Timex and friends

[kieran.l]

Its sunny where you are?

Nice pics Mike. Fred looks in solid condition!


I can show you alot worse...

Safe trip south, looking forward to meeting yourself and Timex - and watch out for those islands!

PS. not sure if I gave directions exactly like this to you yesterday, but when your near Cork city, you stay on the N40/N25 (South ring road) heading South in the direction of Killarney, Tralee, Macroom. Turn off left for Kenmare (if in Killarney, you've gone too far), then take Castletownbere road out of Kenmare (it'll be a left at a small roundabout on the town outskirts, you'll cross over a bridge then) and head for Castletownbere/Ardgroom (its a right turn directly after crossing the bridge). Call at any point if your unsure.

[citsncycles]

Well, as mentioned elsewhere, I got to Ireland and back (after a slight adventure in Pembroke Dock which resulted in a battered sump and a punctured tyre ) and visited Kieran while I was there.

Unfortunately I didn't take a pic of it, but he showed me the DTR that tey've got over there, and it's bad! for the passenger a pillar think of the pic. of fred's pillar above, with all the metal other than the hinge and check strap mount missing and you'll be about there. There's also serious rot at the rear of the roof under the plastic trims, the front panel isn't attached to the inner wings any more and the front of the passenger iner wing has disappeared. It was interesting to look at though, as it seems to be quite a late Mk1, and had a couple of attributes I had always thought of as Mk2 traits. There isn't a hole in the passenger inner wing for the air intake pipe to go through, rather it goes to behind the headlight, like earlier Mk2's. It also has what I've been told is a Mk2 heater blower, which Kieran assures me is original, so as diesel estates were only available towards the end of Mk1 production, the Mk2 type blower in Timex might be correct! we discussed the possibility of finding a donor shell to recreate this car, but it'd be a lot of work!

We then drove each other's mk1's, which for my part was a good experience, and luckily for Fred I only found Kieran's non PAS RD to be heavy on some of the tighter bends, and certainly no worse than the GS. I did realise that Timex's driver's seat is seriously tired though.

I also had a look at his TZD, which while in need of some work on a windscreen pillar and in one corner of the boot floor, is otherwise very solid, and runs quite well with all the doors locked! Incidentally, it seems for some reason Irish market TZD's didn't get the stickers on the rear quarters!

Talk also included other Irish market oddities, including the vans, at which point Kieran showed me his Mum's C4 Coupe Van (again sorry, no pics), which I'd never seen before. All in all - a good day out.

Kieran has covered stuff I took pics of elsewhere, but here's a couple I took in Birr, just up the road from my parents:

[Mothman]

Nice piccies Mike. Sophie has some of the late Mk 1/early Mk 2 attributes too. She has what appears to be a Mk 2 heater blower and the air intake pipe goes in behind the headlight, all of which seem original so there does appear to be some crossover between the models.Completely different to what's on Wilma. I expect they were tooling up for the Mk2 before the Mk 1's production ended and had used up a lot of the Mk 1 parts.
Glad to hear you had a good time whilst in Ireland. Had a great time there myself a few years back near Cork, the Murphys was great.

[kieran.l]

Nice write-up Mike! I hope you don't mind me adding a few pics, for what you described above, for you?

DTR pillar!


Roof


Mk2 heater blower


Also, as you pointed out Mike, the interior is not tweed and the dash has open demister vents for the side windows (blocked off on lower spec models?)


Moms C4 van and interior



For me, it was nice to drive a mk1 with power steering! Timex has a more positive gear change than mine and dives nicer at the lower revs whereas mine doesn't like to be a lower revs and is very jumpy as Mike can attest!

And yes, as Mike said, its unusual but the Irish registered TZDs that I've seen have had no sticker on the rear quarter panel. Two of these have been identical grey TZDs, one 1991 and one 1993. Coincidence? Maybe someone else in Ireland knows otherwise.

[citsncycles]

Thanks for the pics - I'd forgotten the DTR had odd spheres on the front!

[citsncycles]

Sillyness of the week - Timex on a rolling road!



It's already been said elsewhere, but thanks for the entertaining evening Kitch. He commented on how smooth it felt, how clean the exhaust was, and the remarkably low power losses. Mind you if you thought Timex just being there was bad, you should have seen the graph:



The red lines are for comparison and are from The Estate, now in the hands of Tim Leech. As you can see, it was looking really good up to about 2500rpm, at which point it all went a bit wrong! The conclusion reached is that the cam fitted during the head rebuild is from a TD engine, as the power and torque dips at about the point the turbo would be kicking in. At least I now know why it was performing so well in Scotland, sometimes to the point of surprising everybody, both with the pulling power and the economy! Anyway. Jaba has a cam for me once he gets back to this side of the Channel. So hopefully it can be swapped in and parked on the rollers again.

There's a TGD estate in one of the local scrappy's, so hopefully I can cut some much needed panels off for Timex - back wings and windscreen pillars would be good, as would rear footwells!

In the meantime my days off are mainly composed of welding a 2CV for a mate - lower bulkhead repair, front floors and some sill repairs so far - I'll try to remember to take some pics, but basically, A series Citroens are childs play to rebuild compared to either BX's or GS's

[Dollywobbler]

Ah yes. I heard Tarquers had got you welding his latest project!

[Stinkwheel]

Ah yes. I heard Tarquers had got you welding his latest project!

Tarquers as in Simon?

I thought he did his own welding and stuff?

[citsncycles]

He can do welding, but I'm a bit quicker and more experienced at it, especially with the number of 2CVs, Dyanes and Amis I've welded over the years (both mine and others). His Dad actually bought my new welder for me in return for my welding his 4 light Dyane in the spring, and when I do jobs like this for them or other ARTists there's usually a bit of quid pro quo in the form of parts for one of my projects, or help with one of my cars etc.

[Stinkwheel]

He can do welding, but I'm a bit quicker and more experienced at it, especially with the number of 2CVs, Dyanes and Amis I've welded over the years (both mine and others). His Dad actually bought my new welder for me in return for my welding his 4 light Dyane in the spring, and when I do jobs like this for them or other ARTists there's usually a bit of quid pro quo in the form of parts for one of my projects, or help with one of my cars etc.

Sounds like a perfect arrangement then

I wish more local 2CV'ers were near me for similar such arrangements

[citsncycles]

Yep, he's just resued another car, although I suspect that this will be just cleaned up and sold on as a project. This car was rechassied several years back by the owner buying the parts and about 8 local members mucking in and helping with the mechanics, painting etc. That one ended up with new floors, lower bulkhead kit and several other small repairs courtesy of myself too!

[citsncycles]

Well the collection has been undergoing some changes over the last few weeks. The 2 rescue Dyanes are off to pastures new, probably with one being used as a parts car to rebuild the other.

I'm also going to put the series 2a Landies up for sale, and possibly the Trabbi too. This is because after a 7 year absence I am reentering H van ownership (sort of). It was a 1980 HY ex French military panel van bought in about 1995 which got me into Citroens in the first place. This was replaced in 1998 by an HW livestock truck, which was swapped for the Land Rover ambulance 7 years ago. I've always missed having an H, although never expected to own another, mainly due to the way the prices are going. This hasn't stopped me buying a 1959 pickup from a specialist in north Wales. Apparently they've overstocked themselves with projects and decided to move some of their stock on instead of having vehicles sat for 7 months or more before being started on.

This particular one has been off the road a long time, so will need a thorough going over mechanically. The front of the bodyshell is solid, but the rear needs work, which suits my plans for it quite well. What I hope to do is adapt it to either carry an A series citroen on the back, or tow a trailer with either the GS or a BX on board. If the engine is ok, it'll be the slowest thing on the planet, with the top speed of 50mph or so, but if the engine is no good I may well consider fitting a diesel engine in it - I have a 2ltr Perkins Prima from a Montego, and a 2.5ltr Peugeot Engine from an LDV sat waiting for a new lease of life. I hope to collect it early in the new year, so watch this space.

[mat_fenwick]

a specialist in north Wales

Anywhere near Blaenau Ffestiniog?

[citsncycles]

Conwy, which according to my Blackberry is about 28 miles away.

[Dollywobbler]

Ah, I was mightily tempted by that one too. The way H van prices have been going, it seemed good value. Do miss mine sometimes, even though I was absolutely sick of it after driving it to Sweden and back. Via France, The Netherlands, Germany, Denmark and then Norway on the way back. They're an astonishing design really. A front-wheel drive, monococque van with a super-low loading floor DECADES before the rest of the world caught up (other French manufacturers cottoned on, but not the rest of the world). They handle like big Minis too, but sadly ride almost as badly. Horrible over speed humps!

I'd love another but with more sound deadening and taller gearing. A screaming 50-55mph really did get a bit tiring!