Pulling the Cord
Once again my own folly has deposited me in a vortex of escalating problems with the Cord. Having ‘parked it up’ due to the vacuum-assisted electromechanical gearbox being reluctant to engage first and second gear, plus what I thought at the time were a couple of relatively minor problems – electric fuel pump had packed up, a soldered connection had dropped off the starter button – I took far too long to address the faults. In my defence, the non-standard pump is situated close to the fuel tank under the rear of the car and well out of reach without a pit or a sturdy high-lift jack, and I simply didn’t want to go tunnelling.
I finally bit the bullet and elected to have the car trailered to a workshop. That wasn’t as easy as it might sound, since a couple of years of immobility had inevitably resulted in seized brakes. After much effort the Cord was dragged onto the trailer and on its way to the Lewes workshop of Ben Brown and Janos Varga, complete with a big note attached, outlining the problems to be rectified. It basically said: ‘Get it going.’
A few days later, an incoming call relayed the good news. Fuel pump cleaned and pumping fresh petrol, new starter button fitted. However, the bad news was far from encouraging. The car simply wouldn’t start and a compression test revealed that one bank of the V8 had virtually no compression on three of its cylinders and the other side was not so hot either. A visit to the workshop to assess the problem was requested.
Obviously the cylinder heads needed to be lifted for a peep. The half-good news is that, despite evidence that some water had leaked into a few of the bores, they have polished up nicely and much of the lack of compression seems to be down to corroded valve seats. Reseating is underway.
The less-good half of the news is that the brake cylinders have seized solid. Plus, of course, I need new head gaskets, which for reasons of cost I’m investigating having made over here.
Clockwise from top Discouraging compression test on V8 resulted in heads being removed, below; a cheeky wink for the camera from the mischievous Cord.