Head scratching is not good for the nerves

 The horn button is proving somewhat problematic, an understatement if ever there was one.

The horns worked, I knew this. Last year it took ages to get the right connections via a relay. Eventually managed it. The Haynes and Advance diagrams are wrong !

The horn push lever acts a an earth to activate the circuit. I wondered why there was constant power on the purple circuit but no horn sound.

Back to the present, no horn.

A wire did come loose, or maybe two on the relay. Regardless of which way round it is wired no joy.

I had found online two diagrams, both different, but one did show the switch via earth. These did not work !

I did find the two wires that when connected and the horn lever depressed continuity sounded, yay.

However, each wire had two wires in the spade connector ????. 

Then the bottom fuse in the fuse block keep blowing.why?

Then a continuity check on the bottom fuse holder spades gave nothing, why??

It was getting dark by then and the new trusty Rolson torch had given up the ghost anyway.

So with a headache and a night sure to be restless, Morpheus beckons.

Not helped by the fact we are dog sitting for son #1 for two weeks. She has a bladder the size of a walnut but still wakes us ( me usually) at least twice in the early hours for a roam down the garden to pee and bark randomly at leaves rustling, bless her.

How I hate electrics. 

Must get the electrician in to wire in some lights for the garage, it may add to my frustrations though.

Not even touched the starter motor or the radiator or the flashers right hand side.

Any advice would be appreciated

A home at last

 Yes, that's right folks the MG has its own home. Dry and spacious, warm and inviting. Smooth floored and draught, damp and rain free..,,,,,!!!

It's only taken 30 years. A garage was there when we bought the house back then, but on moving in day it had somehow disappeared. 

''Twas only a rusty, rickety corrugated small thing anyway and we had a lot more on our plate than to worry about the outside of the house. Like that all the lightbulbs had also been removed. 

Anyway....digression over and back to the MG.

Lo and behold

What a thing of beauty. Thats where the good news ends though. Still had trouble starting the engine  so I bit the bullet and ran an extension from the kitchen into the garage to give the battery a damn good charge for two and a half days. 

Great. Cranks every time now. It eventually started but still ran a bit rough, well a lot rough.

Moreover the radiator overflow tank overflowed......again.

Even moreover, the right hand hazard warning light did not flash, neither did the same indicator, pfffft.

It gets worse. The hazard warning switch ( which is only about 3 months old ) disintegrated completely after I had to wrap tape around the outside to stop it/ make it work correctly straight after installation. This really pisses me off, why pay good money for something that is sub standard, poorly designed and never going to last very long anyway. To add insult to injury, I ordered some time ago a new fan switch only to find I already had not one but two ! Ffs.

And that's not the end of the woes.

The horn does not work at all. Not a peep. All the electrics worked a few weeks ago, but since I fitted the steering wheel binnacle/ housing and tidied up all the under dash wiring bundles nuffin.

I've saved the worse till last.

Since the battery is fully operational now most startups the starter motor spins like crazy or grates gearing or does nothing at all. So I guess that's got to come out to be inspected.

A small bit of good news is that the engine runs much much better. I don't really know how. I did re- position the carb linkage links, tighten up the choke cable and generally fiddled with the mixture/s.

Of all the stuff that needs sorting I'm worried about the radiator overflowing as this could be a head gasket failure, maybe something as simple as a thermostat swap or a blockage somewhere in the pipes.

It's nice to know that now I can leave all my tools spread around the garage and just lock up and walk off. Normally I'd have half an eye on the weather then spend ages putting stuff away in the storage box and covering the car and fixing all the springy straps.

More after tomorrows episode of head scratching.