Problem solved

Well I finally tackled the overdrive failure that occurred on the way to the rolling road last week. I had checked the switch and found that to be OK. I couldn't see any major oil leaks and so I decided to take the gearbox tunnel off and check it all. Oil level was indeed fine, everything looked in place.
I started off by bypassing the inhibitor switches as these sometime give trouble - nope it wasn't there.
I then started looking for bad connections, it's fair to say that the overdrive harness had one of every conceivable type of electrical connector in there somewhere. Although some of them were decidedly dodgy they were all making contact.
Solenoid? I took a look and saw something out of place, some broken insulation on the earth wire leading to the solenoid. Nice one, yet that wouldn't cause the overdrive to fail - a quick wiggle and there it was, not only was the insulation brittle and broken but the wire had fractured where it was supposed to be joined onto the spade connector. No earth, no circuit.
I couldn't get to the bottom of the overdrive where the earth wire was attached so I ran a new wire to a convenient point - on the chassis.
After a quick test drive, I put the whole thing back together, sealed up the tunnel with some duct tape and the job was done.
The rest of today has been spent cleaning and tinkering - I fitted a mini filter to the catch tank I'd fitted last week - it's not the best fit but I'm waiting for some nice braided hose to arrive and I can sort out the plumbing properly - I'll have to get some fittings and tidy the whole instaltion up.
The other job I wanted to do was adjust up the rear brakes and see if I could trace the handbrake "sponginess" - yup, the cable is a bit kinked and the return springs are unequal. I've fettled it and now the handbrake is working fine. I could do with getting a pair of springs, something else for the shopping list for tomorrow.
Right, off to get the rest of my stuff together - see you tomorrow if you're going to the Gaydon show, the Vitesse will be on the Club Triumph stand.

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