Noll Posted April 28, 2022 Author Report Share Posted April 28, 2022 Ok, after some cleanup it looks like that was the only bad spot I can see (the factory undercoating did work great except where it flaked off haha), so just going to splice a patch in and send it. I'm going to need to deal with that pitted fuel line at some point, but it's not leaking so that is future me's problem. 2 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted April 29, 2022 Author Report Share Posted April 29, 2022 All fixed 🙂 . Rest of the hardline cleaned up decently so just cut out the pitted area and patched in a new section. 1 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted April 30, 2022 Author Report Share Posted April 30, 2022 Well one last section of line blew out (because of course), but that was an easy one to recreate thankfully. Brakes have now been fully bled and are feeling pretty good, as long as there's no drips on the floor tomorrow the wheels can go back on 🙂 . 1 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted July 14, 2022 Author Report Share Posted July 14, 2022 I kinda fell off on updating the thread, but much progress has happened the last couple of months! cliffs notes version below: sound deadening installed and reassembled/cleaned the interior: found out that the carb was so loosely bolted together that there would be a ~8mm gap when the engine rocked over on accel, but the car still ran lol: found one last rust spot (below front bumper mount), and fixed it (no pics of the repair process): Started the very dusty process of filler work in prep for paint: And epoxy primer and paint. It's not perfect, but pretty happy with how it went for a garage paintjob with (colour-matched) rattlecans. rear half of the interior and rear seat installed: Spare tire back in the engine bay: fuel pump decided to die, so while waiting on a new one, rigged up an electric pump and filter by ziptieing them to the mechanical pump: That brings us roughly to the present. the car passed its safety inspection on Monday, and right after getting license plates on it I took it down an old fire road: The next day the old alt/fan belt decided that it didn't like life any more, but that was an easy replacement job. I've already put on just over 100km since getting it on the road, and other than the fan belt there have been zero issues. Not bad for a car that was off the road for somewhere north of 25 years 🙂 . 5 Quote Link to comment
EDM620 Posted July 15, 2022 Report Share Posted July 15, 2022 Nice to see your progress and another old Lada under power again! 1 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted February 1 Author Report Share Posted February 1 (edited) Been finally updating some of my other threads, so time for this one too 🙂 . God, nearly 2 yrs since the last post, whoops lol. Fair bit has happened with the Niva since then, i'll just post up pics and list off stuff in chronological order as best as I can recall I suppose. Hit enter too soon, oops. Pics etc to come shortly. Edited February 1 by Noll Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted February 1 Author Report Share Posted February 1 (edited) Took it to a car meet shortly after getting her road legal, was a fun time and the first nighttime drive on the way home: Old muffler gave up the ghost (old mouse nest rotted it from inside I think), so whipped something up: aaaand ran out of gas with over 1/2 a tank showing. The gauge was very unreliable, so decided it was time to fix that. Tank access on these is from inside - means the tank rotting out under the car doesn't happen which is nice 🙂 . Found and got rid of the very last mouse evidence in the car. hmm yes, that would explain the non-functional fuel gauge lol. I'm still impressed that the car was running fine on this gas: the sender cleaned up surprisingly well, had to do a lil soldering but got it working again. Will prob replace it eventually but it's alright for now. Got the tank cleaned by a radiator shop, and put it back in: Back on the road, but not running happily. Checked plugs and compression and all was good there. Turns out the secondary carb butterfly had seized closed, making it run super rich all the time. Got a carb from someone to swap on and back in business. winter arrived: made a cupholder out of plumbing pipe: More winter stuff, doing what it's built for 🙂 and going up an offroad hill through a foot of snow with no complaints: Got around to buying and installing a battery isolator for when it's not being driven, just because why not: Nice weather returned, and passed 1000km since getting it roadworthy: headlight bulb that I think was from 1982 burnt out, so replaced both. Plus more general pics. Figured out why the alternator wasn't always charging lol, and sorted that (replaced the cig lighter socket at the same time for one that was a normal depth for modern accessories to work in it): Underside is in great shape 🙂 : Added some insulation under the hood to cut down on engine noise at high cruising RPM. This did way more than I expected, makes the cabin a much more pleasant place. Datsun rescue mission when my friend's T3 balljoint sheered in half: Noticed a ripped CV boot on the Niva so ordered parts to deal with it at some point, and a couple of brake pistons had seized so freed them up and lubricated the seals with a little brake grease to make sure it couldn't happen again altered the cupholder to move it back so the hi/low range lever didn't foul when there was a drink in there. It's just shoe-goo'd in so no harm to the console when i eventually remove it to put something nicer in she is not geared for top end lol, 4000rpm in top gear at 100kmh/60mph Went exploring down a fire road one day, it eventually got too tight to turn around (like, barely ATV trail width), so had to keep pressing thru until I got out the other end which i thankfully did. No pics of the worst bits because i was focusing on not scratching up the sides and roof too bad lol, there were a couple gnarly rock ledges to climb but she did great. Only took pics in the dark for some reason, but parts order arrived so replaced the plugs, wires, air filter, and added front mudflaps: found a bit of MIG wire the factory painted over 42 years ago which was amusing: time to do the CV boot finally. as part of that, i had to remove the balljoints on that side, and while the balljoints themselves were in fine shape, the hardware for them was incredibly corroded and siezed, so this was a multi-day battle. Ended up doing all 4 balljoints as I had new ones and didn't want to spread out the suffering to some future time when the other side needed doing lol added some mesh to the cabin air intake to keep small critters out, and welded a handle on the fuel filler cap because especially in the winter it's a bear to get enough grip on to unscrew. noticed some rust showing up on the driver's door (grr, i just painted stuff not that long ago), so cleaned it up to discover some small holes. Longer-term i'll buy a doorskin and do a partial or complete skin replacement (partial most likely to preserve the decals if possible), but for now I just wanted it presentable and to not get worse, so cleanup/rust converter/fibreglass filler/rust paint/rollered-on touchup paint was the move for the time being, then I sprayed the hell out of the inside of the door with Fluid Film. The right way to do the wrong thing 😛 Got everything sorted just in time for winter to hit - the Niva is amusingly my only car at the moment as everything else is either broken, not finished, or will NOT see the snow and salt (the 260z). Installed some little aftermarket thingies to keep the quarter windows closed as the factory latches keep falling off even with the correct glue and prep. Made a roof rack so my family could bring the xmas tree home with the Niva because why not: More winter pics: ground clearanceee 😛 Edited February 2 by Noll 1 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted February 1 Author Report Share Posted February 1 ok there we go, posted properly 🙂 . That about brings us to the present day. Quote Link to comment
Stoffregen Motorsports Posted February 1 Report Share Posted February 1 Holy photodump. Cool car and great pics. 1 Quote Link to comment
Duncan Posted February 2 Report Share Posted February 2 3 hours ago, Stoffregen Motorsports said: Holy photodump. Cool car and great pics. More photos! That was a serious dump, but i like the car. The picture of the fuel sender as it came out of the tank had me laugh out loud. I see why the float arm was registering a little off... 2 Quote Link to comment
]2eDeYe Posted February 2 Report Share Posted February 2 So cool, looks great in the wild. 😄 2 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted February 2 Author Report Share Posted February 2 20 hours ago, Stoffregen Motorsports said: Holy photodump. Cool car and great pics. 16 hours ago, Duncan said: More photos! That was a serious dump, but i like the car. The picture of the fuel sender as it came out of the tank had me laugh out loud. I see why the float arm was registering a little off... 12 hours ago, ]2eDeYe said: So cool, looks great in the wild. 😄 Ty all! And yeah, sorry for the massive amount of photos in one post haha, I know myself enough to know I had to just get it done and posted or i would procrastinate even longer so that was easier to make myself get done than splitting it up into a bunch of posts. Also yeah Duncan, i'm amazed it was picking up fuel at all lol, and that that sender actually works after i cleaned it up (with a load of brake and carb cleaner and scrubbing). 15+ years of sitting with half a tank of gas will do that I suppose. The car didn't care though, fired right up on the nasty stuff and sat and idled the very first time i got it running years ago. Was clogging fuel filters on a regular basis after I got it roadworthy before cleaning the tank (they're in the engine bay, took 2 mins to remove/shake out or swap in another filter, and keep driving when it happened so nbd) but that was the only symptom at all. 2 Quote Link to comment
datzenmike Posted February 2 Report Share Posted February 2 WTF is that orange thing???? Comrades don't let other comrades ride with fram filters. Get a WIX or a NAPA Gold or you're off to the gulag. Oh wait, you live in Onterrible, you're already there. 1 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted February 3 Author Report Share Posted February 3 9 hours ago, datzenmike said: WTF is that orange thing???? Comrades don't let other comrades ride with fram filters. Get a WIX or a NAPA Gold or you're off to the gulag. Oh wait, you live in Onterrible, you're already there. Worry not, i have a Mann brand filter (common good brand for euro stuff) in a box for when I do the spring oil change 🙂 . That was just to get it on the road - couldn't find the right filter on short notice, but found this NOS in a box of parts that came with the Niva. It's from the 90s or earlier so I so believe before Fram's quality nosedived. But yeah, oil change will happen in the spring. Quote Link to comment
datzenmike Posted February 3 Report Share Posted February 3 I screw on Fram to mask the filter boss when I paint the block. 1 Quote Link to comment
EDM620 Posted February 3 Report Share Posted February 3 Have you ever tried to hand crank it over? That's what the little hole in the front bumper is for, lines up with the crank snout, and the jack tool fits right in. Good for when Comrade Mobile is low on juice, or you want to show off! 1 Quote Link to comment
Noll Posted February 4 Author Report Share Posted February 4 19 hours ago, datzenmike said: I screw on Fram to mask the filter boss when I paint the block. Smart, less work than carefully masking with tape! 3 hours ago, EDM620 said: Have you ever tried to hand crank it over? That's what the little hole in the front bumper is for, lines up with the crank snout, and the jack tool fits right in. Good for when Comrade Mobile is low on juice, or you want to show off! I have once or twice, haven't been successful though, it requires a considerable amount of strength to go fast enough to actually get it to fire haha. I want to see if I can succeed one day though. 1 Quote Link to comment
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