What have I bought?

A test drive was going to give me a fair idea of just what needed doing to the car, so a quick blat up the road gave the answer - gear change bloody awful; brakes barely effective, and handbrake position was obscure to say the least. Other than that, it seemed to make the right noises but could hardly be called "racey"! But I didn't buy it to try and beat every other car on the road.

A plan of action was drawn up - firstly, the brakes needed urgent attention, then the gear change needed looking at, and less important the modification of the handbrake, and a re-design of the gear change.

Brakes - I've always given brakes the priority over anything else so I started by stripping the front - calipers, brake discs and hoses. One caliper was seized completely, and the other partially seized; the pads seemed OK, but the hoses had seen better days and the discs were quite worn. I turned my attention to the master cylinder which looked a little careworn. The locating bracket was rusted and the cylinder itself contained not just brake fluid, but water! Never seen that before. I cleaned up the fixing bracket and ordered a new master cylinder, set of discs, pads, new calipers and flexible hoses. Fitting these is a doddle so it wasn't long before the front end was now newly braked. My thoughts turned to the rear. Might as well sort the back end while I'm at it, but an irritating squeak had started to be heard - UJs perhaps. Best sort them out too. And while I'm at it, the dreaded Herald wheel tuck under could be eliminated by the later "swing spring" as used on Spitfires from 1974 onwards. A sizeable order was placed for the swing spring, various suspension bushes, rear brake shoes, rear wheel cylinders, and sundries.

Contrary to the ease of the front brake installation, the rear presented rather more problems. The removal of the old spring was straightforward, but much fettling had to be done to the new spring to get it to locate in the diff recess, and to give clearance for the fixing studs into the diff casing. Eventually, the swing was fitted, and the rest of the suspension refitted too. The new UJs were there usual pigging selves causing much blue air as needle rollers slipped and displaced at regular and irregular intervals. All came good in the end though but the handbrake cable proved to be difficult because it appeared that the rear hubs were now a little further away from the diff than previously.

When the car was lowered from the axle stands it was obvious that there was more positive camber than previously. That mystery still remains but unless the new spring is slightly longer than the old, the only other explanation is that the suspension needs to settle a little. One other possibility comes to mind and that is the suspension was tightened without being loaded. I'll try jacking up each rear wheel having first loosened the suspension nuts/bolts and the tighten them up under load.