Restoration Blog: June 2018 - Jay Leno's Garage

you've never heard an f1 McLaren without a muffle on it well here's your chance all right hit it [Music] bellissimo welcome to the episode of Jalen's garage a restoration blog edition it's been a while since we did one of these and in fact it's been so long you might remember this car this is my 1958 Chrysler Imperial well I got it it was pretty rough we got it running we put Wilwood disc brakes on all four wheels it made a huge difference and then I realized I liked driving us so much we should probably restore this one as well so we stripped all the paint redid all the chrome it's almost done we went back to the original white it was kind of an off-white before so we went back to the original color we even have all new panels in here we had a new dash made for it we make doing the top right now as you can see putting all the electrics back together it's just about finished so when it's done it'll be a brand new car and it's got about another month and a half or two months to go on it but it's coming along nicely and what a difference it makes when you see all this stuff done properly you know this at all this has just turned to a kind of a dull finish and this didn't shine at all now it really it really pops so it's kind of a fun car when you see one as good as a day it looked coming out of the factory and you don't want to know what it cost to redo these bumpers oh my god but come on I'll show you some of the other stuff this is my 1916 Revere this is a car I've had a long time we've talked about this in the restoration blog the car is just about finished the only part not done is the engine we made a new shell have that cast everything's ready to go together all we have to do is drop the engine in we just got the gearbox together the other day that's still on the workbench over here come on I'll show you the motor Fitness these were incredible in their day because they used a Duesenberg Rochester engine which called a walking beam a fantastic engine that was really fast you may have seen an episode of our friend Wayne Carini chasing classic cars he bought one of these at auction was thrilled at how fast it was because that was a real hot rod of the day it had the racing Duesenberg engine in it and I think Revere was just a receptacle for that engine you know that's all it was was a factory hot rod but they're quite quick come on I'll show you the motor this is the Duesenberg Rochester engine this has probably been in three or four restoration blogs it takes a long time to get all this stuff straight we've got the transmission all together now we got a beautiful clutch from McLeod the single plate clutch right here we're just having a ring gear made so we can put this whole thing together but the transmission is done and as I mentioned before the walking beam engine this was just about one of the fastest engines of that period about 1916 by walking beam it means it the valve operate this way you have this long beam it's really a cool motor as I mentioned there's an episode of chasing classic cars of Wayne Carini where he finds one of these at auction and he buys and he drives it and he just fell in love with it it's a just a great great machine but remember Jim Hall remember the car Tina it's just about done come on I'll show you where we are with that this is Jim's Cortina members over there and the paint booth and trying to get the right colors I love these taillights this is my favorite year for this car and Jim has done just a wonderful job on this this is his own personal car and it's it's really exciting I think this is one of the finest Cortinas in the in the in the world I mean it's just expertly done jim has put every single part on this car himself and it's really a labor of love and it's gonna be a lot of fun to take it out and road test it so just give me an idea that's coming up it should be up and about a month or so maybe a little bit longer than that what else we got Oh remember the Detroit electric we started that we walked away for about a year to do some of these other projects we're back on it now let me show you where we are this is our 1914 Detroit electric you remember this so it's probably three years ago we I bought just this rotted out body all the wood was gone we made all new wood for it we had our friends the Amish who have great wheelwrights they made us these new wheels and believe me those are strong as any magnesium wheel I'm if it really lasts a long time the last set was on here for a hundred years and they didn't break so these should last hopefully just as long this is got to be an updated version of a 1914 Detroit electric it'll have air conditioning it'll have bluetooth and it'll be really really fast it has got a big 50 horsepower motor right here it's gonna go into it we will have all lithium-ion batteries in it as well and let me just show you what the inside looks like here we all been Dinah matted so it'll be even quieter and it's gotta be really good I mean it'll be really fast we're gonna have to do something with that tiller steering because this thing is gonna be quick so we're gonna have to tighten that up a little bit but it'll be exciting it'll have regen and the whole bit but now the body's done the body silent solid the wheels are solid it's really gonna be exciting Oh remember those cylinders that Jimmy was working on memories making the brass water jackets let me show you the car it's gonna go on and then we'll show you the water jackets they're just about done come on follow me now this is the car that was known as rabbit one when it ran in England it was a it ran in 1921 and at lap Brooklands at 113 miles an hour it doesn't seem that fast now but 113 in this pretty quick the chassis is 1908 Mercedes the engine is about twelve thirteen fourteen eighteen point eight litre aero engine this was thought to be a Chitty Bang Bang for years but it wasn't more than what Jeany bang bang cars the guys named Sir Bronski built the Chitty Bang Bang cars he built three of them and for years people thought this is one of them it wasn't but it's a real car it did run at Brooklands this is owned by the famous artist named Peter help he's done some of the most historic automotive paintings his paintings sell for you know hundreds of thousands of dollars you've seen them you recognize his artwork it's all over here really cool stuff this is the one that Jimmy is making the water jackets for we'll get to that in a minute but we had to do was it only had drum brakes in the rear which weren't very good if you want to drive this thing around LA or anywhere you got to be able to stop it so we took off the original axle we got a different axle I think it's from a Lincoln which was pretty close we made these faux drums but now I put these Wilwood disc brakes inside here so now it actually stops it's basically the same system we did to the butter Fogo you remember the butter Fogo that was the big 22 litre Fiat engine job here it is take a look [Music] well now that one stops and goes like a real car we'll have hydraulic disks in the front and regular mechanical drum brakes in the rear all right let's get to these these are big Pistons this is 18 point eight litres the way it works is the water goes around the inside of the water jacket which cools the cylinder well the water jackets were steel and after a hundred years they rusted out only a hundred years so we decided to make them out of brass so hopefully they'll last longer than I will and let me show you what those look like but this is not that far away from running it ran when park so it's not a lot to do the engine the bottom ends been done we need to put a clutch in this this head where's our scroll claw here you go this is the original cut it looks like something from a bad jack-in-the-box trick but it just can't take the power so we're putting a modern clutch in this as well same sort of deal okay let me show you those water jackets come on if you've seen our other blogs you remember these this is the last one you see you close them here the water flows in between here these have all been pressure tested they're ready to go back on and fire up Jimmy's doing the very last one if you want to see how we made these check some of our earlier restoration blocks and that'll show you how it's done give it a how much work is involved here's the old ones you see how they were just rusted they would just steal and the water just ate through them all so now they're brass they'll last 100 years and we'll be in good shape now remember the Merlin the Merlin engine rolls that we were building that's another project that's taken Oh quite a few years it's done it's just about finished except for a few things we'll show it to you now give you a sneak peek of what it looks like and then next time you see it we'll be doing a full road test on come on I'm really happy with the way this is turned out it took a long time but we got it right and it runs fantastic this is my 1934 Rolls p2 chassis with a body of our own design on it and of course as you remember it has the fabulous Merlin 27 litre aircraft engine in it you saw on the other restoration blogs the Intel we made the intake manifold on a 3d printer so we can go run Weber carburetors on it it's got a proper gearbox not enough automatic it's got a six-speed Dodge truck transmission it really really pulls and next time you see this one will be Road testing it will do a whole a whole piece on it will put all the all the pieces from the restoration blog together to show you how the car was built and then we'll drive it we'll take it down the highway it's like taxing in a Merlin on the street it's fantastic about 60 gallons of gasoline that will take you 100 miles something like yep but it's it's it's worth it Oh remember that brough superior motorcycle is up on the on the lift it were waiting for parts for we got that together come on let me show you how that turned out there's another bike that took just about a year to get right but it's just perfect 19:25 ss100 all brussels guaranteed to 100 miles an hour until this model is guaranteed to 110 miles an hour pending alpine I think it's called you know you've got these extra metal straps to hold the tank on I love all this here the cooling fins to cool the exhaust three-speed transmission just about fifty to fifty-five horsepower incredibly fast for the period visa cars were made famous by one of the most famous men of the last century Lawrence of Arabia he had seven of these had an eighth one he died on the seventh one so the legend continues you know that how fast they were but to me not only they fast actually this was the first Superbike I think that's safe to say certainly in England in Europe a hundred miles an hour and a motorcycle was unbelievable back in the day don't forget most roads were cobblestone they weren't paved it took a lot of guts to drive one of these at those speeds but it's incredibly smooth incredibly fast and still to me I think the best-looking motorcycle of all time will have a full road test on this one too and I love the early to mid 1920s because the car was here to stay by that point and then they just got faster and more sophisticated and I'll show you one of the most sophisticated American cars the period it's called will Sinclair 1922 a man named see Harold wills he was Ford's metallurgist he was a guy that came up with the Ford logo you know the blue oval which we still use today vanadium steel I mean all of that stuff brilliant engineer decided to start his own car company the car was $3,000 in 1922 when Alice is about 1200 so didn't really make it but it was a brilliant piece of engineering I found one the other day it's got some water damage we've got to cast some new parts but take a look at this engine I'll show you what I'm talking about although wills is one of the geniuses behind the Model T this is about as far from Model T we get it's a v8 engine it is overhead cam in his bevel drive overhead cam the fan is gear driven it's aluminum block with iron liners you have iron cylinders here it was in the desert and during the day would bake in the heat and then at night it would when it cooled they were pulling cool air and the whole thing just sort of rusted out and then mice got in it and hate the wires and the my speed all over the thing and just so we're gonna take this engine all apart and cast some new pieces but it is a brilliant piece of engineering sixty-five horsepower 60-degree v8 it's basically two four-cylinder engines put together the ignition system has two sets of points each set runs one side yeah that runs the other side it's loosely based on the Hispano Suiza v8 that was one of the winning winning us engines of world war one in fact it was the first v8 aero engine it's a really amazing engine and I'm really anxious to hear this run I've never heard one of these run they're very fast you know Henry Ford said nobody's gonna go 70 miles an hour but wills he liked to go fast and sad thing is this thing cost three thousand dollars in 1922 a Model T was about two hundred and sixty dollars and a house is about twelve hundred dollars but we will pull the engine out and go through it check everything because it's a real piece of American history and American engineering and speaking of engineering let me take you over to what is probably the scariest car to work on in the garage certainly the most expensive car to work on but the car many people consider the greatest car of the 20th century the McLaren f1 it's time to take the engine out of it and replace the fuel cell and that's that's what we started doing today and it's it's daunting but it's you know it's a lot of fun it's still a car in fact it's sleeping now come on let's go over and say hello [Music] and we actually use the tool when you buy one of these this is a toolkit they gave you and they all get used so see that so it's it's still a car it's still just a car you have to see yourself it's just a car when you chip this little piece of gold leaf and they charge you 12 grand for it it's a car it's a car that's all you have to think that to yourself that's all but the engine comes out to replace the fuel cell they conveniently having replaced the fuel cell every five every five years you have to take the whole engine out but it gave me a chance to go through it and check everything and see what's wrong these are just wonderful wonderful cars to drive still the greatest drivers car I think of the 20th century people like the Ferrari GTO whatever I will take this over at any day of the week it's just a wonderful wonderful car they have wonderful technicians this gentleman named penny who travels the world fixing these cars and he's just just fantastic he does a wonderful job so the angel will be dropped out of this we will place the fuel cell well take it back on the road again I don't know maybe we'll take it out again people seem to like this every seven or eight years you doing a video on this car and people seem to rediscover it again so maybe we'll do that okay it's the next day our film crew is pretty much gone home we're just using this on a simpler camera you don't want to take it McLaren apartment the place is filled with people just get a little crazy parts get lost what we're doing is replacing the fuel cell this is the fuel cell here which is essentially the gas tank what happens is mod ethanol fuels you get a porosity problem that science have come through and leak and when you see getting gas on the ground you don't want to drive over the climate but you don't want to burn this thing to the ground after a place at every 5 years which seems ridiculous they can't make a fuel cell that lasts longer than that but that's the way it is but it's a good chance doesn't go over everything and it's held up well over the last more than a quarter century while people think is just an air intake but there are fuel objectives in here and power and check doesn't have your fuel rail down below but those are in there as well it's complicated but it's still a Commerce the inside of the clam as you can see the carpet fiber has held up extremely well there was talk that carbon fiber would deteriorate after 25 years or so and it's time to crack but it's not it looks structurally very sounded pretty much brand new our gold foil is going up well your air intakes here you can see how light this thing is this is your it hooks to the top of the fuel cell this is where your fuel goes through and take their and the best fuel dripping out there while we have it a plan to just do the general maintenance as you can see we'll come around here these are the hoses that connect to cool the brakes as you can see this car has got quite a few miles on itself these this here it this is nothing fancy this is just standard cooling oh that's easy enough to do we pulled the dampers and the shocks we do an exchange with McLaren they rebuild the shocks and they send it back to you and that's pretty much how that works apart and of course you fix the whole car with using just the McLaren toolbox it toolkit now not really ok that of course the famous Kenwood disc player which had aluminum magnets I know aluminum doesn't magnetize what Gordon Murray did to save weight was take a woman on spray are in filings on it so it became magnetized and saved ounces that's how that's how committed he is to lightweight these are all just the various parts everything is nicely laid out but the car is held up very well over the past 25 years I've had it as I said before there was all this talk to do carbon fiber would deteriorate eventually it hasn't it seems extremely strong extremely rigid all these pieces nothing is torn away from the carbon fiber you know it's not like oh my gosh this is loose because years of and this card it doesn't get beaten but it gets driven hard so it's just nice to go through and do everything right so as we said we what not updating the brakes not going to carbon fiber but keeping the original steel rotors they work fine what 41 miles now orthos and stop so I should be safe on the fault line but that's pretty much where we are we'll just methodically put it back together again and hopefully help us God the rest of my life which is it down hopefully four or five more fuel cells as you may have guessed we filmed this over a couple of days period we've got the engine back in now that's all said the only thing that hasn't been put in this is the exhaust system here this is the muffler with your cats and everything on it these this was also the crush zone for the car that was you know how that works when you get hit it would absorb all the impact for crash testing we'll put that down in a minute but you know I've often said that the f1 is kind of like Pavarotti when you hear it in full song and the muffler yeah it's still a muffler it sounds good but if you've never heard an f1 McLaren without a muffle on it well here's your chance all right hit it [Music] bellisimo all right that's pretty good now we got to put the muffler out of the cops'll stop this see you next week [Music]

Channel: Jay Leno's Garage

Views: 923,235

Rating: 4.9492273 out of 5

Keywords: Jay, Lenos, Garage, McLaren F1, supercar, hypercar, McLaren F1 engine, exhaust, restoration, restomod, Chrysler Imperial, Rochester Duesenberg, Benz Mercedes, Rabbit 1, Brough Superior, Wills St. Clair, Lotus Cortina, Rolls Royce, Spitfire, Detroit Electric, Jay Leno, Jay Leno's Garage, car reviews, compares cars, classic cars, vintage cars, sports cars, super cars, cars, car gear, McLaren P1, Porsche 918 Spyder, Camaro Z28, jay leno garage, jay lenos garage, car collection

Id: w0gPayVLLJk

Length: 21min 59sec (1319 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 01 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/PioneerDingus]

You're really not supposed to post pornography on this sub.

[u/SaraTheWeird]

i love these kinds of videos that Jay makes

[u/[deleted]]

The vintage electric he was upgrading is pretty interesting too.

[u/Spicy_Curry]

thank you bmw

[u/DudeDudenson]

There's no way for compressed video and cellphone speakers to ever make that thing sound as good as it actually sounds

[u/TheWanderingSuperman]

God, Jay is an absolute treasure for the automotive community.

[u/PurpEL]

Jay is amazing

[u/k31advice96]

It will never cease to amuse me how gun owners are all trying to get silencers for their guns while car owners are trying to cut them off.

[u/Freudianslipangle]

It’s funny, he says bellisimo about an English car with a German motor. Ha ha.

Good stuff.