TVH Xmas Lunch

Today we had the annual TVH RHOCaR Xmas lunch.
A good time was had by all, good food, great company. A big thank you to all the staff at the Fox & Hounds for looking after us all.
Also thanks must go out to my other half Becks for sorting out the bookings, food orders and the running of this event.

Merry Christmas to all.

New Weather Hood bag

I now have a new bag for the full weather hood. this allows the hood to be rolled up instead of being folded and stuffed in the boot.

The hood bag fits to the roll bar and sit on top of thr rear boot cover.
The bag is for a wide body seven so it has plenty of room to get the hood in & out of it.

S7 Lives Again :-)

Well the S7 lives again, cam cover refitted along with the fan and fan belts.
Timing reset to 8 degrease BTDC with a timing gun.

I have also I have changed the oil and oil filter .

Video taken on a mobile phone so the sound is not that good!

Cam Belt

As I said in the my last post I had the cam belt break on me when we were away the Cotswolds camping trip. This cam belt is only a year or so old and as you can see from the above photo it has failed in a big way. On closer inspection it looks like the belt has got contaminated by engine oil as there is hardly any wear on it.

The engine stripped of its timing gear

The auxiliary shaft cover removed from the engine block, note the damage to the oil seal.

It looks to me like something has at some point got in between the oil seal and Auxiliary pulley - maybe a stone of some other foreign body, even with a cam belt cover fitted to the engine.

The cam shaft oil seal also has a very slight oil weep so I'm going to renew this at the same time.

The new oil seal fitted to the cam shaft.

And a new oil seal to the auxiliary cover.

The auxiliary cover fitted back onto the block.

Timing pulleys refitted.

And a new cam belt, engine is now set back up on its timing marks.

I hope to have the job finished tomorrow and the engine running again.

Cotswold Camping 2010

Hoody Bear at the bar

We went away for a RHOCaR camping to the Cotswold's and what a great time we had too.

We stayed at the Norman Knight pub which was great, great food, it's own micro brewery and a very nice but small well kept camping field with access to the pub for showers and toilets.

Friday afternoon we went for the ProDrive factory tour, what can I say but what a brilliant place, various Aston's and Subaru's in different states of preparation or repair for racing and rallying, engines and boxes being either built, reconned or being put through their paces on test rigs. And on top of that loads of historic race and rally cars in the heritage centre that you can hop in and out of, including both Colin McRae and Richard Burns' Subaru's.

Saturday we had a Run out, I got as far as Moreton in Marsh when I had the cam belt on the S7 snap, but as I have a pinto fitted in the car no harm was done and the RAC patrol that came out to me had a new belt in the van, so with the patrolman's help (who turned out to be a total star) we replaced it at the side of the road , I did at one point have visions off me going home with the Hood on the back of a recovery truck. The rest of the RHOCaR guys & girls went on a very scenic trip round the Cotswolds, stopping for lunch in Bourton on the Water, and passed a well known Top Gear presenters house, then back to the pub by four thirty with me and the repaired S7 turning up about five minutes later.

Sunday morning we packed up our tents after breakfast as some of the group were off on another run out to a pub for lunch, the rest of us had booked in for lunch at the Norman Knight. afterwards we had a walk round the village before saying our goodbyes and making our way home.

MOT

Took the S7 for its MOT today, which it sailed through.

So I'm all sorted for another year :-)

Uxbridge Auto Show 2010

Today the Thames Valley Area went along to the Uxbridge Auto Show.
The show was alot bigger then last year was more cars and stalls.


Hoody Bear was there as well after his trip with RHOCaR to the Classic Le Mans.

A line up of Hoods with a GTM on the far end.

Mods to Weather Gear and Bonnet

Have added three turnbuckles to the windscreen frame to stop the hood from lifting as the car is on the move

Surrey top in place

With the rubber seal I added not that long ago the front edge of both the full hood and surrey should now be more water proof.

I have also fitted new front bonnet latches. These have eyelets in them so you can fit a padlock if you wanted too, I have gone for using an R clip to hold the latch locked, I have also used a piece of wire attach to the R clip so they don't get lost when the bonnet is off.

May Updates

Hoody Bear at the Thames Valley Monthly Meeting 16th May.



The monthly TVH meetings have gone from strength to strength since it has been moved to the Fox & Hounds just South of the village of Theale near Reading, with most members having a Sunday lunch.

Hoody Bear with the S7

Daryl (on the left)the landlord of the Fox & Hounds was on hand to join in with the fun of Hoody Bear.

Me, Becks, Hoody Bear & Daryl with the Hoods in the car park of the Fox & Hounds.

Here I'am handing Hoody Bear over to Stephen from the Hearts Area for the next stage of his adventure, where he will be taking a trip around London.

If you would like to donate to Hoody Bears Great Adventures Please go to

http://www.hoodythebear.co.uk/

http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/hoody_bear

Stoneleigh Show - May 2-3 Sunday / Monday.

Once again we spent the first Bank Holiday weekend at the Stoneleigh kit car show.

As normal we went up on the Saturday, we made good time on the trip up to the show with only a few spots of rain.

Once at the RHOCaR club camp site we set up our tent, this was the second time we have used our Khyam Ontario 8 person tent and this year we have bought a sun canopy which payed for its self on Saturday night as from about 9pm we had heavy rain right thourgh till 5am on the Sunday morning.

The S7 on the RHOCaR club stand on the Sunday. Again the club had another good turn out of Robin Hoods. The show always has loads of indoor halls and outdoor club stands to explore.

Monday saw the start of Hoody Bears year long Great Adventure raising funds for the Air Ambulance Association with my Thames Valley area of the club kicking the event off.

Bob & Sylvia's BBQ

For the last three years in April Bob & Sylvia have opened the doors of their home to hold a Kit
& Classic car day and BBQ.
This was the first time I had taken my car along to this event, So we set off Saturday lunch time with me in the Hood and Becks & Tasha in the tin top via our sat nav's own crazy route!!
We arrived to find that there was already a good turn out of cars with a few of the RHOCaR guys making the trip.

Phil Shelton had made the trip down from Leicester from the weekend with Hoody bear raising funds for the Air Ambulance Association.

Hoody Bears website - http://hoodythebear.blogspot.com/



Tasha with the S7.

The weather was spot on too, what more can you ask for.

In the afternoon we all had some fun with home made bow and arrows in true Robin Hood fashion, the name of the game was to hit the target to win chocolate. with this in mind Becks was the first to find the mark, anything for a chocolate bar!!

other people started to hit the target not long after and soon the arrows were flying through the air and chocolate was soon being munched by one and all.

Bob did make us all giggle by firing a couple of the home made arrows with his sling shot! He didn't get very far though. after a couple of tries he gave up and went to man the barbecue.

the smell of the burgers and sausages was soon wafting down the garden, so we made our way back up the garden where Bob and Sylvia had laid on a wonderful BBQ feast for us.

there was enough food to feed an army , and we all did our best. with plenty of soft drinks and alcohol for those that weren't driving to wash it down with a great time was had by all.

Bobs own take on the Robin Hood 2B with stainless steel panel work he has made himself.

we left at about 9.15 after being lucky enough to watch Bob fire up his engine. sounding good Bob!

we made our way home in a convoy at the end of a very enjoyable day.

Windscreen Weather Strip

I have fitted a weather strip to the top rail of the windscreen. This should stop any rain water from coming in under the Surrey hood, it is made up from a rubber D section.

The Surrey hood in place, as you can see from the photo the D section makes a good tight seal.

This should also work well with the full weather gear.