[TR] TR2 progress Report

[TeriAnn J. Wakeman]

On 4/2/12 4:33 AM, Chris Simo wrote:
> The car is not yet painted.....  but the engine bay and trunk have been
> painted,  engine reinstalled, and reassembly has begun.
Always a good idea. When I got the primer on my 3 I sent it out to a 
paint shop. They put final colour on the underside of the bonnet, boot 
lid, inside of the doors, front apron, gearbox tunnel,  inside of all 
four wings and mounting surfaces while they were all detached from the 
body shell.  And I had them apply final colour to the underside of the 
body, engine bay, cockpit area going back into the boot area and the 
spare tyre area while all the parts were off and everything was as 
exposed as it could get.

When everything came back home I installed the engine, gearbox 
propshaft, steering box & shafts, radiator & fuel tank.  Enough to fire 
up the engine and take the car around the block.  Then I installed the 
doors, loosely bolted the wings and front apron on and towed it back to 
the paint shop where they sprayed the outside of the car from a single 
paint mix, including the outside of the bonnet, boot lid, hood sticks 
and spare tyre compartment cover.  They also repaired a couple scratches 
from installing the engine.

It was my way of assuring that all the surfaces that you could otherwise 
never get to were properly protected by paint and that all the exterior 
panels were exactly the same colour.  I didn't worry about colour over 
spray to the frame since I undercoated the underside of the body and 
inside of the wings afterwords. My TR was built to be driven and not as 
a show car so I wanted to protect it as much as possible.  Besides it 
had real old undercoating on it when I bought it back in '86. I think it 
was either factory or dealer applied when new.
> Then comes a ton of reassembly work - but it's gonna happen.
There came a point after final paint where I got intimidated by all the 
assembly work and wondered if I was doing it right or if parts would 
just fall off on the road when I was finished.  It was my first (and 
hopefully last) restoration project and I was into a lot of stuff that 
I'd never done before and only had the manual and illustrations in the 
TR parts book to go by.  It intimidated me enough that I stopped work on 
it for a while and contemplated selling it as a 3/4 completed project 
without warranty that the parts were in the right place.

Finally a combination of guilt and my innate tenacity kicked in and I 
went out to work on the project again. I made myself a promise.  One 
part a day, seven parts a week as absolute minimum.  Measured at sunset 
Sunday.  Some weeks I went well over the 7 parts. A nut & bolt wee 
considered one part.  Some weeks I ran out there on Sunday afternoon and 
put on 7 parts just before sunset.  But I never missed a seven part 
count each week. And over time I got it done enough to get it registered 
and it was almost a daily driver.  I just could not admit that I could 
fail at a project I took on even though I believe I was in WAY over my 
head.  And only one part fell off.  A headlight rim fell off and was 
instantly run over.

It took a few months of driving for me to trust the suspension and drive 
train work that I had done.  I was more surprised than anyone I know 
that the dumb thing actually worked.  I only had a single mechanical 
drive train problem and that was with the font bearings. The factory 
workshop manual covers the TR2 and early TR3.  I set the bearings per 
the manual which was for front drum brakes. Well you set it differently 
for a disc brake TR.  I discovered that on a short drive soon after I 
got the car registered.

But once I reluctantly came to believe that a wheel wasn't going to fall 
off or the steering wheel come off in my hands the TR and I became the 
terror of the winding mountain roads.

Keep at your project.  You'll get there as long as you keep at it.

Teriann