Swifty's Navigator

[Mister Towed]

I'm running a Vitesse mk1 motor on a mk2 cam. It's supposed to have been rebuilt with an unleaded head at some stage in its life, but having taken the head off and found it crusted up with sooty crud I doubt that. Even so, it runs fine on bog standard Tesco unleaded - the mixture's a bit rich but that's worn out Strombergs for you. I also ran it with methanol injection for the first six thousand miles and only took it off because the air box I made was restricting the airflow so much it cancelled out any increase in power.

Overall, the Triumph six is a pretty simple old lump - mine even ran with the cam installed 180 degrees out - so I'd say there must be a relatively simple problem somewhere in the system. Hopefully a bit of trial and error will find it and it'll be a simple fix when you do. Good luck!

Oh, just a thought, I ran a modified '67 Beetle back in the 90's and had a similar problem with it cutting out or not starting when hot. It turned out to be a faulty (new) Bosch coil.

[swifty]

Cheers Mr T, I've had the head converted to run on unleaded while it was stripped down so all should be ok there.

I don't know if you noticed but i have mentioned on here on a number of occasions about the carbs flooding but after thinking about it it looks to be more of a fuel vapor issue, the reason i say this is that after the hot engine is switched off fuel comes out of the overflow port on the flange where the air filter bolts to so in theory the fuel pump has stopped so no more fuel being pumped through to the carbs but the fuel spurts out of the overflow in fits and starts if that makes sense which leads me to believe the ethanol in the fuel is vaporizing and causing the spurts in fuel i.e. higher pressures.

If the fuel supply pipe is pulled off releasing the pressure slightly then refitted the fuel no longer comes out of the overflow port for a minute or so but then start to spurt out slightly this time but with less vigor.

So with this in mind i hope the re routed fuel line prevents the fuel pressure building up causing the carbs to over flow plus i intend to make a inline fitting so that i can attach a fuel pressure gauge in at various point's of the fuel supply pipe to hopefully help diagnose the problem. Well that's what i hope.

[lancelot link]

A quick phonecall to Mark at Southern Triumph Services here in Bournemouth might not be a bad idea ...hes a decent guy who is always happy to help and is regarded nationally as somewhat of an anorak on these Beasts ...Hes often the 'quoted professional' in many magazine articles etc..

[deggsy]

Are you using a mechanical or electric fuel pump? it's a lot easier to isolate the fuel lines from the heat source if you use an electric one. On my A352 I have the fuel pump in the boot.

[deggsy]

I've just been back reading your thread and see you are using a mechanical pump, electric may be the way to go? or just a temp setup to check it out.

[swifty]

lancelot link and deggsy Thanks for the info guys.



Success at last.

Re-routed the fuel line temporarily away from the rear of the block by feeding it across the bulk head, the engine now starts when hot so very pleased with that one.

I also piped in a fuel pressure gauge to see what pressure the mechanical pump was putting out and to my surprise it's pumping at 8psi which is way above the recommended 2.5 psi/o.17 bar when running stromberg's so tomorrow I'll hard pipe the fuel line back in and re connect the filter king to see if the regulator drops the pressure to 2.5 psi.


IMG_6619.jpg

Photo of pressure gauge with pump running.

With the starting problem sorted i am very close to booking the MOT once a couple more jobs are completed.


Well that's it for now see you all soon.

[phil9]

great news ..i use a fuel pressure regulator can adjust from .5 to 6psi i have it set at 3psi for my motor bike carbs on new engine.. but always used mechanical pump at 8 psi for stroms with no prob good news well done

[deggsy]

Glad to hear you've got it sorted.

[phil9]

[swifty]

Cheer's Phil for the photo, interesting to hear you ran with 8 psi with no problems on stroms.

I've already got a filter king mounted to the bulk head so i am going to give that a try with its built in regulator.


Something that has been bothering me for a while was the under side of the bonnet which looked out of place with the rest of the paint work so today with the weather being good i decided to sand the rough spots out then skimming over with filler, the whole job has ended up being a full 8hrs on the job.


IMG_6620.jpg

Ready to paint hopefully tomorrow if the weathers good.



IMG_6584.jpg IMG_6575.jpg

Fitted the spyder badge to the back panel today before i started sanding the bonnet. Fitting the badge was pretty simple, i masked the area off first with masking tape then worked around the center of the car before drilling the holes for the stainless pins in the back of the badge, i put small blobs of black grease on each pin then pushed the badge down onto the masking tape which left small dot prints on the masking tape where each hole had to be drilled.

The pins were fitted to the badge to give it something to glue to the body, i wasn't confident enough to just glue the badge directly to the body.


Well that's it for now see you all soon.

[jones]

Swifty I am a big fan of your car, nice shots too of the exterior the badge looks great there. You're not going to get much mileage on it, for everyone stopping you to admire it! Great work

[phil9]

cars looking great..... filter kings one of the best i no all about a 1hr jobs that lead to 7or8 am on one at mo with my car ...?

[Paul L]

Swifty - Your paint looks very deep in those low light photos.

Given the high standard of the rest of your build, it makes sense to do the inside of the bonnet.

Although when I had a look at doing that to mine, I put it into the "come back to later" pile.

Good luck with the last few jobs before the MOT.

Take care, Paul.

[Mister Towed]

I just plastered a thick coat of a rubber type underseal paint on the underside of my bonnet and inside the rear wheel arches. Serves a dual purpose of giving the finish an 'I meant it' look and preventing stone chips as I never fitted arch liners. So far I haven't had a stone chip come through from underneath in almost 3 years and 8,000 miles driven so it seems to have done the trick.



That's the best picture I have I'm afraid. It was black when I put it on but it got a coating of fibreglass dust when I cut through the bonnet to add a clearance blister while it was still tacky. I've still got the tin somewhere, I'll dig it out and let you know what it was.

Paint looks superb btw, great job. Does it look as dark a red in daylight?

[swifty]

Paul L The bonnet was also on my to do list later but as i haven't got the stick on number plate sorted just yet which means i am unable to book an MOT i thought i would make good use of the good weather plus once its on the road it will be hard to get round to doing jobs like rubbing the under side of the bonnet which i can definitely say was mind numbing and i did have a few moments of "why did i start this".

Mr T Spraying with a thick rubber coating was probably the way to go, less hassle plus good protection. I do intend on fitting front ally wheel arches to protect against stone crazing on the front arches but this is on my to do list.

The paint colour is lighter in normal light, the close up rear end shot was taken when the sun was going down plus the garden is surrounded by large trees hence a diffused moody light, before i started this car photography was my main hobby so i like to play around with the camera.

[swifty]

Today the bonnet under side was sprayed so one more job ticked off.


IMG_6621.jpg

Under coat on which reveled a few small hollows so skimmed over with filler then a quick sand ready for the top coat.



IMG_6623.jpg

Top coat on just need to cut the mask lines back in around the bonnet edge. Its not perfect but a far sight better than it was.


Next major job to do is the tonneau cover, Ive had a few quotes from local companies and to be honest they are expensive the cheapest quote is £750 for a tonneau cover and two head cushions.
I am now looking at making my own and found Woolies to be very helpful and i reckon it will cost me about £120 all in, just need to see if the missus can make one.


Well that's it for now see you all soon.

[Mister Towed]

£750 for a tonneau cover? OUCH!

Brockwell's in King's Lynn charged me £130 all in to make and fit the full tonneau cover in red Mohair with white piping. They needed the car for an afternoon, it took them about four hours start to finish.

Swifty's asked me to take some pictures of the underside of the covers, so here you go -



All the edges are double thickness, presumably for strength -



There's a fillet let into the driver's side which creates a bulge for the steering wheel to sit in -





And the fixtures are 'lift the dot' fasteners front and rear and press studs along the sides -





I take my hat off to you if you can make your own cover Swifty, but I've got to say I can't recommend Brockwell's highly enough. If you're not happy with what you end up making, rather than paying through the nose locally, it'd probably be cheaper for you to stay overnight in a King's Lynn hotel, leave the car with Brockwell's for half a day and maybe visit one or two local attractions, like the classic car auction made famous by Clarkson et al -

http://www.angliacarauctions.co.uk/en/classic-auctions/

Best of luck.

[lancelot link]

Or maybe get the wife to make a quick pattern version using a cheap fabric and post it to them to use to make you a nicer ' no offence Mrs Swifty !! ' version ?
They could mail it back to you ?
If they don't or won't do the mail order thing perhaps a local Sammio-ista could help out with the postage side of things ?

If it was a Spyder not a Nav. they could have used an existing Norfolk example as a pattern ! but the Nav underwent a few changes in the body dept. so they wont be the same ...

[phil9]

mine and barrys tonneau also from brockwells of kings lynn think they was 115.. for mine and 120 for barrys its was getting on for 5 years ago now ..toweds is mohair very nice... had work done from them over the years and there been doing car triming for classic hot rods bikes u name it for years 750 a joke

[phil9]

hope that helps