Hillman Imp Wills ringed cylinder head and water gasket

What exactly are Wills Rings and how do they work? the picture will explain most of those questions,the words below should tell you the rest of the story.

This is no ordinary Hillman Imp head,its a sport version with its larger valves and ports,plus its been further cleaned up and the ports opened up further too. The black rings are the Wills Rings,they are gas filled tubes which are located in a special groove thats milled into the face of the alloy head,they alone keep the water and gasses seperate.The blue gasket is paper,that keeps the cooling water in its place.

Seen mainly on competition engines due to the cost but only on engines with steel cylinders,that are fitted to 998cc engines and larger,the Wills Rings can not be fitted to a standard 875cc engine,as the pressure of the steel ring will crush the alloy on the top landing of the cast Iorn bore.

Bravo another SA public holiday?

Somehow I just can not get my brain around why a developing country like South Africa needs so many public holidays? my callender says there are 13 of them but thats not the full truth,as when a holiday is close to a weekend,such as todays Youth Day,many take the next day off to make it a long weekend?

We should have the drive gear set made up for our Toylander by next week,this week being written off due to another holiday.

Why should I care? well the two sets of wheels and tyres boxed yesterday for Mark in Joburg and ready to be collected right now,probably will not be collected untill monday now?

A Hillman Imp front stub axle,now none standard as I have installed longer wheel studs,ex a Ford Escort I was told,they are not a direct fit,we need to turn them down to make a tight fit in the cast Iorn wheel hub.The white plastic thing is the drive hook to the speedo cable,this being the passenger side of the car.

To compound the lack of collection,there is a parcel,two in fact that needs delivery so I can complete the assembly of the Hillman Imps new front disc brake set.I know they arrived,as the courier phoned for our Vat and Import details but they will not be delivered today,friday maybe?

Just how much work is lost nation wide by all these holidays,I wonder!

Roy

Global Warming in South Africa?

I have read many times about the effects of global warming but after around 30 years of residence in Hout Bay,near Cape Town,I have never witnessed a hail and rain storm as we had early yesterday evening!

A cold supper,thats a layer of hail stones on our Trex Wood Polymer table outside.

Our gutters soon filled with hail stones,looks like snow, is this global cooling?

Roy

Hillman Imp cylinder head bolt lubrication

The Rootes factory workshop manual number 141,section B (engine) page 27 tells us to only use (MUST) use Shell Ensis 256 oil when refitting the bolts.There is no explanation why and its taken a few years to find out and when I do the Ensis range is now off the market!

The Ensis range was a large one,based on anti corrosion,the Ensis V type was available some years back when I bought this spray can lot.

Shells Ensis 256 is an anti corrosion fluid,we have just the product to replace it with Fluid Film.

Left click to read the words.

Justin,a now retired member of Shell SA, has just found out for me that this has now been discontinued,we may find new old stock at retailers of course,or as a perfect back up we can use Fluid Film,which we now have in US Gallon packs and can easily refill your trigger packs,or send you smaller amounts in suitable plastic containers.We can post world wide should you need some.

Rootes car company used Shell Oils

I would not say my transaxle and Shell Oils blog created a big stir but mail did happen because of it.

Being a very long while back since Rootes Car Company released the first Hillman Imp,it was in May 1963 and in Scotland,some minor facts may have been forgotton or lost as time went by.

Left click any image for a larger view and to read the info.

A new drivers hand book for the 1967 Singer Chamois,why new? the Hillman Imp Club were offered them back in 1997,I bought four,types to match the cars we had at the time.

The makers identity plate,each car had one of these in the top left hand side of the engine bay,it was fastened on with 1/8" alloy rivits. This ID says HSO meaning the car was a Home Saloon,so built for the UK market and was not an export model.

Page seven,the makers plate saying to only use Shell Oils products,which I believe was a first for any car company or oil company to agree on.

Whats hidden in your garage?

The makers plate advised the use of Shells single grade X-100 30 or the newer grade in X-100 20W/40 when I rebuilt our 1967 Singer Chamois and engine some 17 years back,thats 1974,Shell petrol stations still sold the correct oils for my car and I have used their oils when ever I can since.

Note,this grade no longer exists as far as I know?

Singer Chamois Sport brochures

Original and given to the buyer of the Singer Chamois Sport that was bought at the Earles Court Motor Show in London,1966.He bought the car and imported it to Cape Town later.

When many years later I became the cars owner I was able to make contact with the original owner,he came to see his old car and brought me all the original documentation.

For me finding the car was unusual but to then find the original owner and all purchase documents so many years later was amazing.

Imp Transaxle oils by Shell Oil

It will soon be time to install the transaxle in the Fraser replica Imp,Rootes Competitions found out early on that you must only use Shell EP oils in the transaxles.

The lable says Spirax 80w90 grade oil.

The whole car was designed around Shell lubricants,quite an unususal idea but when I can I only use Shell Oils.

With the engine out its a good idea to fit a new carbon thrust bearing in the transaxle,I have been told that the bearing off one of the VW cars is the same size,it just needs the clip holes drilling in the spigot ends?

Still on duty HMS Victory (Nelsons ship)

News just in from our mate Notty,who in his early years was an electritian (he has progressed to being an electrical boffin now)

  When I worked on the Victory in the early 60's I had to go into every compartment while installing fire detectors, even then they would lower huge timbers down into the bilges where a gang of old timers using the Adz would shape them to fit the curvature of the hull as rotten timbers were removed, so I don't suppose there are many original timbers left after 50-years. That was one of the more memorable jobs I did.

Notty, in central England



The bow on this type of ship is just a blunt end,the ship was basically forced through the water.


HMS Victory bow details


I took the above three pictures in September 2002,the camera was a Sony Cyber Shot digital.


Nelsons ship,the Victory as seen in a full view side picture.


The Victory in her dry dock at Portsmouth.


Artists impression of the Battle of Trafalgar


Imagine the noise when this lot were fired at the same time,deafness was a result?


Its a tight space down on the gun decks.

We have been asked more than once how long will a wooden boat last,I just point to some pictures of Nelsons flag ship the Victory I took when in the Naval Dock Yard,Portsmouth,England.I was told at the time that the ship still has a command and the Queen attends a dinner there once a year,here is some history on this ship,now around 250years old!

In July 1759, Mr Edward Allen, Master Shipwright of Chatham Dockyard received a letter from the Principle Officers and Commissioners of the Admiralty directing him:

"To make preparation and to prepare costing for a First-Rate Ship of 100 guns, to be built and fitted for sea at Chatham".

Upon receipt of this warrant, work began on the ship that was to become HMS VICTORY, and in time, the most famous warship in the world.

The Victory was designed by Thomas Slade, the Senior Surveyor of the Navy. By custom, seven names were reserved for First Rates. The name "Victory" was the only name not already in use so it was chosen for the new ship in 1760. There were some doubts in the minds of the Admiralty Board before the name was actually chosen, as the previous Victory had been lost with all hands a few years before. But a new Victory did not seem to upset the people of the country and, more importantly, the sailors who would eventually sail her and take her into battle.

The keel was laid down in the old single dock at Chatham Dockyard on 23 July 1759. According to a report it was a "bright and sunny day". Timber for constructing a first rate ship had been placed in store to season some 14 years before. It is very probable that the long seasoning time greatly contributed to the ship's eventual longevity.

At first, some 250 men were employed in one form or another in her construction, but with the changing fortunes of the war with France, the workforce was reduced in 1761. When the Seven Years War ended in 1763 further employees were made redundant as work to complete the ship became less urgent.

A Didi Mini Cruise ready for deck laying

Greg and Garth are busy preparing the boat they built from one of our Didi Mini Transat kits,the next stage is to dry fit the drop keel they have made with materials we also supplied,the next stage is to lay the boats decks.

Thats a great idea to pre finish the boats interior before laying the decks,when we buit two,we did the same.

What a nice clean boat and workshop,its good to work like this.

Roy

Warrior from above,the last of the Iornclads

Another photo taken from the viewing tower on Notties trip up the Spinnaker Tower (six pounds) was a ship in the Naval Dock Yard the Warrior,which I believe is the last of her line,she is a cast Iorn riveted hull,we saw her when in the area around 2004.

Left click on the image and see if you can HMS Victory,she is just left of center in the main dock yard.

A view of the Spinnaker Tower,Portsmouth,England

I saw this under construction,my friend Notty has just been up it and send us these words and pictures,thanks Notty.

Hi Roy,


At last I got around to downloading Soni's photos when we went up the Spinnaker Tower in Portsmouth. I've listed what each photo is. The tower is quite amazing, they were still building it when I was working in the naval dockyard there in 2005. It was opened in Oct. of that year by which time I had left. Built on a very small base of just 30 X 50 metres in the heart of the new Waterfront, designed by the same Architects as the CT Waterfront no shops had to be closed during the building from 2001 to 2005.

It is 170-Metres tall to the tip of the GRP spire, with the highest point for visitors being the Crows Nest, which is just above the main view deck that has a restaurant and can cater for up to 150 people. Weddings are conducted among other things there.

A file picture from the brochure on the building.

Built on 84 piles driving down into the seabed the longest of these was 49.5-metres. The main trunnion cruciform that joins the beams together was 95-tons and made by the same company that manufactured the deck beams for HMS Warrior, seen below, in the Historic Dockyard.

The 2 main support legs were made of 11000 cubic metres of concrete using the slip-form method of construction and they were angled at 2-deg. to join at the top and took three months to cast.

Hi Roy,


This one is the window cleaners so a human interest, they must have balls of brass to do that job especially in winter, I wonder if they can only go out when the wind speed is low? There was a vote on if that tower design should be used and over 60% of the population of Portsmouth voted for it. The Portsmouth waterfront is far better than the Southampton one where there are just flats surrounding a marina with bars, the Portsmouth waterfront is more like the CT one with lots of interesting things.



Notty.

You can see for 25-miles on a clear day. The viewing deck has the largest glass floor in Europe, it is 60-mm thick, laminated and strong enough to walk on so you can look down through the construction to the ground below. 1200 tons of steel was used in the construction.

This photo was taken By Notty,who drafted most of the words,thanks Notty.

Apart from the normal navigation warning light, the whole tower is bathed in a spectacular multi coloured light show powered by 50 metal halide lights, 28 of these are 575 watts and can create any colour in the spectrum so the tower can be seen from miles away and from planes flying at over 30000 feet.

Our Toylander gets its 12 volt dc motor installed

Mounted for the first time,we need to develop the various backer pads which will ease installation.

Very much a first try to see how long the motors drive sprocket needs to be but the wires and reversable switch are now in place and the motor turns either way.With power to spare and a strong gear box the motor has a 3000 hour service life.

The first try at a dash panel,the switch is simple to use,three positions,center is off,right or left is forwards or reverse.The switch will be supplied with its own wire loom for user simplicity of installation.Owner installation of other switches are easy to do be removal of the screws.

The twin core motor cable has been run under the Toylander,there are no cables at all in view or accesable from the inside of the Toylander,a cut off supply switch will be installed in the forward battery box. 

Henry has spent many hours with me in the garage,he aprooves of the Toylander it seems.

Roy

New for old,the rear brakes

One thing about so called Classic Cars,is the general availability of service parts,brake cylinders on some cars were used on others,the rear brake cylinder on a Hillman Imp was also found on the Ford Escort and Triumph Spitfire,so parts tend to be held by the various specialists,we stock cylinders and new rubber kits too.

This rebuild of the rear brakes includes a new cylinder,metal and flexible brake lines,friction material and also the drum (8") has been skimed so it will fit the new linings exactly.

Close up its as good as new.

New pipes,replated hy tensile suspension bolts fitted.

The new Monte Carlo competition road springs will be installed when the car is turned back over,as I suspect the wheel drum will meet the concrete floor otherwise as it rolls past it.

Before the brake componants were fitted.

Nearly complete,there was a link pipe still to fit from one side of the car to the other,its now in place and we are nearly finished on this part of the restoration.

Roy

From this to that,Hillman Imp restoration in progress

I say Hillman Imp but it may be any car really,a few years back I did a Mk4 Triumph Spitfire and there is an early series 1000cc Morris Mini waiting in the wings for a new buyer,these things are by the very nature of things are never cheap but I would like to think there is value in whats been done.

Left click any picture to view in more detail.

Taken into stock just yesterday,this is off an early Mk1 Hillman Imp,which will date around 1963/4,I know the car it came from too,long gone in a pile of rust due to being left parked under a large tree,the leaves fell down on the car,moisture and a lack of sun just rusted the car right away.

Its the small items that can often slow the process up,I need two pairs of these cable guides,the hand brake cables go through them,no guides and no hand brake.Check the condition of the metal,while it looks a mess,when bead blasted in a small parts blaster,I can have it like new and painted within hours.

Some spray coats still to go but looking like new again as far as the metal is concerned.

This is the sub frame those cable clips will be fastened to,check the parts,they look new but are off a 1966 Singer Chamois Sport,all blasted and repainted with great care,there is a set of new poly bushes fitted too,imported from England and fitted to ensure perfect handling.

Perkins 4108 faulty Lucas alternator fix

The Perkins 4108 46hp diesel is a super four cylinder marine motor,it was made for marine use,not cobbled from another makers truck and dubbed marine but it still has parts on it that are just the same as the general auto makers use.

The Perkins 4108 must have been issued with a generator,then later installed with a Lucas alternator,I say this as when I got the engine it had a secondary wire loom and a mount plate that was suitable for the older generator,those wires I eventually removed when I rewired the engine to switch panel.

I ran the engine on saturday,all was well excepting the alternator was not charging,I took out a spare Bosch unit,same size and around 35amps,not a huge output but reliable,the plan was to take the Lucas one off and do a change over.
                                         
Thinking this over that evening I though to first check the panel warning light,which on an alternator is also an exciter lamp,without which the alternator will not work.It was my lucky day as thats all it was,with a new one installed,yes I have spares on board,the main engine was soon recharging the boats batteries.

Clearly blown as the dark glass indicates.

So save your self a stack of work,get spare bulbs and when and if the alternator stops charging,check the bulb first.

Roy