LHD V8 2/12 litre saloon..

[tjt77]

The car finally arrived today from Washington state..approx 700 mile journey. P1A 20335 was originally sold new in Jersey, UK Channel islands to Mr Lacien Legende on 18th Oct '64.. so far not sure when it recieved the 5.0 litre Ford 'hi po' V8 conversion.. but Id guess sometime in the 1980s.. car is structurally very sound and has no evidence of past accident damage.. it was re-painted by last own around 14 yrs back.. now straight maroon, it started out as 'opalescent maroon'.. car has a narrow Mk1 jaguar rear axle.. I've spent about 2 hours so far attempting to remove the l/h front wheel so the brakes can be freed up to no avail so far.. ..brakes on both front wheels are stuck .. car looks in typical condition to one that might have spent 2 yrs sitting outside in a Uk winter.. but overall a structurally sound and a very worthy project.. that needs a major re-commission before it can driven and assessed..

[tjt77]

P1A 20335 is now up and running..and has been driven a few times around the block as of yesterday .. but a long way from being a 'useable' driver.. Ive learned a few new tricks in 'bringing back' this car from the dead.. One useful discovery being a product named 'Kroil' which is a penetrant oil that actually WORKS as stated ( states on can :- "frees all stuck metal parts..or your money back") huge challenge to remove the wheels, which were firmly stuck on their splines.. it took over 5 hrs to get the 1st one off and all splines and related parts cleaned up for re-assembly.... longer for the second ( L/H front) which finally came free after the 'kroil' and heat had ben applied several times. The r/h rear was relatively easy (about 1 hour after a 3 day soak down with various different penetrants and heat from a gas torch, allied to a portable hydraulic puller) but the l/h rear has yet to be tackled .. the left rear door is stuck closed..so I cant get the spat off until that issue is addressed.. in a 'normal' situation Id have had the car running within 2 hours.. so far Ive put in about 30 hrs.. and am perhaps 1/3 way there as regards being 'ready for the road'.. also challenging to figure out, due to there being a LOT of modifications, especially to the electrical circuits.. the car was completely re-engineered ( and nicely done) and has add ons such as A/C and some instruments were swapped with something different .. 'mechanical' gauges for both oil pressure and water temp (the latter not functioning) as well as a generic US starter solenoid .. mounted far lower on bulkhead than the original .. the one on the car had failed (causing the car to be parked about 9 yrs back) and the same pattern replacement I fitted ( 'best quality' made in China.. failed within 24 hrs.. so I now have a better built one .. made in taiwan.. to try next... had to stick with same pattern, due to the ignition system for the Ford 5.0 litre V8 which has a ballast resistor ..thereby requiring an 'energizer' circuit from solenoid...which is the part that failed on 1st replacement) more info will be posted as I discover more..

[KV8]

Very interesting some photos please.

Very interested to see (not contemplating) how Ford V8 (assume smallblock) fits in this originally Jaguar straight 6 engine space. My (2.5 l original) V8 virtually fills it!

My V8 was originally and was resprayed by the previous owner in opalescent maroon. It is very original structurally as it spent most of its life in New Zealand where they do not usually use salt on the roads in winter and the general pH of the soil has a minimal corrosion rating.

Thanks for tips wrt freeing agents etc.

Regards

H

[Sydsmith]

Great car to tackle tjt77 and will be well worth the effort to get it sorted, not sure about the engine conversion but time will tell how such a change alters the balance of he car.

With regard to the stuck wheels, I had the same problem with my SP250 and a tip someone on the forum suggested at the time worked. I just slacked off the wheel spinners as far as they would go without taking them off (one at a time) then drove the car forward smartly a yard or two and braked hard, it took several attempts with some of them but they all came unstuck.

Good luck with the car. Syd

[tjt77]

Syd.. the tip of loosening the centre nut, then driving does work well for removing stuck wheels and i have done this in the past ..the issue for me was that brakes were stuck on and the car did not run .. and i had to move it from where it had been dropped off as it was blocking traffic for my neighbors who share same access.... when did get it to run, the brakes stuck up again straight away.. after a freeing up and a few runs around the block, they have settled down somewhat..but Im going to replace the fronts with a 'coopercraft' 4 piston set up.. rears will be replaced along with the axle ( this car has the narrow Mk1 jag far axle fitted currently with a 3.45:1 power-lok diff)
The Ford 302 ( small block..same basic size from 260-351 cu in) actually has more room to work on it than the orginal Daimler engine..this is partly due to it being a 60o V as opposed to the original 90o ..overall very compact and it fits in the space very well .. were i to do this conversion myself form scratch, i'd mount it and inch or so further forward, to give more clearance for routing the exhaust form manifold to under the car. The balance of the car seems very good.. weight is similar to the original 2 1/2.. I intend to replace the iron heads with new alloy ones and save another 60 libs of weight ( parts for these engines are inexpensive..a pair of new 'ready to fit' performance alloy heads is under $800.. a pair of very nice looking new stainless steel 'shorty block hugging headers' approx $125)
Images.. as it stand I have a rather old digital camera which is not very internet friendly .. as and when i update it, I'll try and post some images to document progress.... I have two cut off part of the exhaust in order to replace fuel tank next..whole exhaust system is not in very good shape and will re-fabricated to higher standard than current system on car.

[Sydsmith]

Sounds like a good plan Tim, hope it works out for you, my V8 250 manual has no power steering and conventional brakes with no servo, bit of a beast to drive and stop, but that's half the fun of driving it.

[tjt77]

this should show an image ion th most common US V8 conversion.. to the GM 350 (5.7 litre) engine..

00w0w_8SPHRcR1jwC_50x50c.jpg (1.31 KiB) Viewed 1286 times