Restoration, 2018
Alternator swap
Here in Finland law requires us to use car lights even in summer sunlight. And as we all know, original dynamo is not very good at low rew city traffic. So a discharge has been a common sight for me. I have been looking for alternator swap for a long time, but as Ms.Moneypit has Power Steering, some sort of adapter would have been required for the PS pump. But while ago I saw fellow enthusiast Tigger mentioning Stealth Dynamator on Jag-Lovers discussion and it is 100% mechanically compatible with the original dynamo, including output for the PS pump. So I ordered it immediately and did the swap. It was very easy as like I said it is 100% compatible. It has integrated voltage regulator, so original can be bypassed. I left the original voltage regulator in place and did the necessary wiring changes under fuse box cover. So only thing visible of the change is small sticker in Dynamator and you can peel that off too if you want.
As my car in hibernating the winter, I have not tested Dynamator yet, but I expect my discharge problems to be history.
Broken NDV bolt
One of Non Draught Ventilator bolts was broken deep into its hole. I had to remove the whole NDW to get the hinge into a vise and even after that it was a pain in the a** to remove the broken part of bolt. I drilled a 1.5mm hole into bolt but bolt must be some very hard metal and my 1.5mm drills are not hardened steel so it was more like wearing than drilling. Finally I managed to make 2mm deep hole into bolt and turn it loose with sharp blade jammed around the drill hole.
The NDV can be removed by opening the bottom hinge nuts through the opening in door chassis, behind door vinyl panel. That small topmost round part in hinge is just a pin, hammer it through to get it out.
