For the few who care, the A35 Austin is nearly road worthy. The new blue
paint job is being 'finessed' one panel per night, the correct color carpeting
is on the way to finish the interior and the wire harness from England finally
showed up two months late after being partially eaten by some big postal
machine.
I took it out for a test drive yesterday afternoon and it ran great. The new
ribcase has a bit of the usual 1st gear whine, but the ratios are far better
than the original A35 smoothcase. Paul A., the backplate and tips on the
shifter rods were spot on. It shifts perfectly. The motor balancing paid
off. The irritating harmonic I had blamed on the chassis was the imbalanced
motor. Now its smooth all the way through the RPM range. All the other
engine mods have increased the HP noticeably, but I'll wait for the G-Tech to
find its way back home to find out if I reached my goal of doubling the stock
HP.
All the modern insulation is pasted on every interior surface waiting to be
covered by the soon to be home-made custom carpet set. All the fresh chrome
is mounted and shines beautifully. The original A35 'al-you-min-e-um' wheel
trims look fantastic.
I used a standard oval shaped muffler buried deep in the rear axle tunnel but
found it too loud for the little commuter car this is supposed to be. I added
a dinky (used, $10!)Toyota resonator right before the rear bumper and that did
the trick to get the sound just right.
Bugeye guts, but with a hardtop and pull up windows. This should be a great
winter car while the bugeye rests in the garage. I've never sullied the sound
of the bugeye by installing a stereo, but this little bugger is getting 200
watts of quadrophonic rock&roll.
The only problem so far is that when I add up the receipts, I realized that I
must have a Jag in the garage. I ran out and looked carefully, but it was
still an Austin A35.
Regards,
Glen Byrns
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