Monday, 20 October 2008

Not going to plan

Delays, delays... Got the van back from the body shop today. It should have been done on Friday but there was a problem with the paint oven apparently. Anyway, it's now dent-free and an almost perfect colour match. That paint colour was always going to be very difficult to match.

The new trailer is also delayed as some of the parts hadn't been delivered on time. I'm still hoping it will be ready in time for Friday but I'll need to find out in the next couple of days and look at hiring one for the weekend if mine isn't done by then.

Incessant rain over the weekend made it difficult to get the race car out to work on too however after spending some time tripping over stuff in the garage whilst trying to check the oil and coolant levels (really must tidy up in there!) the rain finally abated long enough for me to roll the car out and try to start it. It was completely dead of course. Flat battery. Then whilst connecting the battery charger I managed to short something and melted one of the crocodile clips in a rather spectacular show of sparks, flames and smoke!

Fortunately the battery charger clip was the only casualty and I eventually got the car started with the aid of a jump start pack. Having run it for a while, it hopefully has enough charge in the battery now to start on its own next time.

Next jobs are an oil change on the van (it still has the running in oil in it), getting the tracking set up properly on the van since I'm pretty sure my efforts with a tape measure after rebuilding the steering last week are less than accurate and then replacing some of the interior trim I took out for the wiring and left out for the body shop.

It's going to be a busy week!

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