What have you done today with your Austin Seven

[Reckless Rat]

I made a similar temporary spray booth when my mate Marcel came from Switzerland for a free holiday. It cost him his time in sprayi,ng the wings & headlamps of the RP...





Probably won't suit the purists. Two pack gloss black. Super finish.

[Adam Brown]

On Sunday, my sister (having shown no interest whatsoever in driving any of our old vehicles) declared out of the blue 'I should like to have a go at driving Grandads old Austin'

Her partner had the first go, he couldn't find second in five laps of the industrial estate......

I gave her the same lesson and she got it right first time, promptly taking off with the car, dog and her other half in the direction of the pub!


She still has to work on changing down the box but hopefully she'll take it out many more times in the future 

[2009jamesb]

Took my MG TD to auction at Historic’s Ascot and then onto Dartfird to pick up my Austin 7 which has recently arrived from America 


[img]blob:http://www.austinsevenfriends.co.uk/8880a520-4e15-4e49-8574-5e90abb58797[/img][img]blob:http://www.austinsevenfriends.co.uk/8cb0d24b-6853-4180-9ca1-ba91df11324d[/img]

[David Stepney]

Took the dog for a run round Bala Lake to put some more miles on the Seven after fitting a new rear main bearing (see thread 'Rear Main Bearing'). A quiet meander along the south side of the lake through Llangower through to Llanuwchllyn and then a fast run (40 to 45 mph so fast for a box saloon) up the A 494 back to Bala. Super fun! The engine makes all the right noises now - Industrial sewing machine with a hint of tin trays falling down stone steps. Will have to sort the back axle out sometime. It growls worse than the dog!

[Hedd_Jones]

After reassembling the handbrake on the Chummy I find that I cannot adjust it up well without the drivers side front dragging. An external return spring now assists the shoe springs. The test drive to the doctors and Morrisons I bumped into a Alvis owning gent in a VSCC jumper. His brother has two Speedys. Lucky man.



I also pulled the RP out and filled it with antifreeze for the first time since its been here. I hope the recent head wap will cure its tendency to leak oil into the coolant. Unfortunatley its always been a poor starter from cold and today was no different. Compared to the chummy with its low compression head, this with a high compression head is lacking in compression. And the head swap seems not to have improved matters. Im hoping a long run and some proper temperature will build it back up. But Im not hopefull despite the bores looking fine. Though the plugs do look oily. Perhaps some vim through the carb will help. Hmm.



Once its fired once it seems to be fine. Which is.ominous as I had a Peugeot 106 like that. It had valve seat erosion. Perhaps I should check the valve clearances. It is however like driving a Rolls Royce when compared to the Chummy with no trim to deaden the mechanical din!

I also put the bonnet back on the RL. 

[David Stepney]

Funny that you RP and RL are both Welsh registered cars. TH is Carmarthenshire and EJ is Cardiganshire.

[Ray White]

Hedd. That external spring is a genius idea. Simple but effective short term fix.

[Hedd_Jones]

Funny that you RP and RL are both Welsh registered cars. TH is Carmarthenshire and EJ is Cardiganshire.

yes. As a welshman it is rather dissapointing the chummy is a Gloucester reg

[jansens]

I made new brake and clutch pedals. I had to extend them out a bit so I could reach the clutch without needing the seat so far forward I couldn't get into it. Since I am not using rubbers I made the pads bigger. Plus that was the diameter of my hole saw!



Still need to do the throttle pedal but first I need to do the exhaust header so I can work out exactly how the throttle linkage needs to work.

Simon

[Tony Press]

Front Brake Return Spring .
 
 With the Austin Seven front brakes, there is often a problem with making sure the levers return fully to ‘off’, to prevent the Brakes from dragging when turning.
 One way to assist with this is to add a short external tension spring to the brake lever, one end hooked around the neck of the ball end of the Brake Lever, the other attached to a hole drilled in the backing plate.   
 Another better way is to make up two special long cotter pin as shown below.


  Brake cotter for spring.jpg (Size: 8.76 KB / Downloads: 204)

 A piece of 5/16” dia. rod about 4” (102mm) long is turned eccentrically one end and threaded ¼” BSF with a filed taper flat as with the original cotter pin. The outer end of the pin has a couple of flats filed and a small hole drilled to accept one end a ‘pull of’ tension spring about 4” long. This 'cotter' is inserted into the front of each brake lever and the other end of the spring is stretched up and inserted in a hole drilled in the backing plate. You will have to experiment with the spring size, length and position to get a good return tension, but not so tight that the front brakes are difficult to apply.
A pair of these have been fitted to the Chummy since the 50's