ERA rally update

So where has our 1966 Jaguar 3.8 ltr S type got to you may wonder?

( monday afternoon, 19th of May 2014) they are now at the Etosha Pan in Namibia, tommorrow is a lay day?

Now this is a heck of a long way from Cape Town and on day 17 they still have a long way to go before they return and through Namibia!

Roy

My thanks to Wikipedia for the information below.

My last fill up of LRP (lead replacement petrol) was done in our village of Hout Bay and on the way to Cape Towns, Salt River to hand the car over, look where the car is now!

Sunday, 18th May 2014, they have now crossed into Namibia and can be found in the Caprivi Strip town of Mukwe, thats quite some drive out of Botswana.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Map of the delta

NASA view of Okavango Delta, with national borders added.

Typical region in the Okavango Delta, with free canals and lakes, swamps and islands

The Okavango Delta (or Okavango Grassland) in Botswana is a very large inland delta formed where the Okavango Riverreaches a tectonic trough in the central part of the endorheic basin of the Kalahari. All the water reaching the Delta is ultimately evaporated and transpired, and does not flow into any sea or ocean. Each year approximately 11 cubic kilometres of water spreads over the 6,000-15,000 km² area. Some flood-waters drain into Lake Ngami.^[1] The Moremi Game Reserve, aNational Park, is on the eastern side of the Delta. This statistical significance helped the Okavango Delta secure a position as one of the Seven Natural Wonders of Africa, which were officially declared on February 11, 2013 in Arusha, Tanzania.^[2]

The area was once part of Lake Makgadikgadi, an ancient lake that mostly dried up by the early Holocene. Although the Okavango Delta is widely believed to be the world's largest inland delta, it is not. In Africa alone there are two larger similar geological features: the Sudd on the Nile in South Sudan, and the Inner Niger Delta in Mali.^[3]

Looking for a Hillman Imp or similar?

I am looking for a new Imp project to follow the one I am working on now.

Do you know of a Hillman Imp or one of its re branded names anywhere in the Western Cape area of South Africa. Other areas considered but transport may be expensive?

For sale or trade and in a better condition than this GPO phone box.

What can I say, the car needs a little work I know but with panels now re manufactured we can fix most things!
We have doors and a roof in stock anyway. Roy

The Hillman Imp Motor Car launch magazines

Back in 1963 it was very rare for a car magazine to make a new car the main subject of most of the issue.

Sporting Motorist did just that, it was the May 1963 issue and at just three Shillings a good price.

I have that magazine here, as I do the Autocar May 1963 issue.

The cars and the magazines are now fifty (50) years old, Autocar still exists, I wonder does Sporting Motorist?

The Imps still of course still exist and I drive mine as many times each week as is possible!

How easy can that be?

Roy

This was a third British magazine doing a front page story on the Hillman Imp, there were also French and Dutch magazines doing the same thing, looks like Rootes we good at promotions. This issue I do not have , does anyone have one for me I wonder?

Such was the excitement and press coverage that Rootes covered an entire car with them!

Spray dodger roof cover

This may happen for a client who has his spray dodger in place already, we supplied the bending plywood for that construction and now the owner asks about making an extension over the cockpit and steering position?

For that application  we can supply the builders jig off the normal hard dodgers kit, plus the plywoods and epoxy. The roof becomes a light weight plywood section, with very light 8mm  Superform bending plywood in as a core and okoume 4mm marine ply on both faces, when bonded together with thin laminating epoxy, a stiff but strong roof section is the result.

Roy

Packing our kits for export

We have now been selling computer cut boat kits around twelve years, enquiries and orders being recieved from around the world we had to ensure that these valued orders arrived at their destination intact and undamaged.

This was a Cape Henry 21 kit we shipped to Seattle in the USA, note the heavy steel drop keel plate, we used various off cuts of material to hold it in place before closing the packing crate off and then steel band strapping it.

With a Didi Mini Transat Mk3 ready for shipping, we will be packing that next week in a similar manner.

More information here at this link

 http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2012/07/packing-cape-henry-21-drop-keel-plate.html

Roy

Didi Mini Transat kit to Dubai

This kit adds yet another export country to the growing list we have already supplied.

Backbone frames cut from 12mm thick okoume marine plywood to BS1088 grade.

Perfectly crafted and as designed by Dudley Dix.

Hull or deck panels, note the jigsaw joints which will really speed up your assembly time.

This is the amount of plywood we CNC cut to make up the boats full kit, there are also some sheets of 4mm okoume plywood which becomes the boats moulded radius.

How easy can this be? well I have myself built two of these boat hulls from our kits in 12 days each.

Simple, yes.

Roy

See what Dudley Dix has to say about our kit supply here http://dudleydix.blogspot.com/

Making your drop keel or rudder

This has been an addition to the CNC cutting of the normal boat kit side.

Shaping a rudder or foil by hand can be quite time consuming, so we offer a laminated timber blank CNC shaped to the correct profile every 50mm, its then an easy job to chop the excess wood out and arrive at the correct shape required.

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2009/02/keel-and-rudder-foil-manufacture.html

How easy can this be, just look at the time we save you!

This is the drop keel from a Didi Mini Transat Cruise which we shipped to Australia.

Other designs are also possible.

Roy

ERA Africa rally

The Jaguar we owned for around thirty one years is an entry in this years rally, by all accounts the car went well on its shake down drive to Port Elizabeth and back to Cape Town.

The rally started at the Cape Grace Hotel, V and A Waterfront, Cape Town at 8am on May 2nd.

This was the basis of the cars preparation for its new owner who was flying in with his wife from Australia.

Greg and Jenny bought the car unseen and on the basis of a phone call. The car is a 1966 Jaguar S type which I restored over the years, it has won the Jaguar Car Club concour' s event five times in its class.

The nice Motolita  wood rim wheel was removed and replaced with the correct and much stronger original Jaguar steering wheel!

This is the route 

http://www.endurorally.com/pages/5th-classic-safari-challenge-2014-route

Twenty six days of rally driving in classic cars,the cost? GBP 24,000 (Rands 430,000?)  for this years entry which was sold out, the next event may be in 2017?

 This is the car.http://kenwal.wix.com/glomads

To take a fine car like this and prepare it for a 26 day rally around Southern Africa is not a low cost item, we can search out and prepare similar cars and of other makes, you will still find this option less expensive than preparing your own car and shipping it to South Africa?

Roy

17th April 2014, the news is they are now in Botswana!

The DS15 racer sail boat in South Africa

We have just been asked to supply a DS15 sail boat kit.


http://www.dixdesign.com/DS15.htm

The difference with this kit order is that it will be built here in South Africa, so from a kit a new class will soon start.

This design started as a 16ft bigger sister to the Paper Jet. It was to be of similar concept but a twin trapeze skiff for two adults. When he told me that he also planned to use it as a picnic boat for four adults with cooler boxes, I told him that the Paper Jet concept really had no chance to serve all of his requirements. The concept immediately changed to what you see in the Didi Sport 15, as a ballasted sportboat.

The Didi Sport 15 design started a few years ago and has been moving along very slowly, at the pace of the prototype that is being built by a very meticulous builder. He is making a beautiful job of his new boat, hence the slow rate of building.

The Didi Sport 15 hull is a little sister to the Didi Mini Mk3 and a direct development from it. It has the waterline beam and stability to serve the picnic purpose that the builder wants, able to carry load in a relatively docile manner if reefed down to suit the breeze of the time. In this mode she is really a sportboat with a modern and powerful rig that can be reduced to be more docile if needed. With her full rig of squaretop mainsail, self-tacking jib and asymetrical spinnaker on a retractable bowsprit and launched from a chute, she will be a spirited racer for club Olympic triangle and point-to-point racing. Or just blast back-and-forth across the bay or lake until you wear yourself out from fun and excitement.

This DS15 was built from a kit.

She has a covered foredeck above a sealed rapid-draining wet deck, which creates a safe and dry storage area and shelter for small crew. These characteristics make her a good option for raid-type racing events that require carrying one's own stores, camping equipment etc over long distances between camping stops. Hanging a tarp or the mainsail over the boom turns her into a camp cruiser, with a cockpit long and wide enough for a couple of airbeds for a comfortable night anchored or nudged up onto the beach in a sheltered private cove.

But this boat is schitzophrenic, it has a very different alternative personality for those who want to have some high-performance fun. Remove the ballast bulb from the daggerboard and she morphs to what I originally intended with this design. She becomes a high performance skiff with one or two trapezes for adults.

Construction is over permanent bulkheads and a ladder-frame backbone, with stringers. Most of the hull is 6mm sheet plywood, the exception being the radius area that is done with two layers of 3mm. The topside chine uses a stitch-&-glue joint and increases the power from the stern when power-reaching. The deck and cockpit are all 6mm sheet plywood using stitch-&-glue detailing.

All information is from the designers web site.

Roy

Sunbeam Sport brake servo repair kits

These were fitted to the Sport Imps and made a nice difference to the feel of the brakes, I have used them on my two Sunbeam Stiletto's and to good effect.

This one is in stock and comes from a 1966 Singer Chamois Sport, its done 134,000 miles and has been to many places, Vic Falls, Kilimanjaro, Mozambique and even up the Sani Pass.

I have now sourced the correct service kit and will be fitting it to my 1967 Singer Chamois with its part sport engine and front disc brakes from the Ford Fiesta / Ford KA.

How easy ? I will let you know but I have the section pipe from the front to rear of the car, plus the four way union in the picture.

The early sport Imps had the servo in the front of the car, then a four way union, plus the suction pipe to the twin Stromberg carbs inlet manifold, this is the system I will use. Later Sports saw the servo move to the rear of the car and in the engine bay on the passenger side, which is more weight where its not required really?

It does seem that my idea to re sleeve the original 0.625" brake master cylinder to the larger 0.70" (sport)  master cylinder is possible, you will require the correct size piston though.

Roy

Coventry Climax silver stickers

The first batch were sold out and when we asked for more the company who did them was not to be found.

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2011/12/coventry-climax-brand-name-stickers.html

We then had to pay for new art work and the cost to sell on doubled, so now at R35 each plus postage, that's about U$3.28 and GBP1.95? so still affordable?

Postage at our cost!

Roy

Hillman Imp cylinder head valves

As you can see we have a choice.

The ones at the back are the larger Sunbeam Sport inlets, then the Mk2 versions, the smaller ones being the exhaust valves which are common to the Mk2 and the Sport engines.

The Mk2 and exhaust valves will be fitted with new valve stems to a Mk2 cylinder head later this week.

The new valve seats will be used if required?

Roy

Cruising yacht hard dodger build progress

This was posted some while back, then as a planning idea, which became an order. We supplied the jigs and materials to extend the roof on this one.

Hout Bay Marina on a fine winters day.

Open the picture by clicking on it.

The owner is doing his own assembly and works when he can, he covers each days work up with a tarpaulin at the end of each day.

Some weeks later and just look at our winter weather!

We can recommend a pro boat builder if you want the kit pre built and fitted to your own boat?

Now what we call the Mk3 version, kits have been shipped as far as New Zealand and the USA, we supply it all, the roofs building jig, front window panels precut, 6mm tempered glass, Dow Corning glazing sealant, plywoods, solids and a builders guide.

To be continued.

Roy

We are pleased to announce that a Proteus 106 sailing catamaran will be built in South Africa soon.

The order means we are now sourcing the required okoume marine plys required and should have them here in about a month?

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2013/12/proteus-106-catamaran-build-details.html

This order is the plys and MDF removable stations, plus epoxy, the customer will supply his own meranti wood and glass cloth himself, shipping as a flat pack of CNC cut plys and boxed 25ltr drums of epoxy is then easy for us.

The program will be updated as we proceed.

Plans and detailed design information can be sourced from Angelo Lavranos at www.lavranosyachtdesign.co.nz

lavranos@ihug.co.nz

Hillman Imp engine number 1574 dated 1963

Todays picture shows a very early example of the Imps overhead camshaft design as taken from the lead from Coventry Climax (stickers in stock).  At just 875cc and this motor still is on that standard bore, there was plenty of power for a car that weighed just 710kgs.

There were around 440,000 Imps made between 1963 and 1974 so this really is an early unit.

Click on the image to enlarge.

The engine was rebuilt using stock parts to underline that the engine (this one) is now fifty (50) years old, once upon a time fifty seemed to be old but that's not the case anymore? This actual motor was gifted to me but in such a dirty condition that it took two days just to wash the dirt off with water soluable cleaner. Then another two days in the bead blaster cabinet until we had the parts looking as close to new as they can be.

In truth the sum of the parts were good, new piston rings and crank bearings, gaskets and so on soon had the engine on its way to what we can see today but it was still a weeks intensive work.

This engine design was just the ticket for tuning shops, so much so that the Rootes Competitions shop started producing their own kits, then moved into the larger 998cc bored engine.

See if this link will open for you, there are a great selection of Imps in it, many I have been involved with .

https://www.google.co.za/search?q=hillman+imp+cape+town&client=firefox-a&hs=saB&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=np&tbm=isch&imgil=Fwx3Aa7LxR8K2M%253A%253Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fencrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com%252Fimages%253Fq%253Dtbn%253AANd9GcSE9ERz8m3TXLZeSomGTf6bUjINm9oGkv5p0ZQG4gfNAOE1zL84UA%253B510%253B340%253BxKMVSBbJvHN6UM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fblogs.timeslive.co.za%25252Fwheeldeal%25252F2013%25252F03%25252F25%25252Fthis-hillman-imp-is-driving-from-joburg-to-coventry%25252F&source=iu&usg=__beLzrw8BjrYiO0DAPrZxXu_Qzow%3D&sa=X&ei=K9tUU-GEJqjC7Aa32YCwDg&ved=0CHcQ9QEwDA

Roy