- Edited
Meet Chloe, the third 140 in The Fleet -
Yes; this is the beginning of an ongoing project thread.
By Any Other Name
Okay, so (I hear you ask), how did this 145 get the nickname Chloe? Well, the first 140 I'd owned in many years was christened 'Xoe' by her previous owner (after the letters on the original registration plate). The second car to join the fleet, a white 142 from Queensland, copped the nickname 'Clyde' during its long journey from the sea to the mountains, due to the intermittent nature of its indicators just after purchase. Which reminded me somewhat of this phrase -
https://youtube.com/watch?v=i98QrSSHxo4&feature=youtu.be&t=46s
With the addition of another '74 140 to a collection consisting of a 'Xoe' and a 'Clyde', and without any plates to suggest another nickname, by the power vested in me by.... me, I guess... I thereby christened her 'Chloe' (an amalgam of Xoe and Clyde).
All In The Family
Clyde and Xoe....
... and Chloe makes three.
<p>
Genesis of Chloe
The Place: Goteburg, Sweden. Time: sometime in 1974:
A blue wagon trundles down the production line, and chassis number 250459 is driven out to the holding yard, where it awaits shipment to Australia.
The Place: Albion, Queensland. Date: August 9, 1974
R.L. and N. Johnson take delivery of their new car at the Albion Car Centre.
The Place: Albion, Queensland. Date: January 13, 1975
Chloe (who will not be named Chloe for another 40 years) gets her very first regular 10K service at Albion Car Centre - the first of many.
The Place: Bowen Hills, Queensland. Date: March 21, 2002
Chloe now appears to be owned by a guy named Andrew, and Bazz at Swedish Auto Spares sold him a water pump and some filters for Chloe.
The Place: Mountain Creek, Queensland. Date: January 20, 2005
Some 30 years and 417,892 km after her first 10K service, Chloe was at Sovereign Vehicle Specialists for another one that day.
The Place: somewhere in Queensland. Date: June 16, 2006
A failure to proceed raised the need for a receipt to Andrew from a towie for Chloe.
The Place: good question Date: sometime between June 16, 2006 and March 2014
Chloe changes owners from Andrew and end up in the hands of David.
The Place: the telephone network. Date: March, 2014
@egads (she/her) does a deal over the phone with David, the car's owner, to transfer that happy condition. Chloe is trailered to @Rob's place, where Chloe poses for pix under a tree.
The Place: Plainland, Queensland. Date: June 6, 2014, 12:30pm
On this day, @egads (she/her) flies north so he can drive south. An unregistered vehicle permit is created for Chloe, and he begins an epic five-day cross-country trip to bring her home. The duo get as far as Armidale with a bunch of pain and towing. An exhausted @egads (she/her) then rests on @PaddlerEd 's floor. Thanks to @jonbot being rad, Chloe then got trailered to Yass.
The Place: Yass, NSW. Date: March 10, 2015
A deal is done, and Chloe is mine, all mine! (cue evil laugh)
But I... lacked Faith, and had second thoughts about driving Chloe back that day.
The Place: Hume Highway, NSW. Date: May 11, 2015
Feeling the bravery inspired by packing a Power-All portable power bank, a trunk-full of tools, and a can of 'Start Yer Barstid', the wife and I head south to pick up and retrieve Chloe.
The dramas began with my wife's VW Golf - we were short of fuel, and the Check Engine Light came on just before we got into Sutton Forest to fill up - lots of misfiring. (I checked the engine - it was still there). But then we filled it up and it went okay. Phew!
As the sun was setting, we picked up Chloe, and away we went... momentarily.
And then, Chloe stopped. Twice. On the Hume Highway. On some uphill sections. Great! (Yes, it did...)
The first time it stopped, the fuel gauge said I still had plenty of fuel (halfway into Reserve) but it's clear now that the pump wasn't pumping it. So it would cough on hills, and then while going up a slight incline, it stalled. Then all the lights went out ....
I was worried about that temp gauge that was in the red since we left Yass. Had I lunched the engine? Opening the bonnet with a degree of trepidation, and found....
Loose battery terminals.
Problem part solved!
So we got going again and got about 3 kays... and it stopped in an even worse place than the first time. After that, we decided the fuel gauge be damned, it needs more gas. So into Gunning we go at 7:30pm - and found all the servos were shut. :( But the pub at Gunning keeps jerry cans of gas behind the bar. Who would've guessed? So I got her going again with a lot of hesitation and surge until we filled her up at Goulburn. She took 45 litres but she didn't miss a beat after that.
And then finally, at about 11:45pm, Chloe finally arrived at @Bennigee's place (phew!) where some MIG magic is to be performed.
Chloe is (at present) powered by a B20E equipped with K-Jetronic and a BW35, the ubiquitous 3-speed auto that's been fitted to damn-near every model of car at some point since Grandpa was a lad.
The Chloe Masterplan
The goal is to make Chloe an enhanced, but classic daily driver - meaning reliable, comfortable, practical, and reasonably low maintenance.
Parts of the interior trim have held up okay; others, not so. The dash will of course get the Dashboard Recovering Services treatment. I have a mini tacho ready to go into the instrument cluster, and a good set of spare door cards and carpet from a 164 which are the same colour, so they can have a new home. However it appears the heater fan has sung its last song to the Choir Invisible, so it's a good excuse to rip out the whole HVAC unit, give it some new seals, clean 40 years' worth of dust and crap out of it, and add aircon while I'm at it.
After 420,000+ km, it will also be high time to check out the state of the suspension. Nothing very radical is planned there - a polly rebush, slightly lowered springs, new shocks, a bigger front sway, and a little rear bar ought to be sufficient.
Since Chloe is going to be a DD, and since having an engine buzzing away at 3500 RPM is silly at highway cruising speed, and since my wife will also drive it and it therefore must have an auto-tragic, the BW35 is to go adios and get replaced with a slushy-something-else. A rebuilt AW71 seems like the go; they are known to do duty for many moons.
But what do I do about fitting an AW71 behind a B20? I've heard there are adapter plates around in Europe, but the asking price from one supplier is outta this world. Another solution is to get one made locally, I guess. Or maybe do an engine swap...
There's a school of thought which says the engine should be kept original. However, I am not seduced by K-Jet, regardless of how romantic it is said to be... and so I'm considering options, like -
* a sensible B20 rebuild with a K- or F- cam, and replacing the K-Jet with Megasquirt ... or
* dropping in a B230 with a 16V head and leaving it NA with chipped LH2.4 ... or
* swapping to a basically blueprinted and balanced B230FT set up for quick spool and low boost.
All of those decisions are a while off yet. The first step is to deal with the rust, of which Chloe has her fair share. Here's a diagram of where the rust has been found, so far.
It's possible more corrosion will be found, once the carpets and interior are removed.
To be continued....
Yes; this is the beginning of an ongoing project thread.
By Any Other Name
Okay, so (I hear you ask), how did this 145 get the nickname Chloe? Well, the first 140 I'd owned in many years was christened 'Xoe' by her previous owner (after the letters on the original registration plate). The second car to join the fleet, a white 142 from Queensland, copped the nickname 'Clyde' during its long journey from the sea to the mountains, due to the intermittent nature of its indicators just after purchase. Which reminded me somewhat of this phrase -
https://youtube.com/watch?v=i98QrSSHxo4&feature=youtu.be&t=46s
With the addition of another '74 140 to a collection consisting of a 'Xoe' and a 'Clyde', and without any plates to suggest another nickname, by the power vested in me by.... me, I guess... I thereby christened her 'Chloe' (an amalgam of Xoe and Clyde).
All In The Family
Clyde and Xoe....
... and Chloe makes three.
<p>Genesis of Chloe
The Place: Goteburg, Sweden. Time: sometime in 1974:
A blue wagon trundles down the production line, and chassis number 250459 is driven out to the holding yard, where it awaits shipment to Australia.
The Place: Albion, Queensland. Date: August 9, 1974
R.L. and N. Johnson take delivery of their new car at the Albion Car Centre.
The Place: Albion, Queensland. Date: January 13, 1975
Chloe (who will not be named Chloe for another 40 years) gets her very first regular 10K service at Albion Car Centre - the first of many.
The Place: Bowen Hills, Queensland. Date: March 21, 2002
Chloe now appears to be owned by a guy named Andrew, and Bazz at Swedish Auto Spares sold him a water pump and some filters for Chloe.
The Place: Mountain Creek, Queensland. Date: January 20, 2005
Some 30 years and 417,892 km after her first 10K service, Chloe was at Sovereign Vehicle Specialists for another one that day.
The Place: somewhere in Queensland. Date: June 16, 2006
A failure to proceed raised the need for a receipt to Andrew from a towie for Chloe.
The Place: good question Date: sometime between June 16, 2006 and March 2014
Chloe changes owners from Andrew and end up in the hands of David.
The Place: the telephone network. Date: March, 2014
@egads (she/her) does a deal over the phone with David, the car's owner, to transfer that happy condition. Chloe is trailered to @Rob's place, where Chloe poses for pix under a tree.
The Place: Plainland, Queensland. Date: June 6, 2014, 12:30pm
On this day, @egads (she/her) flies north so he can drive south. An unregistered vehicle permit is created for Chloe, and he begins an epic five-day cross-country trip to bring her home. The duo get as far as Armidale with a bunch of pain and towing. An exhausted @egads (she/her) then rests on @PaddlerEd 's floor. Thanks to @jonbot being rad, Chloe then got trailered to Yass.
The Place: Yass, NSW. Date: March 10, 2015
A deal is done, and Chloe is mine, all mine! (cue evil laugh)
But I... lacked Faith, and had second thoughts about driving Chloe back that day.
The Place: Hume Highway, NSW. Date: May 11, 2015
Feeling the bravery inspired by packing a Power-All portable power bank, a trunk-full of tools, and a can of 'Start Yer Barstid', the wife and I head south to pick up and retrieve Chloe.
The dramas began with my wife's VW Golf - we were short of fuel, and the Check Engine Light came on just before we got into Sutton Forest to fill up - lots of misfiring. (I checked the engine - it was still there). But then we filled it up and it went okay. Phew!
As the sun was setting, we picked up Chloe, and away we went... momentarily.
And then, Chloe stopped. Twice. On the Hume Highway. On some uphill sections. Great! (Yes, it did...)
The first time it stopped, the fuel gauge said I still had plenty of fuel (halfway into Reserve) but it's clear now that the pump wasn't pumping it. So it would cough on hills, and then while going up a slight incline, it stalled. Then all the lights went out ....
I was worried about that temp gauge that was in the red since we left Yass. Had I lunched the engine? Opening the bonnet with a degree of trepidation, and found....
Loose battery terminals.
Problem part solved!
So we got going again and got about 3 kays... and it stopped in an even worse place than the first time. After that, we decided the fuel gauge be damned, it needs more gas. So into Gunning we go at 7:30pm - and found all the servos were shut. :( But the pub at Gunning keeps jerry cans of gas behind the bar. Who would've guessed? So I got her going again with a lot of hesitation and surge until we filled her up at Goulburn. She took 45 litres but she didn't miss a beat after that.
And then finally, at about 11:45pm, Chloe finally arrived at @Bennigee's place (phew!) where some MIG magic is to be performed.
Chloe is (at present) powered by a B20E equipped with K-Jetronic and a BW35, the ubiquitous 3-speed auto that's been fitted to damn-near every model of car at some point since Grandpa was a lad.
The Chloe Masterplan
The goal is to make Chloe an enhanced, but classic daily driver - meaning reliable, comfortable, practical, and reasonably low maintenance.
Parts of the interior trim have held up okay; others, not so. The dash will of course get the Dashboard Recovering Services treatment. I have a mini tacho ready to go into the instrument cluster, and a good set of spare door cards and carpet from a 164 which are the same colour, so they can have a new home. However it appears the heater fan has sung its last song to the Choir Invisible, so it's a good excuse to rip out the whole HVAC unit, give it some new seals, clean 40 years' worth of dust and crap out of it, and add aircon while I'm at it.
After 420,000+ km, it will also be high time to check out the state of the suspension. Nothing very radical is planned there - a polly rebush, slightly lowered springs, new shocks, a bigger front sway, and a little rear bar ought to be sufficient.
Since Chloe is going to be a DD, and since having an engine buzzing away at 3500 RPM is silly at highway cruising speed, and since my wife will also drive it and it therefore must have an auto-tragic, the BW35 is to go adios and get replaced with a slushy-something-else. A rebuilt AW71 seems like the go; they are known to do duty for many moons.
But what do I do about fitting an AW71 behind a B20? I've heard there are adapter plates around in Europe, but the asking price from one supplier is outta this world. Another solution is to get one made locally, I guess. Or maybe do an engine swap...
There's a school of thought which says the engine should be kept original. However, I am not seduced by K-Jet, regardless of how romantic it is said to be... and so I'm considering options, like -
* a sensible B20 rebuild with a K- or F- cam, and replacing the K-Jet with Megasquirt ... or
* dropping in a B230 with a 16V head and leaving it NA with chipped LH2.4 ... or
* swapping to a basically blueprinted and balanced B230FT set up for quick spool and low boost.
All of those decisions are a while off yet. The first step is to deal with the rust, of which Chloe has her fair share. Here's a diagram of where the rust has been found, so far.
It's possible more corrosion will be found, once the carpets and interior are removed.
To be continued....
