(Nov 8th~10th)
Well, what could I say, yes please and thank you! It was totally unexpected but welcome all the same, thank you Andy!
This kick started me into getting some jobs done that I'd been putting off. I'd already done the seat belts but now needed to sort out the ignition, some issues with the headlights and a bit of cosmetic tidying up. The plan is to drive BART to the NEC, stay over and spend a couple of days at the show, come back by train for a family commitment and return by train on the Sunday to collect BART and drive home.
My two main concerns are the ignition issue and lighting. The lights on BART are no better than candles, the dipped and main beam supplies are run through multiple switches and connections, I measured a 2.5v drop in the wiring supplying both headlights, that needed sorting.
Cosmetically BART is by no means perfect. I've already detailed some of the rust areas and the paint work despite being relatively new is not the best. The prep work prior to spraying leaves a lot to be desired but there's not a lot I can do about that short of a respray...so a wash and polish will have to do.
It seems wiper arms are no longer available new so I decided to rub down and respray the ones I had as they where looking very tatty and starting to rust, it's amazing what a coat of paint can do! I also sprayed the rear number plate lights, these should be chrome effect but the chrome finish had long gone and they had been sprayed during the restoration but where now flaking. No sooner had the paint dried I fell upon a company in Germany selling reproduction chrome effect plate lights! I couldn't believe my luck and promptly bought a set! They sure look pretty and take the car another step back to being original.
Wiper arms
Sprayed up lights
New chrome lights, nice!
For the ignition I bit the bullet and went and bought a full Lumenition PMA50 system, thinking this would solve once and for all my ignition concerns but this got interesting.
The distributor fitting kit I purchased clearly stated it was for an S155AX distributor but it was not possible to fit it as the distributor plate has a vertical post riveted to it for the points to pivot on which was in the way of the Lumenition fitting plate and optical chopper wheel!
I called around a few places to see if replacement plates where available but no joy. I was left with either drilling out the pivot post making retrofitting the points an impossibility or making my own plate. I decided to make my own, this would preserve the points entirely and allow them to be refitted if necessary as a single unit even preserving the points gap!
I used 2mm Aluminium sheet using the original plate as a template. It was then a case of drilling out the required holes, tapping two for the Lumenition trigger plate and filing / smoothing off the edges so it fitted the distributor cap.
Plate marked out, testing optical plate for fit
Cutting out
Smoothed off, grommet cutout to be done on tab
Test fit into the cap
Finished
Assembly
Back on the car
With that done the PMA50 was mounted next to the ignition coil and the distributor fitted back onto the engine. With it all connected up I timed the engine to 10deg BTDC and fired BART up. I hope that puts my ignition journey well and truly behind me!
PMA50 (Silver box) mounted on a bracket near the coil
To rectify the lights I ordered 16A wire, connectors and 40A relays from 12voltplanet.co.uk. The idea being to use the existing lighting circuit as a low current circuit switching dedicated headlight relays mounted in the headlight access bays. The relays would then switch a high current feed direct from the battery. This worked well, the full battery voltage was now available at the bulbs themselves improving the light output no end. Maybe I'll be able to see at night now!
Relays mounted back to back using the horn mounting bolt, 12v 40Amp
Fly leads made up using male and female connectors and plugged into existing wiring, no cutting required!
One interesting thing I did note and which maybe common to all Lido cars is the fog lights override the dipped and main beam lights. IE: if the fogs are on the dipped and main beam don't work. This took a lot of head scratching to figure out and a lot of relay swapping and circuit checking before I discovered that simply moving one wire on the fog light switch enabled the dipped and main beams to work at the same time. It seems this may have been by design as it has been confirmed another Lido is wired the same way.
Fog light switch wiring from the factory
Revised wiring
During my testing I found the heated rear window demister relay had failed, having never used it I thought the dash bulb had blown! Inspecting the relay I found one of the fine coil wires had burnt out, I managed to cut out the bad bit of wire and solder in link from what was left to the connector. With that done the demister was working again along with the dash bulb!
Wire repair to demister relay (bottom left of relay)
And whilst on lighting funnies I noted the headlight flash function only flashes the dipped (Lo) beams...not the main (Hi) beams. This seems to be by design. I traced the wiring at the column light switch and the flash circuit is wired in parallel to the dipped beam circuit it seems from the factory. I think I can rewire this to make it parallel with the main beam but have not got around to doing so yet, it makes sense to me to flash main beam and not the dipped beam!