Happy Christmas to all readers! The preparation of car for daughters wedding took on a rather manic aspect and I got quite obsessive including getting hubcaps rechromed but it did look stunning and 25 year old daughter did the driving duties without mishap. After various people "having a go" at driving it in the days following the wedding the new shifter became somewhat difficult to get out of Park. In an effort to remedy it myself I managed to break it. A new shifter mechanism turned up very quickly from
https://dantesparts.com/ and all is well again.
Fuel smell from the rear is cured - renewed all breather hoses etc, but the problem was a through bulkhead fitting that was leaking slightly.
Also took the opportunity to get the side trim redone...it was held on by a mixture of double sided tape, and clips and over the years it was pulling away in places...mainly where it had been caught by cleaning cloths and so on. I got the local bodyshop to redo it using the correct clips... I gather it was a bit of a performance but it looks excellent.
Have got New Years Day run planned and after that it's going in to get the only remaining bushes on the car that haven't been renewed done. They're the ones on what I'd call the sort of anti tramp bar at the rear.
Hopefully do some serious touring in 2024.
Cheers
Andrew