Steering Box refurbished and refitted

At the end of April, I collected the rebuilt steering box from Holman Engineering in Surrey, a family owned small business nestled between houses on a residential road. The rebuild kit I bought in January for a Mk1 Cortina unfortunately wasn’t quite right, the ball bearing races were too small, but I assumed the rest of the kit that included the gaskets and sector shaft bush were all ok. Jeff (Holman Engineering) sourced the correct size ball bearings with bearing races and the rest of the build was apparently straight forward.

Steering Box rebuild kit
Steering Box rebuild kit (MK1 Cortina) – note bearings and cups too small for Corsair application

It only took a couple hours of an afternoon over the Bank Holiday weekend to re-install, though it was a bit heavy and awkward to get the steering shaft up into the interior without the column bracketry catching on nearly every edge and surface. I made the mistake of tightening the bolts to the body/chassis too soon that it left me no wiggle room to attach the bolts to the pedal supports and dashboard. A bit of back tracking loosening bolts, I could wiggle the steering shaft into place and get the other securing bolts under the dash lined up and fitted. I just had to reconnect the steering drop arm and drag link, refit the steering column bits and the job was done.

I had to wait before I could take the car out for a test drive as I needed to get some SAE 80EP (AGL-4) oil for the steering box, but my local motor factor couldn’t source the specific grade I needed. In the end I used Amazon to buy 2 litres so I can use it on the gear box later, as well. A week later when the weather had improved (or had stayed dry long enough) I took the car for a test drive and to serve as a trip to get some more fuel. It felt so much more positive and responsive to my input and was very smooth to turn and drive. Coupled with the new shock absorbers all round the Corsair is much nicer to drive, just a minor misfire to check which could be a failed spark plug as before.

I also took the opportunity to fit a replacement steering column shroud I had bought a while ago, as I had cracked and glued back together my original shroud a few years ago. However, I was missing two bolts, so I had a rummage in my spare bolt jars and found some metric bolts that would fit if cut down and re-cut with a new thread. It was was one of those things that bugged me for a while and now I have 4 bolts to secure the two halves of the steering column shroud.

Blue Dots

blue dot light effect on Corsair

I first came upon these back in 1990s as a custom tail light effect mainly seen on hotrods or pre 1970 custom cars. By the mid nineties, I was spurred on by a friend in the Capri Club who had them on his Mk1 Capri and subsequently I fitted them on a couple of my Capris. I remember the packaging stating ‘off road’ use only and only got picked up by the police once for the ‘non factory’ lens alteration, so from there on I carried spare unaltered lenses in the car.

Fitting was quite straight forward and now armed with better tools than 25+ years ago, it was an easier job. I ensured the hole in the lens I was to cut was directly aligned over the bulb holder to maximise the final effect. I used a 19mm (wood) drill bit with a variable speed drill, though a 24mm bit would have been ideal. Using a small curved file I enlarged the hole to 24mm so it could house the chrome ring which would hold the blue dot lens. There are four tabs on the chrome bezel ring, two to grip to the light lens and the other two to grip the blue dot. For greater security I used a universal clear glue to hold the blue dots in place.

With the simple modification done, fitting the lenses was all that was required and some low light to get the full effect of the lights with the brake lights on (see video, above).

Waxoyling Again

I Waxoyled the Corsair 3 years ago (March 2017) and upon seeing the underside earlier this year during the MOT inspection it was clear it needed doing from the rear axle chassis to the front as far as the front footwell sections. The old under seal was flaking off in large chunks and in some places exposing fresh metal. A messy business prepping for the Waxoyl, but equipped with safety specs, some decorators scrapers, wire brushes and a rubber dusting brush I was good to go. The most awkward part was the manoeuvring around on my back and keeping my arms up while trying to apply pressure and elbow grease.

A good 2 hours of this saw the worst of the flaking under-seal removed and then the frustrating business of applying the wax began. Firstly I warmed the Waxoyl in a bucket of hot water for about 20 minutes – not that I noticed much in the change of the viscosity. Aftet transferring some waxoyl the special Waxoyl pump system and hand pumping pressurising it, the steady even spray of wax I was expecting sputtered out and squirted in directions I didn’t want before clogging. Washing the nozzle took several attempts in white spirit to get the spray effect I desired and then had to repeat the process countless times through out the process. I eventually covered all the areas I needed and not all over myself.

Dog coming to check on progress

Name that tune – Gunson Colortune

I finally got a round to trying out the Gunson Colortune I got last October. It wasn’t as difficult as I thought it was going to be with the instructions in clear English and to the point. The most difficult part was putting in the spark inspection plug in, without burning my fingers on the exhaust manifolds.

On the instructions it said you only needed to use one cylinder on a single carburettor and one inlet manifold design as per my V4. It was a simple task of removing a spark plug from any one of the four cylinders and replacing it with the Gunson spark inspection plug. It advised on having a clear view as possible of the plug which would become evident later. As mentioned earlier, the awkward part was fitting the inspection plug with its copper washer as it was quite a lot shorter and stubbier than a spark plug and difficult to get a decent grip with finger tips especially with a warm/hot manifold nearby. A deep 14 mm socket would have been best to tighten the plug but finger tight with a normal socket was good enough. After that, a long thin rod from the set was screwed in place so the HT lead could be connected.

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The Annual Inspection

MOT for the Corsair
Annual MOT Inspection Jan 2020 at 5 Square Motors, Shaftesbury.

How time flies, and the annual MOT inspection was due at 5 Square Motors, Shaftesbury. Technically in the UK, cars over 40 years old do not require an annual vehicle safety check. But for about 45 minutes of an inspectors time with the car up on the ramps and myself being there to assist, it was worth being done for the peace of mind. On the day the car was booked in for the test, a storm was looming and I had chosen potentially the wettest afternoon to take the Corsair but at least the wipers and lights worked as they should. The Corsair passed with an advisory, as per last year, but this time I’ll need to change the front damper inserts within the front struts over the coming months. The rear nearside brake cylinder was also something to look at aswell judging by the results on the brake tester.

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One Hot Easter

At the entrance to Pythouse near Semley, Wiltshire
At the entrance to Pythouse near Semley, Wiltshire

I thought I would have a closer look at the condenser issue this month (April). The old condenser I put on at the end of last month, to get the car back in to the garage, was also faulty but good enough to run the engine on tick-over. I only found out it was dodgy because I thought I would take the Corsair for a quick spin to warm it up in readiness to taking it out to the Haynes Breakfast meet the following day. I barely got out from my road and the car was lurching all over the place under light acceleration, very quickly suspecting the condenser, I headed back for home and put the car away. A week later, after some contemplation I decided to go the electronic ignition route (Powerspark) but also bought a new coil and couple of spare condensers as back up.

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Door Cards and Knobs

Plenty of driving has ensued for the month of September. A visit to the Breakfast meet at Haynes International Motor Museum on the 2nd, two trips to my place of work (54 mile round trips), a drive to Gillingham and onto  Sturminster Newton and another trip to Salisbury has put on the miles and smiles.

Here is another video, this time with a former work colleague driving the Corsair back from his leaving do.

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The drought ends

Being somewhat dismayed with life and other things, I had left the Corsair well alone – there was no need to involve it in any work, feeling the way I was. Typically though, the weather had been extremely nice from the first May Bank Holiday weekend with it still continuing to be hot and sunny, including today, the day I finally ran out of excuses not to do something for the Corsair. So, feeling brighter and more confident with myself, I chose to use the day to clean up the spare fuel tank I bought way back in February.

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Drivers Side Window

New clips and bits for the window windder mechanism. Note the Triumph parts – the Corsair’s winders are modified Triumph Spitfire items.

A few months back… yes it was that long ago, the window dropped down rather swiftly when it was wound down. No problem I thought at the time, it’s popped off the runners as before as I wasn’t sure the securing clips were any good anyway. A few weeks back I bought a Triumph Drop Glass kit with new washers, clips and bolts etc. Now, with the weather finally being warm and sunny, I was able to to get the Corsair out of the garage for a bit of tinkering. I left the engine rough idle alone for the day as I wanted to fix the window winder mechanism and do other minor jobs.

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Wobbly Steering Column – Sorted

The fuel issue is still unsolved though I have another idea to try out, but got distracted with a quest to sort the wobbly steering shaft in the steering column. Looking at the manuals, the column was missing a felt bush, backed by Peter from AJ Restorations also saying something about a felt bush being required. So a search around the internet and I saw on the MK1 Cortina site the felt bush, a small rhombus shaped scrap of fabric about 6 x 4 cm (approx 3×2 inches). The problem being, minimum orders were £10 and this part was only £4 and I think my membership had lapsed anyway. So looking around Ebay I saw a very similar felt bush for the MGB steering column, so for about £7.50 including postage, I had placed my order.

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