Restoration of Hull 731- Carrier, MG (Aust) Mortar Carrying

[Darrin Wright]

In the last week the fuel tanks have dried with the POR-15 fuel tank sealer, have installed the pick up tubes with new gaskets, installed the flame arrestors and caps.

Fuel tanks have been painted green a couple of times and have been installed.
Prior to installing the tanks I had to cut the felt spacers/lining strips and glue them onto the mount brackets.

The tanks fit snugly into their location.

Installed the new fuel hoses to the pick ups, purchased the hoses from Macs Auto in the USA.

Installed the RH seat and assembled the LH seat and installed it into it's location.

The dash has been installed and have only minor tasks to fix there. Have installed the horn into position; however, the new horn I had purchased years ago does not work. Have used the multi-meter and it appears that it just does not work, there are no obvious faults and the volts go where they should. Will try and source another Ford horn internals.

I panelbeated the LH guard and had it sandblasted, it has now been painted green and installed. With this on, it allowed me to install the headlights and connect them up. I have modified and installed a new light and lens into my head lights, they are running at 55W and a bit bright and get a little bit hot. Will look to installing a smaller wattage globe to see if this helps, but I will definatly be able to see at night.

So after all this work it was time to test the vehicle, started with cranking the engine over by the remote button on the starter solenoid in the rear. No problems there, so started it from the dash. With a little bit of choke (I adjusted the idle screws during the week and it runs a little better than before) it fired up straight away.
NOTE: when the tracks were put on I had a dodgy wiring circuit for the ignition.

I have driven it around the back yard, up the drive way, around the house nearly took out the mail box and my sons apple tree. But it steers, stops & accelerates when it should.
I have found that the driving controls are not very well placed, and when trying to displace the track on a slope (turning) is a bad idea as you are trying to move the weight of the hull against the slope or gravity. For the steering to work the vehicle must be moving.

Took my boys and wife for a drive around the house and they love it, smiles from ear to ear.

So will continue to work on the little jobs and continue to iron out the little issues. Have already adjusted the brake linkage on the LH side.

It is lots of fun.