‘need to get some of whatever you used!’
Yeh, well good luck with that Will. When I set out on this rebuild, I remembered that I had a bottle of some sort of rust remover on the shelf. Looked it out and gave it a try. Brilliant stuff. Only problem, its about 40 years old, and will no doubt contain everything that is banned today!. Had another look on the shelf yesterday, and came across the large tub of rust remover that I actually bought myself about 10 years ago, but had completely forgotten about. Hopefully, when I come to use it, that has also got some nasties in it that todays meh stuff has not. Note from Government, ‘Be careful out there children, don’t hurt your fingers with this stuff’.
Re machining costs, there seems to be a huge differentiation in prices between shops now. I did shop around before alighting on the company that I have used before. I have used Gosnsays in the past, but discovered that they never carried out engine balancing themselves, they farmed it out, so they were never going to be reasonable for that job. Also, they are quite a distance from me, so I passed on them. Having said that, just like painting a car, it is worth travelling for the right people.
You will find though, that costs have risen ridiculously over the past 2 years, due to electricity prices and the ‘little man’ in russia. Chating to the owner of the engineers I used, he told me that shop costs now are crazy and electric prices for commercial users only ever go up, unlike residential prices that fluctuate.
Re acid dipping, my shop quoted £150 + VAT and said they take blocks to Birmingham to get that done. I passed on that, as I thought the price steep, and also believed that they would not get the block any cleaner than I achieved. The sludge in my block had turned to dust as it had been kept dry for 40 years, and just digging at it with various tools removed it all. A pressure washer would have come in handy there, but a good hose and nozzle sufficed,
Leslie
