For those interested in old cars.

[MJI]

i was lucky enough to get my hands on a very cheap 136 engine on carb (the latter ones were fuel injected ) got hold of a janspeed manifold to allow twin 45 webber downdrafts couple that with a slightly wilder cam dropped it into my 130 L saloon lump of flat bottom rail under the bonnet (to keep the nose down ) and i had a fantastic little street sleeper .won many a traffic light grandprix against various gti/gte/and XRs much to their surprise and embarrassment .was able to easily hit 120 on the motorway great car petty the tin worm got to the swing arm mounts 

 

I always liked the old Skodas pre VW, honest cars with interesting handling (in a good way)

I have beaten XRs in various cars, the funniest are

 

1) Astra 1.3 ex company car I was collecting for selling off.

2) Avenger Estate

3) Fiesta with Chrysler hatch fully laden pre Kent cam and twin carbs

 

My parents a Reliant Rialto

 

I also once killed a TLGP between a couple of hot hatches by riding up the middle and leaving both for dead, Bikes always win TLGPs

 

For fun

Warm Peugeot with a hot Chrysler hatch not being thrashed just wondering why they were trying, suffice to say that their max RPM is first was the same as my start of power band in first

924 with Chrysler hatch

Naughtiest was leaving a Sierra Cossie with a bike on a fast twisty A road

 

Please note all were well over 20 years ago except 924 which was about 20

[MJI]

My Dad worked for a Skoda dealer for a while (mechanic) and I think the old rear engine ones were very underrated, preferable to the VAG rebadges.

 

I have a real soft spot for the 136 Rapide, I was in a Rootes group car at the time.

 

I saw a rally Sunbeam 1300 once on the road, slower though than a road 1600, as to a rally 1600 a friend had one, took me for a ride - QUICK - mainly due to less weight rather than more power.

[edcayton]

Sorry, I have to disagree. Even with the fondness that nostalgia brings, rear engined Skodas were utter sh1te. I agree that the handling was not as bad as some said, but the build quality was just awful. My Dad had two. He bought the first brand new and tried to drive it from Darwen (Lancs?) to Newquay and the fan belt came off. It had been shredded by the roughness of the crankshaft pulley. There were many faults with it (some helped by Dad's driving and maintenance routine).

 

He then part exchanged it for a second hand one at the local Skoda shop near Newquay, To be fair, nobody else would touch it, The second one was slightly better until he bu66ered the engine. A ball bearing came out of his cheap ratchet and went down a plug-hole. It did a little dance on top of the piston before jamming between the piston and the liner. He was going to mend it but Mum made him buy a little Micra they had on the forecourt! He did his best to kill that but it out-lasted him.

 

Ed

[57xx]

Sounds a bit fanciful to me. If there was enough gap for a ball bearing, however small, to "jam" between the piston and liner, the engine was way beyond bu66ered already. All it would have taken was a magnet on a stick to recover that. I've recovered many a piston circlip with one of those on 2 strokes when they've pinged out and dropped between the crank webs.

[peanuts]

Who remembers Skoda's on the RAC Rally? The real one that is. Won their class more times that you could shake a stick at. Another area they were good at was trials like the London/Lands End. Rear engine,good torque and good traction.And the Skoda Rapide was a cracking car. Slow in, fast out. Just don't change your mind halfway through! 

winners of their class (upto 1300cc) ten years running usualy in the hands of John Haugland  iirc up against much more modern front wheel drive cars  suzuki swifts vauxhall corsas talbot sambas etc plus thier greatest rivals Lada wasnt untill the introduction of the front wheel drive felicia that they lost their run in the forests . and thiswas when the RAC was a proper five day event with 48 stages totaling over 1000 miles none of this nine to five three day sprint rubbish we have now 

[alastairq]

Build quality? Compared to what?

 

They stayed together longer than other cars of their era.....[not many Leyland/rovers around from that age...or vauxhalls...or Fords, either]

 

Skodas needed hands-on care..that's how they were designed.

 

Their competitors pandered to the customers of the day [still do]...who didn't want to be 'bothered' with messing around with the car.

 

Now, for me..the Fords and Vauxhalls were the 'utter shy#te of their day too...and the Rover metros, Maestros, et al. VW were trying to live off a reputation not really deserved...and as for Renaults and Peugeots of the day???

 

Many makes of car died premature deaths purely because the owners couldn't be bothered to service them correctly...or the garages they paid to service their cars didn't do it as well as one would wish. Many failed to appreciate new technologies required new service procedures..thus many ally engined cars died because fitters insisted on being dinosaurs..[Triumph Stag, for one?]

 

The 1980s saw the arrival of the throw-away motor car...and the cavalier attitudes of owners....?

[edcayton]

Sounds a bit fanciful to me. If there was enough gap for a ball bearing, however small, to "jam" between the piston and liner, the engine was way beyond bu66ered already. All it would have taken was a magnet on a stick to recover that. I've recovered many a piston circlip with one of those on 2 strokes when they've pinged out and dropped between the crank webs.

 

 

I still have the piston/liner "assembly" somewhere. I used it when I taught car maintenance classes!

 

Ed

[PatB]

Regardless of the feasibility of where a ball might end up, any damage resulting from dropping something down a plug hole and then neglecting to retrieve it before starting the engine can't really be regarded as a fault with the car itself.

[37114]

Now that Peafore Yard is finished (its in the January BRM) and the MK1 BSO is nearly done, I started on this at the weekend:

 

 

I replaced the chassis 10 years ago with a Galvanised new one and it is still good condition having only done 10,000 miles since but the bulkhead and front panel are rusted and there are numerous other little jobs to do. Needless to say it started second go on the button after being stood for over a year. The front panel is coming out tomorrow to take over to my dads for some welding:

 

[RANGERS]

 

 

Actually, no, the Skodas were not based on, or even inspired by, the VW beetle.

 

[skoda..and its former name, LAurin & Klement..who built cars to rival Rolls Royce......pre-dates not only VW, but Porsche, and pretty much every other car manufacturer going today!]

 

The Skoda 'chassis'...[ for they didn't have one, being monocoque, unlike the beetle, which had a pan chassis]....did not have torsion bar suspension...rater, coil springs up front, and coils at the rear.  

 

The swing axle rear suspension was a quite common method of providing independant rear suspension, at the time. VW beetles had it, but so did Triumphs [herald & spitfire]....FIAT, Renault, Tatra and many, many others.

 

Where Skoda leapt ahead of the likes of VW, Renault, etc was in the design and use of aluminium for the engine & transmission.  This overcame the inherent problem of a rear engined vehicle, that of, extreme weight behind the back axle.

 

Rootes developed a significantly lighter engine for the Imp [based upon the Coventry Climax SOHC engine]....and the Skoda [rear] engine was second only to that, in lightness.

 

The VW aircooled beetle engine was significant in its very short length, using the boxer cylinder layout...thus reducing excessive rear overhung  weight. It had other issues, however..[its apparent longevity & reliability down to nothing more than, in standard form, it was entirely under stressed...the 1600cc version pushing out no more power than a Ford 1100cc motor!    Tune & stress a VW aircooled, and one enters a whole new world of unreliability!!!   Believe me, I know!!  Porsche had to seriously re-design the flat 4 concept to produce even reasonable power,without continually busting things....even the Porsche 1600 cc flat 4 engine wasn't what one would call, 'super powerful'!!]

 

Skoda overcame the swing axle issues by changing to  a 'semi-trailing arm' rear suspension setup. This was introduced [i believe] in the Rapid coupe [ a 2 door estele, not as versatile]...which brought formula 1 grand prix suspension to the cheap car world.

 

Skoda even were the first [?} to fit, as a production item, 4-pot caliper disc brakes to the Rapid...[to homologate them for the rally cars]...

 

Once the new design rear suspension came into play, the press loved the cars....Later [mid 1980's] the engine became all alloy [the earlier ones had an iron head]....the 136 motors....which also gained 8 port cylinder heads.  There are varying  degrees of support as to whether this engine was able to produce more power reliably, compared to the 5 port, iron head 1300 [the 130 engine]...issues centring on valve gear, head gaskets, etc. personally, having built a 130, using a swan neck manifold and sidedraught 40 DCOE Weber, I found the earlier engine produced better bottom end power than my current [but idle] 136 motor with its bike carb set-up. MAybe the passage of time dims my memory?

 

The 136 engine eventually went into Skoda's first FWD car, the Favorit....which essentially was pre-VW in every aspect.....and a very good car it was, too...certainly compared to everything else on the market.

 

When VW[VAG]'s tendrils eventually penetrated the darkest corners of Skoda...there came the Felicia [which shared a shell with the Polo]..probably the best car VAG ever made, IMHO? {from a 'driver's point-of-view].....the old 136 motor, now with 4 point fuel injection,modern ignition and an ecu...was retained, as, within the VAG group, there wasn't a 'small'...as inm, 1300cc, engine anything like as light as the 136.....therefore the car was far better balanced than the other VW range.....spoilt when VW planted their own 1.6 petrol and  heavy diesel lump into the Felicia to please the non-cognoscenti market.

 

For owners of rear engined skodas, the 136 motor is  a cheap tuning conversion in its own right...with modest alterations, the FWD engine [which eventually went into the FAbia, as the 1.4....Skoda engineers warned VW engineers not to increase the capacity, due to flexing of the alloy block...VW ignored them, as they do....and ended up having to design an incredible alloy webbed casting, to keep the main bearings in line...1.3 was a limit Skoda arrived at very carefully.]

 

Back in 'the day'....for a modified cylinder head, one sent one's article off to a noted tuner or two [blydenstein did some, I believe?]....for gas flowing, valves, etc.......however, to make the 136 more efficient, in the FWD cars...Skoda basically 'copied' what had been done before by tuners...so, these days, for one's Rapid/estelle, with its 136 motor, one blaggs a freebie Felicia cylinder head....!  In fact, why not blag the enter Felicia 136 engine,complete with fuel injection?  More power,with reliability?

 

Mechanically, the skoda rear engined cars were not exactly simple....but...unlike their competitors, consideration had to be given to how the home market worked......these cars had to be designed to be mended & maintained by the roadside, or in a car park.

 

Thus,virtually every component or system could be stripped down to its component parts.  essentially nothing could not be repaired....unlike the competitors, and today's cars....where, if a major component like a starter motor busts, it's a complete replacement jobbie, not a 'strip & repair'...Everything was put together with screws,nuts and bolts on a Skoda.

 

What let Skodas down, IMHO, was the quality of the ancillary components...especially the electrics, made by PAL...[who sub contracted to Lucas, which might explain a lot?}...but then, Skoda had little choice when it came to outside contractors.

 

The throttle cable is very easy to replace, just incredibly long!....the clutch is hydraulic, all adjusted from inside the car [there is an access hatch under the rear seats]...same with the speedo cable.

 

The engine is incredibly easy to remove, using a trolley jack and a few blocks of wood......simply, remove the rear body panel.....support engine on trolley jack, undo cross member, support on wood blocks, disconnect services, and gearbox, take the weight, and wheel it out...did that outside a hotel in Babbacombe once, to replace a burgered clutch!

 

It helps to re-do the fuel tank balance pipe, then one can easily drop the transmission as well.  All my skodas had their fuel tanks shifted up front.....to make maintenance even more easy. The rally folk did that to improve front-to-rear weight distribution...not something I was worried about when trialling..preferring everything to be at the back! But...the car had to be easily mendable when major items went bang....so that I could drive to work in it on a Monday!

 

The enter front axle/suspension was easily detachable as a unit too...simply disconnect steering column [at its U/J]...undo brake pipes, undo shocker tops, place jack, lift car, prop up, and lower front cross member, wheel to one side, play about with to one's heart's content!

 

I have re-built an engine in the work car park [good old East Yorkshire..]..that is, new cylinder liners, pistons rings, etc....with the engine still in the car....also won the bet as to how I would be getting home that evening!

 

Skodas these days are a differnt beast altogether.....as are nearly all cars.

 

Most of the youngsters I come across now, don't even now what a dipstick is, let alone, where it is.   A car is a means of comfortably getting around, and looking good..endex!  A driving licence is purely a travel pass....nothing more!

 

A genuine, oily handed young motor enthusiast is an exception these days, not the rule.  The furthest most get with regards to repair & modification is, the online catalogue!  

I wasn't suggesting there was any connection other than that both were born from a need to build a car from virtually a standing start with limited resource and no access to what had become the latest technology elsewhere. L&Ks advanced engineering capabilities, and they were leaders in their field in pre-war/ pre-Eastern Bloc days, had been diverted away from the car division along with the best of the manufacturing resource to more "important" matters of national importance.

 

About the only thing Beetle and the 110 et al had in common was the position of the engine and the evil job of changing that clutch cable!

[37114]

These 2 beauties were in the work car park today, and serve as a regular reminder why I am rebuilding mine. 

[brianthesnail96]

Funny how they seem to accumulate isn't it... I do like that grey series 2.

 

Nice to see a S3 getting restored, they've been a bit Cinderellaish for too long but are definitely on the up now.

[37114]

Funny how they seem to accumulate isn't it... I do like that grey series 2.

 

Nice to see a S3 getting restored, they've been a bit Cinderellaish for too long but are definitely on the up now.

Sadly the price of series parts is also on the up which is putting pressure on the budget but I am in no rush, I have loosely set an October 2017 deadline so it is back on the road for it's 40th Birthday

[brianthesnail96]

Indeed- why I've ended up with a 110, I couldn't afford a decent series. It is nice to be able to get parts easily, compared to the Marinas and even the LDV, just a shame that quality is such a gamble (something that affects other popular classics too- some of the repro Triumph bits we got for the Dolomite were shocking).

[37114]

Indeed- why I've ended up with a 110, I couldn't afford a decent series. It is nice to be able to get parts easily, compared to the Marinas and even the LDV, just a shame that quality is such a gamble (something that affects other popular classics too- some of the repro Triumph bits we got for the Dolomite were shocking).

Stay away from anything in a blue box branded Britparts wherever possible! I looked on eBay the other night and there where a number of tidy series 3 priced at £10,000 upwards, I turned the screen off quickly before the wife saw I. Case she has any ideas of selling mine when it is done!

Edited November 26, 2015 by 37114

[brianthesnail96]

Should have kept my last one, a little dog eared cosmetically but galvanised chassis and an unusually sweet 2.25d with a good overdrive.





Had this one briefly while studenting, after the run back from Plymouth to Gloucestershire (having donePlymouth- Kent and back to pick it up a couple of months previously) I decided that I really couldn't afford a 2.25p on a student budget!



And this was my first car when I passed my test, still miss it!



Apologies if I've posted those before, this thread is long and my memory is poor...

110 currently laid up with what I hope is a failed clutch slave cylinder. Using the red Marina as daily transport until it's fixed, it's considerably faster and much more comfortable but the heater doesn't work!

Edited November 26, 2015 by brianthesnail96

[MJI]

Funny how they seem to accumulate isn't it... I do like that grey series 2.

 

Nice to see a S3 getting restored, they've been a bit Cinderellaish for too long but are definitely on the up now.

 

Prices are scarey now.

 

Only cheap Land Rovers now are Discovery 1s

 

Series only a few years ago were disposable. Now very high compared to where they were a few years ago.

 

A petrol S3 does appeal to me. As does a 1999-2007 Defender. Or a 110 V8.

 

Don't like the post 2007 Defenders, too cramped and rough engines.

 

As to parts make it depends what is sold.

 

I have some awkward repairs to do, a leaking seal on the front axle, and a leak from a suspension valve block.

 

I am trying to find a local company to drill out my valve block so I can use hydraulic fittings.

[37114]

Should have kept my last one, a little dog eared cosmetically but galvanised chassis and an unusually sweet 2.25d with a good overdrive.

Had this one briefly while studenting, after the run back from Plymouth to Gloucestershire (having donePlymouth- Kent and back to pick it up a couple of months previously) I decided that I really couldn't afford a 2.25p on a student budget!

And this was my first car when I passed my test, still miss it!

Apologies if I've posted those before, this thread is long and my memory is poor...

110 currently laid up with what I hope is a failed clutch slave cylinder. Using the red Marina as daily transport until it's fixed, it's considerably faster and much more comfortable but the heater doesn't work!

 

MFO918 seems familiar for some reason, has it been in a magazine?

[Titan]

Memories!

 

 

On the subject of Land Rovers, the car I most regret selling is this one, pictured nearing the finish of a minor rebuild due to a slight prang (which wrote off two other cars)

 

 

 

I really had a lot of fun in that car, it was pretty much unstoppable!

 

 

 

Since I sold it values seem to have been skyrocketing, even for the early 4 doors like mine!

[brianthesnail96]

I've always liked the classic, especially with the earlier bumpers. I've missed that boat though! Too nice for jumping in covered in oil and grime as well.

 

MFO was owned by Dave who ran the OLLR forum, there's a few videos on YouTube as well (including the two day chassis swap). He's on here as well.

[Rugd1022]

Loving the old Landies and Rangies, excellent stuff gentlemen! I've not seen it for a while but there used to be a very early K reg'd (71/72) Range Rover regularly parked up in the staff car park at Leamington Spa station which made a lovely sight. One of the first five ever built was on display at the NEC Classic Show a couple of weeks ago, in plain white with no frills it was a gem to behold.

 

A mate at work has a SIIa Landie waiting to be recommissioned, I'll have to gee him up a bit!

[37114]

I've always liked the classic, especially with the earlier bumpers. I've missed that boat though! Too nice for jumping in covered in oil and grime as well.

 

MFO was owned by Dave who ran the OLLR forum, there's a few videos on YouTube as well (including the two day chassis swap). He's on here as well.

Thats where I have seen it! I met Dave a couple of times, he is a top notch modeller having seen the amazing work he has BT&S, I am on OLLR as well.

[MJI]

Well keep a look out on Saturday for a light metallic blue Discovery 2 with a light bar at the NEC car park.

 

It would be mine.

[brianthesnail96]

Yes, somehow I managed to end up with BT&S as well as the Land Rover! Top bloke.

You might well recognise the late 2a as well then, Dougal the 1-ton is now owned by "SOTD", aka Mike, although it's changed a bit now (wider track axles, reversed Discovery wheels and a blue canvas being the obvious ones). Goes all over Europe in it.

[37114]

Yes, somehow I managed to end up with BT&S as well as the Land Rover! Top bloke.

You might well recognise the late 2a as well then, Dougal the 1-ton is now owned by "SOTD", aka Mike, although it's changed a bit now (wider track axles, reversed Discovery wheels and a blue canvas being the obvious ones). Goes all over Europe in it.

Small world, look forward to meeting you Matt as we are both exhibiting at Yate in February

Edited September 14, 2016 by 37114