Thursday 16 March 2017

The start of the driving season ...


After a bit of a false start for 't Kreng I actually managed to get her back on the road last week. Wanted to take her out for a short test run in preparation for the Nacht van het Oosten, which actually turned out a bit longer than planned. Not because something went wrong but because it was good fun. But when I got home and went over the engine bay after everything had cooled down a bit, I found these traces of coolant around the waterpump cover ...


Bugger! Clearly the leak is coming from the infamous connecting tube (UKC2538) between the water pump cover and the thermostat cover. As there was no visible loss of coolant in the header tank I decided to ignore it for the time being and hope for the best. This was mainly given in by the fact that I didn't have time to repair the leak or swap cars and go over the DHC in preparation for the Nacht van het Oosten in the time remaining for the event.

So while travelling up North towards the start I kept an anxious eye on the temperature gauge, but the needle remained rock steady between the 1/4 and 1/2 mark. And a last check before the start showed a complete dry area around the waterpump cover. Time for a (one sided :-) look at some of the other cars.


©GTRoger

©GTRoger

The rally itself again was very good fun. 180 Kilometres of rather challenging narrow winding country lanes around the Salland area in Overijsel, with a wide variety of surfaces, ranging from smooth tarmac to forest tracks. Which from far above looks like this ...


And I needn't have worried about the car, she behaved absolutely fabulous. It was almost as if she tried to persuade me to use her more often. Even the leak seemed to have disappeared completely. But on arrival home next day there were again some traces of coolant around the waterpump cover. See how it develops, but I have a feeling that the manifold will have to come of sooner rather than later!

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