The 'E' Type Forum

I have just recieved Chris Rooke's Book 'E-Type Jaguar DIY Restoration & Maintenance'. Excellent. I was wondering if Chris is here on this forum? Are you there Chris?

Hi there! I am indeed here on the forum and log-on now and then (when I can remeber my password!) Harry did a fantastic job setting this up and I just wish it had been there when I was doing my restoration as it would have saved me so much hassle. I mean if you've a problem who do you contact? You can only ring the specialists so many times before your goodwill runs out (and their patience!) plus you get many diferent opinions at once - always the case with E-types!
Really glad you like the book. When I wrote it I wasn't sure how it would be received (as somewhere inbetween a manual and the chronicles of someone undergoing a mid-life crisis) but people have been very kind and my sanity is almost fully restored to its pre-restoration level of only slightly eccentric.
Have just finished sorting some minor teething troubles out by removing the engine and gearbox and dismabtling the entire back axle - nothing major! But at least it's done now (new articles on this should be in the E-type club mag starting next month)
Regards,
Chris
If anyone wants any advice/info/chat then please get in touch.

I am so pleased to know that you still have the FHC. A great series of articles, and a splendid book !

Yes I have your book too Chris and have read it cover to cover. I think it's brilliant - I admire you for having made the effort to write and document what you have done for the benefit of people such as myself. Many thanks.
Graham

Hi Chris,

Kudos from small Belgium as well. I have you book and read it from cover to cover and still go back from time to time.

Many thnask for all of yuour efforts. It helped me in many ways.
cheers and all the best
Erik

chris Rooke wrote:by removing the engine and gearbox and dismabtling the entire back axle - nothing major! Regards,
Chris

dismabtling - is that a technical term? There may be quite a bit of my car I have to dismabtle. - Only teasing

You know the shroud that covers the steering column (BD19714) that is originally plastic or glass fibre that (in the book) you showed as replacing with an alloy one. Do you still have the old one, and would you part with it?

The shrouds on the 3.8 cars were alloy, later cars used plastic. You cannot easily use the alloy ones on the later cars as the indicator switch/light flasher is totally different so it won't physically fit. Replacing the flasher assembly is an expensive option so best to stick with the correct one for your car. On a side note the repro plastic shrouds I have seen are not of good quality so try and find an original off eBay or try M&C Wilkinson.

Hi Chris,
Yes I have your book, I requested it for Christmas.
I think it is brilliant, nothing else published like it, showing the ups and downs of e-type restoration.

David.
I think the shroud that Skiday is refering to is located in the engine bay where the steering column enters the cockpit area and not the shroud that covers the indicator switch.

Steve.

Yes I think so too. I rememebr when I saw that in the book, i thought it was a nice change as my fibre version was split. But I could not find the alloy one...

So I too would love to know where it came from.

Confession time Chris :)

I have it, too, and even take it to a "silent room" from time to time to read it !

My most famous word is "thingamabob".

Carsten

That's the one. Here's a repro from the book:


I see that SC parts do one at ?71.38 which I hope at that price would be alloy and David Manners do one at ?21.67 which at that price I would imagine would be non alloy. I think I'll go for the DM one.

I did think that some of Chris's detailing was a bit OTT perhaps, i.e. chrome plating the pedal box etc. and blanks on the other side. Chris, do you think in retrospect that making things 'better' than original (more shinny) was a good thing or not?

I'm now going to take the book to my 'silent room' and get a bit steamy - It's the sauna!

Back from the sauna.

Whilst reading, I note that the names of most suppliers is absent. For example, the supplier for the steering rack, which was 'from a horror movie', was not named. Could it have been that the advertising within the book affected this? I can understand that making a profit from a publication like this is neigh on imposable without advertising, but has that affected the neutrality of opinion?

It certainly affected the weight - heavens it's heavy! (one and three quarter times as heavy as a Haynes Manual the same size and thickness - the publisher must have used pulp from oak or mahogany!

No, it is issues of defamation which are the problem . Hence overt criticism is discouraged by all publishers

Incidentally I must tell you and indeed Chris Rooke , of one mistake in this otherwise excellent tome which could mislead. When he was setting up the rear hubs, he said that excess end float was removed with a thicker shim . This I am afraid is wrong. Although it is couner-intuitive, to reduce end float you need a thinner shim . If there is a reprint, perhaps this could be corrected

OK, Ok, enough!
You've all got me bang to rights! Not in any particular order I'll try and reply as best as possible:
Firstly I apologise for my poor typing in my original post - a combination of it being late on a Saturday evening (mainly) and a dodgy keyboard led to some amazing new words being added to to the E-type lexicon.

Secondly the shroud. As pointed out it is indeed the one on the bulkhead being referred to. I bought it from Ken Verity (Series I spares) in Rotherham. Not quite sure what I paid for it but certainly not 70 odd pounds! I think I do still have the original and if anyone is desperate for it I could part with it (althouh as a rule I have kept all parts removed for 'upgrades' and won't sell them). Let me know if you're interested and I'll hunt it out.

The lack of naming about suppliers etc. A difficult one that I wrestled with a lot. Some suppliers I found to be great and others not. Some great suppliers sometimes supplied poor parts (as with the steering rack). In the end I gave a star rating to the suppliers I used as I thought this would be OK. However as soon as Philip Porter saw it (Editor) he immediately advised getting rid of this due indeed to the risk of legal action etc. In the end we simply removed one or two names from the list of recommended suppliers. As I said in the book different people like different suppliers. There's one supplier I would NEVER go back to, but I've met at least one E-type member who swears by them (not at them, like me) so it's very subjective. Ask me in person at a meeting somewhere and I'll freely talk about my recommendations etc.

As for advertising I had absolutely no say in who advertised in the book but I do know that some were keen to advertise as they had been following the original articles and were keen to be associated with them, which was nice. I definitely didn't in any way change my comments to avoid putting prospective advertisers off, just wary of being sued I'm afraid - such is life.

Lastly, mistakes. Oh, dear. I'm sure the book is littered with them and I'm rather embarrassed about them. I'm not sure about the specific one referred to about the rear hubs (although I'm quite sure you're right) but I will check it and, as you say, I will try and correct all errors if there's a re-print (no idea about this as I'm not sure how many were printed and how many have been sold - ignorance is bliss!). Thanks though for pointing them out as I'm sure I'd miss a few otherwise and I don't want to give out erroneous information.

Wow! A rather long post but hopefully answers most queries so far - keep them coming!

Lessons learnt this post:
1. There's no auto spell check on posts
2. It's inadvisable to post late on a Saturday (Can I remove previous, embarrassing posts?)
3. Writing about suppliers (negatively) is unfortunately not easy

Oops, forgot to talk about the chroming/polishing etc.
Well, when I began I decided to plate parts on the suspension etc to stop them from rusting in future (and use stainless steel etc). You need to remember that much of the suspension etc was VERY rusty on my original car (see the photo of the brackets for the horns etc in the book). I also wanted to make the engine bay look nicer than it was. However, as time went on I polished and chromed and nickel plated far more parts than I had intended to and it did become far more polished etc than I'd originally intended.

I personally really like the engine bay. A far as I'm concerned it's an homage to the car. It's a kind of shrine that I worship at. That being said it's a total pain in the proverbial keeping it clean. I've now done nearly 5,000 miles, much in the wet and it's a weekend's work cleaning it back up again. I'm aware it's a wel known car because of the book and people always want to see the engine bay so I feel duty bound to keep it shiny.

So is it overdone? Well, to be honest, to my mind, no. I love it. But that's my view. As you're probably aware I like slightly customised things (in a weird non customised kind of way - see my Matchless) and I think my car looks great. But it's totally subjective. I'm fully aware that some people don't like the extra chroming etc and I can see where they're coming from but it's my car so I did it how I wanted it. I can understand how others like a totally standard car or a beautifully worn original car (if only!) but I hope they can appreciate my car even if they don't approve.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder: Roadster or FHC? E-type or GTO? Kate Moss or Elle Macpherson?

chris Rooke wrote:Lessons learnt this post:
1. There's no auto spell check on posts
2. It's inadvisable to post late on a Saturday (Can I remove previous, embarrassing posts?)
3. Writing about suppliers (negatively) is unfortunately not easy

Chris

1. There should be a spell checker in your Browser. I use Chrome/Firefox and misspelt words are underlined in red when typing a response. You may need to activate the feature though.
2. You can edit or delete your own posts (there will be extra buttons to the right of your post) but not those of others. Best not to delete the first post in a thread for obvious reasons but feel free to get rid of duplicates and correct, add to or re-edit your past posts.
3. Don't we know it! The Moderators have to watch for any derogatory posts and edit them accordingly. You can throw sugar at vendors but nothing else I am afraid.

Note:

Spell checking in Chrome:

Click the wrench icon on the browser toolbar.
Select Options (Preferences on Mac and Linux).
Click the Under the Hood tab.
In the "Web Content" section, click Languages and spell-checker settings.
In the Languages and Input dialog that appears, use the "Enable spell checking" checkbox to turn the spell-checker on or off.

Spell checking in Firefox:

Firefox automatically checks the spelling of words that you enter in text boxes containing more than one line. As soon as you finish typing a word, it is checked against the words in the installed dictionary. If the word is not found in the dictionary, it will be underlined in red.

Spell checking in IE:

You need to download a plug-in. Use Google to find one. This is the reason I don't use IE plus the fact Chrome is twice as fast to load pages!

Quite right Chris....do as you like it.

You might have heard that I painted my diff silver in my S1...shock horror. I wanted it silver so guess what.

I painted my Shocks RED on my Commy.....for personal reasons and that was to pay homage to my late Dad who always painted his red on his V12.

David,
Just a quick note to say what a superb job I think you're doing with the forum. I read some of your info. about E-types and factoids etc and they were both really informative e.g. there never was a second speaker fitted to E-types, earlier or later - another error in the book!
Keep up the good work.
Chris
PS Thanks for the advice on the spellcheck etc. I'll give it a go.

Chris

Just got your book today. What an excellent read, thought I was the only one with poorly fitting doors after spending soo much time during the body resto making sure they fitted correctly.
currently trying to source softer door aperture seals

Well done

Regards