1969 Jag S2 FHC, 4.2l Rebuild Story

I would caution against the term, “yank:” those plastic manifolds can become as brittle as an old eggshell.

“Lift gently” would be my term of choice…:stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

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Disassembling upper steering assy, windscreen, dash, and wiring all day. Any preference on highest quality windscreen rubber replacements? Also, the side chromes for the outside of the windscreen were just glued in place with windscreen caulk. Is that normal or am I missing something?


Use ONLY SNG rubber: yep, that’s the standard method of attachment for the hockey sticks, plus capturing the cross trim pieces.

Give the screen a really good clean and see if it’s worth keeping before storing. Then add some of that slip-on waterpipe insulation around the edge, then make a crate.

Were there not pop rivets on the back side of the stick going into the back of the A pillar? The 3.8s have 3, two on the bottom and one on the top. Then there is some sticky stuff holding the front foot against the lower front chrome strip.

edit: wait forgot yours is a coupe. This may be an OTS thing

The hockey sticks were on top of the horizontal chrome. Is that wrong?

There are definite wiper marks that I’m not sure can be buffed out. Perhaps I replace it with a new and keep the original boxed to preserve some originality for the future.

Try buffing them now. If I’m not mistaken, windscreens sometimes have a long lead time. This is a prime candidate for the “If a special offer comes up” list.

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Nope: that is correct. I got it backwards.

Old age…:smiling_imp:

Get a huge light source and a large megeapixel camera and take about 1,000 photos of each wiring connection both from 2 ft diameter and zoom in close. Is the first thing. and the continuing thing as each part is removed. Write down the order so you can reverse it

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I think I found one screw and a blob of windshield adhesive, IIRC

Keep it so you can compare the new one to the old one, when you wonder why the new one won’t fit

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I stand corrected. Keep everything, at least until the replacement arrives and you’ve compared dimensions AND fitted the new part successfully.

(Then keep it a bit more… just in case.)

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Then giggle hysterically as you ceremoniously throw the old part away and open a beer.

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Believe it or not wiper circles can come out. It’ll take 60-90 minutes or so. What isn’t going to come out are rock pings. Mine had hundreds of itty bitty little pings, almost like it went through a sandstorm, and no amount of polishing would get them out. But the swirl where a wiper blade fell off in a flash storm and the rain was too heavy to shut it off polished out completely.

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Or list it on ebay with the words rare and patina in the description.

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Regarding the pictures, don’t just take pictures. Follow a system from start to finish. Wether it’s a wire or brake line. From Brake MC all the way back to the wheel. every damn inch. Use lots of light. There are things that you will miss and sometimes they show up accidentally in another picture…

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Wow, that would have been good idea from the start. Haven’t come up with a system other than to take a crap-load of photos. I’ll implement that from now on.

BTW, had a good conversation with Chuck at Monocoque… this morning. Sounds like a good source of information and knowledge.

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A) download and label, daily.
B) buy an external HD: Costco has 6TB ones for $100.

Amen.

It’s easy to concentrate on the wrong thing. When you’re removing the wiring harness, for example, you don’t really need to document which colour wire goes where - that’s what the schematic is for.

But where the harness passes through a hole in the firewall, how they lie on top of each other (particularly behind the dash), if a branch exits upwards, or downwards… that’s the stuff that you really need when you’re putting it back together.

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