Changing Switches
One of the really irritating things for me on the FHC was that it had the wipers and indicator stalks on the "wrong" side, so there were several times when I indicated to turn and the wipers came on instead. Apart from being embarassing it was also potentially dangerous so I wanted to swap the switches around. All the cars made from the next year onwards have theirs on the "normal" side - indicator on the left so I wanted to swap them over. I already had a set of the switches from my original old red TR7 that I had broken for spares. The ignition lock was also on the left which sometimes had me fumbling to get the key in, so I wanted to swap that over as well. I needed the plastic cowl that covers the ignition switch but Steve Wilcox at S&S Preparations supplied that from his huge stocks of all things TR7.
It was not a difficult job and only took a couple of hours, the most difficult part was getting the security bolts out that hold the ignition lock assembly. They are the sort that are made to shear off when you tighten them up, presumably to deter car thieves. I had to use a Dremel to put a slot in the head and a centre punch to start them turning but they came out easily enough.
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| Right side and left side ignition key assemblies |
The changeover means I no longer have to fiddle with the key or have to think every time I want to indicate or switch the wipers on which is a good result for me.
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| Ignition key where I like it! |
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July 2020: Strut Braces
One of the TR7 Owners Club members called Glenn Allchurch asked if anyone was interested if he got a batch of strut braces made by Whiteline who had made some really good ones back in the day. This was always something I wanted to fit on the DHC as well so said yes immediately, and ordered two - one for each car.
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| Whiteline Strut Brace on the DHC |
The one for the DHC went on very easily as you can see from the picture above, but on the FHC it was a bit too too close to the throttle linkage on the Dellortos for comfort so a little engineering was required.
One of the TR7 friends I have met over the past few years is Henry Brown who lives up near Evesham and he had been telling me about machining and building a model steam engine. This was in the middle of the COVID lockdown so he had been using the time to rediscover his machining skills. I asked him if he could help and he jumped at the chance.
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| Problem: Throttle linkage too close to brace bar |
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| New Henry Brown outer cable end | |
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| New Henry Brown inner cable fixing |
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| Final result: nice amount of clearance to brace bar. |
The throttle linkage on the Dellortos is made by Magard and is aimed at
the competition market where dual throttle cables is the norm. I don't
need two on the FHC so some modified parts could easily be used. I
sent Henry some pictures of the problem and the parts concerned and in a
couple of days his solution came back. He had made some completely new
parts from stainless steel and they fitted perfectly. Superb job.
