.

Anyway the drive was long and the day was wet. I didn't stop often other thanks to refill the tank and the rain just kept on coming down. Was great to see some streams that I have never seen water in before, though other thanks that nothing exciting to say really...

Oh I did receive this picture over Instagram from a fellow Valley Green Morris Minor owner, seems a friend of his had taken it while driving on the Hume and passing me. Small world isn't it.  Note it isn't my photo, I would credit the photographer, so thanks Retroasted.