Swivles, Horn and Grill, and we're done!

This entry actually covers a couple of work days.
I had the wheels off last week to paint them, and while I had them off, decided to check the oil in the "swivels", better known as "king pins" in North America. Yes, you might notice, I said "oil", not grease. Most cars have grease in the king pins; older cars would have grease nipples while newer ones are permanently sealed. But the Rover P4 has king pins that require fluid oil rather than grease. So, I opened them up by removing the filler plug on top and the drain plug at the bottom. Sure enough, someone had filled them with grease!
Referring to my newly purchased "Rover P4 Technical Tips" book, I cleaned out the grease by using baby bottle brushes that I bought at London Drugs, along with Kerosene, and then filled them with 140 weight oil. That took most of a day.

Here's the swivel with the fill plug open.

Here's my new Technical Tips book.

 

 Today's job was to see if I could fix the non-functioning horns (yes, there are two). I used a deep cycle 12 volt battery that I had and connected the horns to that. Neither worked. These horns are pretty big and complicated gizmos. I managed to get the casing off, and investigated the mechanism, which is a clever little setup involving an electromagnet and a set of points which are to be set at almost the open position. When power is applied, the electromagnet opens the points, cutting the circuit which causes immediately closing of the points which engages the circuit again, and so on, very rapidly. Each closing of the circuit also draws in the sound diaphram, so the rapid on and off vibrates the diaphram, making the sound.

All I had to do to get them working was fine tune the "points" to get them to just the correct amount of tension to operate properly. Kind of fun because I never knew how a horn operated before. I suspect modern horns use a different system.

When that was done, I decided to clean up some more of the chrome, particularly around the windows. As I got to the chrome around the front grill, I decided to remove the grill so that I could paint the visible rust spots inside it. That was very worthwhile, as I was able to polish up the chrome on the grill as well as paint behind it. Lucky I still have the parts car though, because I lost a couple of the mounting nuts, and being Whitworth standard thread, I would have been up a creek.

With this, I am going to pretty well declare the car done for this year, and ready to hit the road! I am just awaiting ICBC's response to my application for Collector's status before I get it on the road.

Meanwhile, I have another project lined up and ready to go. My Westfalia van needs a new clutch, so it is now in the garage and ready to begin.

I may start a new blog for that project.