Spent a bit of time with the exhaust putty and the crossbox earlier. Have managed to block most of the gaps and improve things somewhat. If I was down in Worcestershire I'd just make a trip to ECAS to buy another one, but I've learnt how much more difficult (and expensive, and delayed) delivery to the Shetland Islands is, so just not worth the effort. It'll wait till September when I'm next heading down.

PS: Still oil tight.

You could try cutting some tin cans and big jubilee clips with the sealer etc.

True, I'm sure I could cobble something together, only needs to last till Sept. The main test will be the drive from Aberdeen down to Worcester, but it doesn't matter too much if it starts to blow on the way down. In the meantime it only needs to pootle around Unst, Yell and Fetlar, and maybe a trip down to Lerwick. At least the oil leak is (currently) dealt with.

Bit of an update. Felt sure the exhaust was blowing far too loud to just be the crossbox, so today I decided to take another look. Turns out the two nuts holding the manifold to the cylinder head on the driver's side(RHD) had worked loose. After fully tightening them up the engine is much quieter, and the car much more pleasant to drive. Crossbox still needs replacing soon though.

Was hopeful the exhaust crossbox would last till September, but.....

Almost serviceable!

Almost.

Anyway, new crossbox fitted along with new clamps. Have been using it to pootle around the island and the odd day to work. Used it to pop down to Lerwick last week, a round trip of about 120 miles. I'm booked on the overnight ferry to Aberdeen on the 27th and heading down to Worcester to get it MOTed. Fingers are crossed. Once it has a fresh MOT I'll be popping over to France and hopefully head down to the far south.

So tomorrow sees me driving down to Lerwick and boarding the overnight ferry to Aberdeen. I should be off the vessel before 8am on Sunday and have a 450 mile drive down to Worcester to visit family and friends. 2CV is also booked in for a check-up, fettle, service and MOT whilst down there. With luck I'll be heading to France the following weekend for a week to ten days.

So the 2CV had an MOT yesterday and (not unexpectedly) failed. I can't complain as it's only the second time it's failed during my ownership, and it's not as bad as I'd feared/expected. The previous fail was 2 years ago, a year after moving to Shetland, so clearly the climate is taking its toll The good news is that it isn't bad, so with the additional work that I'd wanted done, I should have it back by Friday. Looks like my trip to France is looking much more likely this weekend. Fingers crossed.

The downside/upside (depending on how you look at it) of not having a car is that I've been walking everywhere for the past two days. After dropping the car off in Tibberton, Worcestershire, I walked along the canal towpath into the centre of Worcester, and spent the afternoon walking around the shops. A total of just under 19 miles walked. I also walked into Worcester yesterday and ended up walking 14 miles. Feeling surprisingly well this morning, but intending on not being quite so active. I'm still looking at popping over to the local Halfrauds store though, and that's a 5 mile round walk.

So I've been without the Deuche since Monday morning and as I mentioned in my last post I walked 19 miles on Monday and 14 miles on Tuesday. Well yesterday was meant to be a relaxing day, but I ended up walking some 12.5 miles, and so far today I'm at 6.3 miles. On the plus side I'll be having the 2CV back tomorrow with a fresh MOT. Jobs needing doing were replacing the rear brake cylinders and shoes, a full set front brake pads, removal of engine oil contamination of pretty much everything under the bonnet, and a wee bit of welding (quite a bit actually) of rear offside seat-belt mount. Just waiting on a few additional things to be done, namely replacing the oil filler/ crankcase valve with a brand new item from ECAS, and replacing two tyres that were getting close to the limit but still legal. Just need to decide whether or not to go to France for a week now.