Fast Marina Magazine

Mick
Must admit I had never thought to check if the ferrule on the kickdown cable would move.
Have found on several O series setups which use different carbs to the 1800, that when adjusted correctly for kickdown operation, the full travel of the cable would not allow the carb to achieve full opening of the butterfly.
I chose to ignore the throttle problem and opt for correct auto function.
Best luck.

Cheers Kilroy. It is possible that on my old Mk1, the ferrule thingy on the cable had broken free with age (though the car was a mere six years old when I bought it) but I was a teenager, so simply finding out how to get around the problem of high revving auto changes with a kick in the back was more than enough to satisfy me at the time, without going to further trouble of having to renew the cable or figure a way of filing the ferrule off. Just winding it back up the cable every few months was the equivalent of that old comedy routine of slapping an old telly on the top to stop the picture rolling. We used to do that to old stuff.

Well I'm sure you've all seen grubby carburettors before, but these were mine yesterday before they went away for a six week holiday near sunny Grantham.

Andrew Turner certainly appears to know his stuff. Much of his working areas appear a little chaotic but he's got lines of bead blasted carburettor bodies in rows on shelves, for all manner of BMC, BL and Jaguar cars. He had a preliminary look inside my carbs while I was there, and he was happy that they were in basically good nick, but picked up on the fact that the floats weren't the originals and pointed out to me that the jet flexible pipe on at least one of them wasn't original either - so this is where I need to know if the jets are the right ones, damaged or worn. Seeing as this car has ran so badly since I bought it, yet it is meant to be relatively unworn with its genuine low mileage, I feel as though I've got a task ahead of me worthy of Sherlock Holmes, detecting what's good, bad, and what' been altered.

I could have sworn I was due to qualify for historic vehicle tax this year. I thought 1975 vehicles were all tax exempt last year, and all 1976 vehicles would be exempt in 2017. I've just received the VED reminder for the HL and it's £235 for 12 months. I've looked up information on .gov websites and it says 8th Jan 1976 onwards pay. Surely any vehicle registered on 31st December 1976 has already reached the age of 40? I thought the age of 40 was the qualifying age for historic VED class.

Not done automatically. You have to apply for it.

Am I right about the age of my car being applicable though? Or do I have to wait till 2018? Which by my maths will make it 41.

Actually I've just read on the Honest John site I need to go to a road tax issuing post office with all my documents including a valid MoT. Haven't got one, so I can't tax it. Will have to SORN it or I suppose I qualify for a fine. The things I read though were uploaded in 2016 and talking about tax exempt 1975 cars - so logically a 1976 car SHOULD now qualify.

Mick - tax free is only available those cars on the road. If you are SORN it doesn't matter. As previously stated you need an MOT to become tax free, but not SORN. Once historic status is granted it can't be taken away, so SORN is OK until you are ready for the road. If you are not sure about dates call me in the evening 07967 480534 or 01234 407518 and I will confirm.




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Okay Chris thanks, I might give you a ring after work. I never intended my Marina to be off road or without an MOT. I'd forgotten I needed a valid MOT to obtain road tax because I've only renewed online for a number of years, including my daily drive which is also VED free, due to being an eco diesel (ha ha). So basically renewing tax has been a tick-box affair for me online for a few years, and no outlay....apart from the Marina last year, which under new rules needed me to buy tax as the new owner. The last car I SORN'd wad a 1973 Mini which in 2009 was not tax exempt, and I only taxed it for the summer. So I've always believed the Marina would be exempt in 2017 when the current tax runs out, end of March. But online info I've read so far might contradict this. The last MoT on the Marina expired mid November when it was very sick and I was going through some job upheaval, so I didn't bother, and now of course it is completely immobile until I spend some more time sorting out its issues. I'd simply forgotten I couldn't renew tax without the MoT, and fair enough, I've heard about people having to apply for the historic status before, but yesterday's notification with the request for £235 did come as an unpleasant surprise.

It won't be tax free until April if I'm not mistaken- seem to recall although the dates run from January the exemption doesn't come in until the new tax year, i.e. April- the youngest car that will be tax exempt is 40 years and 3 months (give or take a week).

Yes according to Chris yesterday you are right. Not until 1st April, which in my arithmetic is my car's 41st birthday, from first day of registration, will it qualify for historic tax. All the online information I'd read before coming on the forum with the question, seems to be out of date, as I read in more than one place that vehicles first registered after January 8th 1976 did not qualify for the historic category. I do seem to have got the impression from somewhere that before the historic class was frozen at 31-12-72, back in 1997, that any car built in the whole qualifying year was classed historic, regardless of the a actual month the car was built or registered. But I'm prepared to be told I'm wrong about that since I wasn't a classic car owner in 1997, so it didn't affect me. I often saw post '72 cars for sale on ebay though in the 2000s, when I got a computer, with the vendor claiming the car they were selling would 'qualify for free historic tax next year when it reaches the age of 25', when I knew damn well it wouldn't.

My Precious......

Pretty things

ohh! now they look the boss Bet your glad to get those back.

Yes today was six weeks to the day since I took them. I did phone up myself to check on them, and was told they were ready....maybe I would have got a call next week if I'd not checked, as he did have quite a lot of units waiting for collection when I turned up. They look the biz, I assume they aren't complicated devices if you know what you are doing (unlike writing software for a modern car) so lets hope they provide my benchmark from where to start returning my Marina to life. When I've traced the electrical problem, that is...

I've got a fair bit of stuff to put up when I've time, but just for now, in case anyone can offer helpful advice, here's the link to a video I just put on YouTube of what my starter was doing, that caused the total immobilisation of my Marina around late November early December. I know the usual advice is 'rock the car in gear' in case the starter gear is stuck, but mine's an auto. But I turned the engine over with the crank pulley to no benefit. I checked and cleaned the earths, there was 12.3V at all the power leads, and strangely (to me) the more I actuated the starter, the fainter the clicking got. You can hear that in the video. That's why it impersonated a flat battery at first. The starter is now off the car.
https://youtu.be/XLXdUYicFlw