Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Jag display day

Five DLCV members accepted the kind invitation of the Victorian Jaguar Club to attend their annual Display Day, held in the grounds of Wesley College just off St Kilda Road.

Long-time DLCV member Keith Ashworth has an amazing collection - today he chose to come in his Regency Sportsman: the only example of this rare model in Australia, as far as he's aware.


There were a number of Daimlers among the Jags - this 420 Sovereign caught my eye.


Dame Zara had had a good wash and polish, and sparkled in the sunlight. Posted by Picasa



a hole in the right-hand exhaust patched with a bandage ... but I've just located a near-new stainless steel system from a car that's being wrecked, so I'll be replacing the whole rusty set-up soon. (note to self: must repair that patch of underseal I've taken off with the jack!)

The lower photo is of the front valance panel (which goes under the front bumper). It looks in a pretty sad state, but a going-over with a wire brush and two coats of POR15 rust-proofing paint now has it looking pretty spiffy. Posted by Picasa

Fresh sandwiches, no more leaks and a (pretty) full service

Current mileage: a hair over (1)57,000
Costs since last time I totted them up in July: $700

It seems like ages since I've updated, and plenty has happened of late.

Let's see ...

Firstly, I've replaced the front suspension 'sandwich' mounts, as DLCV V8 guru Jack 'Fast Eddy' Edmonds was correct in his telephonic diagnosis that they were had it (old one on the left).

This still hasn't cured all the clonks in the front suspension though, so there will still be some ball joint &/or bush replacing to go, and most likely shock absorbers too.

Next up, I had the rear window seal replaced - which turned into a bit of a runaround when the guy who was doing the job got the window our and discovered that the reason the demister had never worked for me was that both wires were broken off the element. So I picked up the window and took it to Connections and had then re-solder the wires, then took the window back and had the seal fitted. The window no longer leaks, but he didn't do a great job with re-fitting the chrome strip ... And as I took out all the water-damaged headlining around the rear window, I'll also need to have that re-made - and the parcel shelf and a few other bits of trim while I'm at it.

Last Friday I took the day off work and set to doing most of the tasks on the 2500 and 5000-mile service checklist, including:
  • oil change (decided to try Penrite HPR30 this time)
  • fresh oil filter
  • went around pretty much the whole car with grease gun, oil can and WD40, lubricating everything from rear springs to door hinges to carburettor pots

I also took off the front valance panel and repainted it with POR15 rust-proofing paint, and fixed a leak in the rusty exhaust with a bandage (pics in a separate post above, as I can't seem to add more than two images to this post).

I also took the opportunity to re-fix a few things I thought I'd 'fixed' before, such as the front passenger door-handle, the stud on the dashpad and the left-hand handbrake caliper.