Rear Window

Last week, the long-anticipated used rear window for my hard top showed up in the mail.  It survived the trip, and was in good shape, though a little dirty.  I cleaned it up and made ready to install it.  I had already received the rubber gasket that surrounds the window, so nothing was holding me back from putting the window in.

To Paint or Not To Paint?

Nothing, that is, except the feeling that maybe I ought to get the hard top repainted while I had the window out.  It's got a spot in the center of the leading edge where the paint has flaked off, exposing bare metal beneath.  I decided to call a few body shops and find out what it would cost to get the top painted.

It turns out that a professional repaint of the hard top would cost around $400-600.  As much as I'd like to do it, that's just not in the budget right now.  I'll have to handle the paint trouble with touch-up paint.  So, armed with that decision, some slave labor from the kids, and a nice warm day to do the work, I went out yesterday to get the window installed.

Installation: The String Method

I've never done anything like this.  I've never even read a how-to about it online.  But I did hear one reference to "the string method" for installing windows, in which the guy mentioned pulling on some piece of string from the inside while his friend pushed on the window from the outside.  That was enough to figure out what to do.

Pull the rope to the right, past the gasket flange
in the hard top, and the gasket will seat correctly.

The gasket had two slots in it.  The one intended for the glass was really deep; the other was intended for the flange in the hard top, and it was significantly shallower.  So I installed the gasket on the window, and got a piece of 1/4" nylon cord that I pressed into the other slot in the gasket, all the way around.  There were two tails left over, sticking out of the gasket in the lower corner.  Out we went to the car.

I'm pulling the string while Calvin...
persuades the gasket to cooperate.

I put the two free ends of the cord into the car, set the window in place, and instructed my biggest, strongest kid to press hard on the gasket right there at that point.  I then pulled on the cord, which peeled the lip of the gasket over the flange as the cord pulled free of the gasket.  Calvin moved his hands to provide pressure at the point where the cord was peeling free from the gasket, and around we went.

There were a couple points where the gasket was really reluctant to cooperate, and I was pulling hard enough I was worried I'd break the skin on my hands.  We took a break, lubed the recalcitrant parts of the gasket with some silicone spray, and I improvised a pulling handle out of a crescent wrench.  Work continued.... and suddenly we were done.  Elapsed time was probably less than 20 minutes.

Ta-da!

The only thing left to do was to press in the decorative silver bead that surrounds the window.  That went even more smoothly, and, for only $275 and 30 minutes of (DIY) labor, the hard top is weather-tight.  It looks pretty darned good, if you ask me.  And now I know how to do it.

Oh, and one more thing:

Never Put Duct Tape On A Car's Finish

When we had a big, windy snow storm bearing down on us, I made the decision to duct tape sheet plastic and plywood over the opening to protect the Spitfire's interior from the weather.  As I did it, I wrote:

When the window arrives, we'll pull this wart off and see what violence the duct tape does to the paint.... 

How prescient.  The duct tape pulled off a couple of large (thumbprint-sized) patches of body paint, and another strip pulled a few smaller spots off.  Once I'm able to get some #82 Carmine Red spray paint, I'll need to do some spot repairs on the paint damage.

Oh, well, it's not as if I could have left the tarp on.  The flapping in the wind caused some paint damage to the driver's side door, too.  Maybe I need two cans of #82 Carmine Red....

Alternator Reassembly

I got the alternator mostly reassembled today.  With temps still in the single-digits or teens (Fahrenheit), it was nice to have an indoor project.

I had intended to replace the drive-side bearing, but I couldn't press the rotor free of its housing to replace the bearing, so I left well enough alone.  I'll be satisfied to replace the rectifier (a.k.a. diode pack), voltage regulator, and brushes.  Here's the entire top of the reassembled alternator, with the new voltage regulator on the left, the new brushes on top of the slip ring cover in the center, and the rectifier at right.

Everything went back into the alternator in pretty obvious ways.  I didn't even need to consult my photos of the alternator taken during disassembly.  (The one exception was making sure I got the wire connections right on the slip ring cover, for which I drew myself a picture.)  Everything else fit together like a puzzle.  Even the stator leads engage the rectifier diode leads in obvious ways.

Rectifier installation involves soldering the leads from the three stator coils onto the diode leads on the rectifier.  Certainly the trickiest and most skilled step of the whole process - but just a couple of fairly large solder joints, after all.  I am not particularly skilled with a soldering iron, but I'm capable of this, at least.

And like that, the alternator is (theoretically) reassembled.  I'll wire-brush and paint the alternator fan and pulley before reassembling everything, because they're a bit rough-looking.  And then we'll hook everything together and see if the smoke stays in the darned thing this time.  I have high hopes....

Mounting Brackets Again

The brackets I primed yesterday were calling out to get their final silver coat today.  Here they are, in all their shiny glory.  After our weather moves through, I'll install these on the freshly primed bulkhead, and we'll be ready to start putting things back together.

Mounting Brackets

Cleaned & rust-converted example at bottom,
primed pieces above

With weather on the way, I've turned to projects that can be done indoors.  The alternator is a prime candidate, but I'm still waiting for the brushes to get here. 

That leaves rust mitigation.  At the beginning of the bulkhead job, I pulled a bunch of brackets out of the way.  They were fittings for the master cylinders, speedometer cable, ignition coil, etc.  Each had its own sad patina of rust, grime, and road dust.  So I went over them with the wire wheel while the weather was still good enough to do it outside.

Once they'd all been brushed clean, I wiped them all down with a rust converter and set them aside for 24 hours.  A day later, I came back and primed them.  Tomorrow, I'll hit them with a coat of metallic silver Rustoleum and they'll be as good as new - or, rather, as good as I'm likely to get them, which is more than adequate.

A quick word about my indoor paint setup.  I sealed up the edges and corners of a cardboard box, shoved a wire hook through the side of it pretty deep within, et voila! Indoor paint booth.  Overspray is contained.  The fumes still require an exhaust fan or an open window, but it's manageable.

The wire hook - a bicycle spoke, in this case - is bent to form a handle so that the work can be rotated in the booth to hit it from all sides.  Works pretty smoothly!

Detail of the handle for rotating the work
in the paint "booth"

Bulkhead Rust

The bulkhead on the driver's side was pretty rusty when I got the car.  It's a common problem - spilled fluid from the clutch & brake master cylinders attacks the paint, leaving the metal unprotected, and chemistry has its way with the steel, resulting in something like this:

With the brakes on my short list of to-do's, it was now or never.  Once the master cylinder is installed, the job is way harder.  So I got started, removing all of the parts mounted to the left bulkhead and firing up the electric drill with a wire wheel.

I was pleased to see that the rust hadn't gotten deep into the bulkhead:  

After scouring the affected area to my heart's content,  I cleaned it and applied a rust converter chemical, then shut down for the night.

Today, I masked the work to prevent overspray getting all over everything, and hit it with a healthy coat of Rustoleum automotive primer.

Came out looking great,  and now I can install the brake system with the piece of mind that come from knowing I'm not slowly losing a critical structural member to the tin worm.

Getting Started With the Starter

One of the issues I face is the starter.  Upon turning the key, we get plenty of spinning noise, but no engine rotation. 

Clearly, the pinion gear was not engaging the ring on the flywheel.  Or perhaps the gears were so badly stripped that it was spinning but not able to drive the motor around.

My options: replace the starter with a $50 Autozone special, pay through the nose for a rebuilt Lucas model, or, if no prior owner had gone the Autozone route before, attempt to rebuild the faulty original one myself.  Since all of these options involve removing the bad starter first, that I did.

The process took all of 10 minutes.  As somebody who spent far too many hours trying to work on a SAAB 9-5, the Spitfire engine access was heavenly.

Upon removal, it was clear that it was indeed the original Lucas model, and therefore unlike any starter I had ever touched before.  It was also clear that the pinion gear was in fine shape, which was a relief.

As I understand it, modern starters use a solenoid to perform two tasks: to connect the heavy-gauge circuit that actually drives the starter motor, and to slide the pinion gear into contact with the  ring gear.  Well, this older design uses a separate solenoid to close the circuit, but relies on inertia and a helical grooved shaft to slide the pinion into place.

If the helical shaft is gummed up, the gear can refuse to make contact.  And it appears that is my problem - the gear was not sliding freely on the helical shaft.  This is good news, because it means I just saved $50 and learned something pretty cool, to boot.

I've always loved the intricate windings of electric motors, so I took it apart anyway.   The interior of the starter looked pretty good. There wasn't any sign of damaged bushings or other trouble.  So I left well enough alone and put it back together, hitting the helical shaft with a couple shots of WD-40 to loosen things up.

To be clear, this is a little half-assed.  It's anyone's guess how long the starter's been in there, and I should at least be replacing the brushes & bushings inside just on principle.  Some guys go a bit further, cleaning or replacing everything and repainting the shell.  

But getting to it is so easy, it doesn't seem like much of a missed opportunity to try it out now and pull it if there are problems down the road.  And the motor has clearly been spinning, and sounding good while doing so -- it just hasn't been engaging the ring gear and turning the motor.  

Besides, I'm trying hard not to fall down the rabbit hole of "perfect" right now -- my schedule and budget couldn't bear it.  The short-term goal is to get the machine running and driving.  Once that's done, I can make occasional improvements as time and money allow.  And if it turns out I love the car and can track down some workshop space, well, maybe I'll attempt a more serious restoration in the future.