Classic Jalopy Blog

Citroen DS rear bumper reassembly 1

Citroen DS rear bumper reassembly

The world’s slowest Citroen DS reassembly continues.   Today’s job was to reassemble the bumper in readiness to put it back on the car.   I had taken the opportunity to polish the bumper while it was off the car.   Since the DS rear bumper is made from stainless steel it came up very well with a bit of autosol. I went through a whole bag...

Preparing the Citroen DS boot lid 1

Preparing the Citroen DS boot lid

The Citroen DS boot lid is almost ready to be mounted on the car.   Before Xmas I was able to finally fit the badges properly.   The next task was mounting all the other hardware and fitting a new boot lid seal. The latching hardware and handle goes on quite easily if you have a 36mm spanner.   The only fiddly bit is getting the drainage...

2018 CARnivale 0

2018 CARnivale

Adding overzealous private security guards rarely enhances an event and the 2018 CARnivale was no exception.     This event used to be held in the city and was relocated to Parramatta Park a few years ago.    It is now much smaller and the cars are squeezed into a small area so unnecessary security barriers can be put up to contain them. This year...

British Motor Museum Reserve Collection 1

British Motor Museum Reserve Collection

The British Motor Museum has more cars than they can display in their main collection.   Unlike most museums, they open up their reserve collection to browse.   The cars are obviously packed in close together to fit them all, so harder to see all the details and photograph.  I still think  its great that the museum opens this part of the collection to the public....

British Motor Museum Main Collection 2

British Motor Museum Main Collection

The British Motor Museum contains the world’s largest collection of historic British vehicles.   It was a really impressive museum and worth a visit if you’re ever in the UK.   It is a nice combination of early vehicles, examples of popular British cars, concept cars and competition cars. The museum is located in Warwick, near Birmingham, about an hour or so north of London on...

National Motor Museum, Beaulieu 1

National Motor Museum, Beaulieu

The National Motor Museum arose out of the collection of the previous Lord Montagu (3rd Baron Beaulieu).  It is housed at the Montagu family estate at Beaulieu in the New Forest.   Lord Montagu’s father was a keen early motoring enthusiast and his personal vehicles started out the collection. Starting with the five original cars in the 1950’s the museum has expanded out to hundreds...

1914 Rolls Royce 40/50 Continental ‘Alpine Eagle’ 2

1914 Rolls Royce 40/50 Continental ‘Alpine Eagle’

The Alpine Eagle is a variant of the infamous 40/50 ‘Silver Ghost’.   It was actually referred to by Rolls Royce as the Continental model.  However, the Continental was a replica of the cars entered in the 1913 Austrian Alpine Trial. During the 1912 Trial, the three speed gearbox had proven insufficient.   Therefore, four cars were prepared for the 1913 season with four speed gearboxes. ...

British Motor Museum – Jaguar Heritage Collection 2

British Motor Museum – Jaguar Heritage Collection

The Jaguar Heritage Collection was displayed near the historic Jaguar Factory at Browns Lane until that site was redeveloped in 2012.   The collection is now split across a few museums, but the bulk of it can be found at the British Motor Museum. During a recent visit to the UK, I was able to tour the British Motor Museum.   The Jaguar Heritage Collection is...

Unfortunately, Facebook is killing car forums 0

Unfortunately, Facebook is killing car forums

The online communities for collector cars are now on their third iteration.   They started mostly as email lists, moved to forums and are increasingly moving to social media.   This is not a good thing. The car forums and lists built a real sense of community and there was a lot of effort that went into many postings.  Indeed, some individuals spent a lot of...

W111 battery mounting frame 2

W111 battery mounting frame

When I last replaced the battery in my W111, I was unable to fit the correct sized battery.   In the end I fitted one smaller than I would have liked, but it was the only one that fit into the mounting frame I had.    I knew the mounting frame was not original to the car as the previous owner purchased it on eBay. ...

The R107 560SL is not the best model in the series 5

The R107 560SL is not the best model in the series

In recent years a nice 560SL is going for 3-4x the price of other R107s.   They have always been the most valuable of the series, but are they worth the extra money?    I would argue they are not event he the best model of the series.   They might be the newest, and have the largest engine, but that doesn’t make them the best....

Last drive of my 0 Rover P5 Coupe 0

Last drive of my $230 Rover P5 Coupe

I am no longer the owner of a Rover P5 Coupe.   The car was really too far gone to practically save it.  It needed pretty much everything.  Instead, I found a new owner that is going to use it for spares to get three Rover P5 Coupe’s in much better condition back on the road.   I wouldn’t normally like to see such a rare...

Mounting the badges on the DS 1

Mounting the badges on the DS

Before the boot lid can be attached to the car, the Citroen DS badges need to be mounted.   This is something I have unsuccessfully been trying to do for a few weeks.   I found a solution last night that works for me, no idea if this is the ‘correct’ way as I couldn’t find any reference on the internet.  My car, being a 1970...

300SE Double relay change 2

300SE Double relay change

The saga of my non functional A/C is now over.   The 300SE is blowing cold air.   It would want to after all the parts I had to change to get this far.   The final piece of the puzzle was the Klima relay.   This relay controls the engagement of the compressor and had burned out when the clutch shorted.   I ended up buying a rebuilt...

Mercedes 450SE W116 – The car I almost bought 3

Mercedes 450SE W116 – The car I almost bought

I have always admired the W116 model.  However, since the introduction of the W126 in 1980 the W116 has lived in its shadow.   My 450SLC has been my primary car for most of the time I have owned it, but with three children, this is no longer possible.  As I needed something that could fit three child seats in a row, a W116 would...

Sometimes new parts are not better 0

Sometimes new parts are not better

My E-Type has had ongoing problems with the brakes holding on.    This has been on and off since I bought the car in 2010.   Over that time, I have pretty much renewed the entire braking system.   Turns out, that might be part of the problem.    What I have learned, is that the reproduction E-Type Master Cylinder can be problematic.   So much so,...

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