"Hazel" - a series 1 V8 daily driver

Phil Robson said:
Hazel's heater has been pretty well non-existent to say the least for about 3 years now, which has always been a pain in the colder weather & has put me off driving it. As is so often the case, it has been a repair that I have put off because I thought I was going to have to pull the heater box out & that would have been a faff.

Anyway, the time came to investigate this week & it was decided to have a ride round (as you do) to warm things up. When the hoses were inspected it was seen that the first part of the 'in' pipe was very hot (bottom arrow) & the other was cool (top arrow):

View attachment 25715

It seemed to imply that there was a blockage in this hose but after taking it off, the hose was clear. Presumably then, the heater matrix was blocked & the cool water in the hose would be merely because there was no onward flow & that the water hadn't yet warmed up purely by heat transfer from the engine outlet pipe.

The next stage was to flush the box through with a normal hose pipe. This was done in the reverse direction & the water quickly became very clear & the flow was apparently unrestricted. The same happened for the normal direction of flow. This was puzzling as there's not a fat lot else that could be wrong.

However, we put everything back together & then had another 'test run'/jolly. Surprisingly, the heater then worked perfectly :D. When we got back, my friend Mick spotted this on the drive, under where we had been working (coin only for size comparison ...):

View attachment 25716

It was a lump of soggy 'grot' that presumably had become lodged in the system & we hadn't spotted it coming out. It looks & feels like an old piece of hose that may have come loose in the past. I did change all the heater hoses a few years ago to try & remedy the heating problem, but it's quite possible that I was already too late!

As I always say (though I hardly ever do it myself), "try the easy things first". If I'd spent the same 2 hours about 3 years ago, I'd have had a toastie interior in all those cold times instead of a freezing one :rolleyes:.
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I back flushed the heater on the Alfa the other day, a load of horrible gunk came out, sadly no pound coins though :hmm:
 
If you havent already, suggest you fit one of the translucent radiator overflow tanks - makes it easy to see coolant level, and easy to get radiator completely full.
rpyUf5M.jpeg

This one is 1/4 full cold, over half full hot.
 
jp928 said:
If you havent already, suggest you fit one of the translucent radiator overflow tanks - makes it easy to see coolant level, and easy to get radiator completely full.
rpyUf5M.jpeg

This one is 1/4 full cold, over half full hot.
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From which car has this come from? I like the idea of this.
 
Thank you for the suggestion, JP.

I struggled for many years with Hazel's temperature & it eventually got so bad that I couldn't even drive a few miles without it overheating & getting vapour-lock :oops:. I installed an expansion tank & was going to fit an electric fan too.

I then read in 'Driving Force' (other P6 newsletters are available) about overheating & the fact that a car set up per the manual shouldn't usually require any further 'help'. I decided to start from scratch & also flushed the carb tower through etc, as suggested (see my posts #117 onwards in this thread).

After I did all this, the car runs better then ever & the temperature gauge hardly ever gets past 1/2 - way, no matter what the weather is like or how long a traffic queue is :D. The car has now done 136,000 miles & it has never had any major work.

The expansion tank came out again & I've not looked back since!
 
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I use a a cylindrical expansion bottle from an Alvis, and located next to the screen washer bottle (lower RH corner). It is also translucent. That seems to work ok
 
Mines out of a series land rover V8. Its a solid brass one .
As far as needing to see the level of coolant -doesnt worry me. Just does its job and doesnt take seconds to take the cap off to check.
 
Phil Robson said:
Mine was too, until I took it out again.
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Hi Phil -What was your reason for removing the expansion tank?
Before I fitted my "ET" ,the radiator used to dump a small amount of fluid after a run. I was always topping her up.
Talking to others on here, it was a similar occurance. So decided on the "ET" idea.
Never had a dumping on the ground again and hardly top-up the header tank.
 
GRTV8 said:
Hi Phil -What was your reason for removing the expansion tank?
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No reason other than after setting the car up properly, I thought I shouldn't need it - which I haven't. Hazel hasn't dumped any fluid since.

If I was going to do a lot of hot miles & traffic jams, I might consider reinstating it :)
 
In the interests of thinning my fleet a little, I put Hazel up for sale a few months ago :oops:. I directed potential buyers to this thread (& the one about its bump) & got an enthusiastic guy pretty quickly. However, he didn't end up getting it.

Then, as you do, I drove it myself for a few weeks & realised just how good it is. Not perfect, but a good honest car, much of which is original & unmolested (even the sills).

Anyway, my wife Karen has been very keen on getting a motorhome for us aged retirees to use (which I've had my reservations about) as we used to have caravans back in the day when the children were young. These were always a little unwieldy & we always towed them with a Land Rover product (the V8 manual Discovery we had was great :cool:). A motorhome seemed a bit more user-friendly.

However, now we've spotted some pretty lightweight & slightly narrower caravans that should tow reasonably well with most cars, but they're still quite roomy. This got us thinking about a caravan again & also attending some more classic shows etc a bit further from home. Karen likes driving Hazel (it's automatic with power steering fitted), so you can see where we're going with this...;)

Has anyone towed a caravan with an automatic P6 (esp. V8) & how does it handle, please?
 
Back in the day I towed caravans with my 3500S without any problems, and I can't see why the auto should be any different if the transmission is in good order and you don't abuse it. Get the nose weight correct and they tow very well.
 
Thank you Harvey. I've towed a caravan with a TC before which did fine.

And I don't suppose I'll be doing particularly steep hills & the like with a 'van on the back, so hopefully the auto V8 will be at least as good!
 
Whilst OCC came with a straight towbar (no over-riders), which I still have & will refit, I needed a curved towbar for Hazel.

Fortunately one of my friends has had one for decades & will never use it, so I bought it off him & will fit it in due course.

IMG_7266.jpg
 
When towing a caravan with the automatic P6, it is important that the transmission has a good oil cooler.
 
harveyp6 said:
It's an automatic in question, so the transmission cooler is in the radiator, but I'd be junking that in favour of a separate one anyway, whether I was towing or not.
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Would this be one in front of the radiator, connected to the standard pipes on some way?

If so, presumably sourcing an ‘S’ radiator would be beneficial, too as it must be a bit more effective than the auto’s.

Finding one would be an issue, although I could have the auto one rebuilt I suppose.
 
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