Tech tips for today

Thought I might impart a few tech tips that spring to mind as a result of goings on in the w/shp this week. Firstly be careful when fitting or refitting your 6 cyl oil filter adapter to your block. We have a couple of instances recently of terminal and near terminal cranks and or crank shells as a result of damaged or incorrect spec inner 'O' rings that go between the adapter and block. The first was a week or two ago and the seal that had been fitted was far to small in profile and was allowing unfiltered oil to go straight to the shells/crank. Fortunately the crank survived unscathed but we had to change the shells and this on an engine that had run less than an hour, not fitted by us of course, but by a 'professional' garage never the less! The second was on a car in for an engine change this week because of a noisy crank. On taking the adapter off Karl noticed that the inner 'O' ring had been damaged when it had been fitted, again allowing unfiltered oil straight to the crank.
Second tech tip. We have a lovely PI saloon in the w/shp that was losing power and dying. All the usual culprits were blamed pre seeing the car diagnosis, fuel pump, prv, etc, etc. Poor old Lucas PI it always gets the blame and 90% of the time its something else. As it was this time, any thoughts as to what it might be? No. Try this, the car had recently been fitted with a refurbished tank with some of that miracle gunk injected that is supposed to line the tank with a bullet proof layer. Well within a couple of weeks this layer was starting to be washed off by the petrol! Sheets of the stuff were being sucked into the outlet and giving the in line filters a coronary.
We had a similar thing a year or so back with a TR6, a great big glob of silicon sealer was rolling around in the tank, the car would go great for a while and then the sealer would roll over the outlet, and then? Well you know the rest.
Talking of TR6's and silicon sealer, we have had a nice red 125bhp car in the w'shp this week. The owner was being passed between pillar and post with various traders 'having a go' at fixing the leaks from around his metering unit. Having reached the end of his tether and having shelled out for recon metering unit and loads of labour to no avail he was pointed in our direction. What did we find? Metering unit pedestal seals shagged, allowing fuel to drain from the m/unit past the first seal and exit via the tell tale hole in the pedestal. It was worse than that though, whoever had fitted the metering unit last had fitted far to small a profile 'O' ring between the m/unit and pedestal, and decided to back that up with a good application of silicon sealer! It gets better, the m/unit had been timed 180 degrees out and the distributor clamp wasn't (clamping!), allowing the dizzy to float around to its hearts content, no wonder it ran like a bag of poo! A couple of hours labour and a couple of quid for some new seals/O rings, and the thing is really sweet, lovely and smooth, and no leaks!
That's it for today, I'm orf.

What I mostly did today

My average day, or a day in the life of.

Out of the house for 5.30AM fire up the Chicane and cane it all the way to work through the lovely empty Warwickshire roads. 10 minutes later open up the shop and offices and get the kettle on! Whilst the kettle is boiling do all the required computer reports. Spend 20 mins replying to e-mail, while the last of the reports get churned out. Spend the rest of the time before the rest of the crew start turning up at 8.45 alternating between purchase ordering and e-mail. When the 'normal' office crew turn up I beat a hasty retreat to the w/shps. 10AM load up the Chicane for a trip into Coventry to do the rounds, machine shops,blasting company, platers, and two suppliers. Interesting aside, whilst at one of the machine shops I bump into the owner of a 'works' Triumph rally car, we get talking (as you do), might lead to some work on said car, nice. Get back to work for lunch time, eat turkey salad roll on the move, whilst talking to Andy Roberts (owner of Del Lines V8 saloon we are restoring)who has pitched up all unexpected like. Andy leaves after viewing progress and I spend the rest of the afternoon cleaning and tidying my engine building workshop in preparation for a concerted effort to catch up on backorders in that department. Make a good start on a 2ltr GT6 engine for a car in Karl's w/shp. Have a quick check on current sales orders and see that I have got to build 5 engines of various specs before I have caught up and can start building stock again, bugger, its a good job I love the work. 5.30 the car park Grand Prix kicks off and Phil and Eve are the first away, leaving the w/shp crew to try and shoehorn the customers cars back inside for the night (16 customers cars on site). The last of the dayshift departs leaving yours truly to spend a couple of hours working on the new catalogue whilst waiting for a delivery from a supplier due in at 8.30ish. Probably knock it on the head about 9.30 and cane the Chicane home through the once again deserted country roads, there you have it, boring aint it!
David

TR6

Today I was mostly fixin a TR6