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June 2005

Post Curborough track day repairs

After the track day there were a few faults with the car. Some of which have now been fixed and others still need further investigation. There aren't any pictures though.

Radiator Cap and water leak

As mentioned in the track day report I managed to lose the radiator cap for the car. I did obtain a replacement from a motor factor in Lichfield but this proved to be the wrong size so I knew that something had to be done when I got home.

The water leak looked fairly easy to fix as it seemed to be just leaking from one of the pipes at the bottom of the radiator. A bit of investigation later and it looked like the jubilee clip clamping the hose was at fault as it had rusted and wasn't that tight.

So I went and had a rumage through the spares in the garage - I couldn't find any clips but did come across a spare radiator cap! I don't know why I bought a spare but it was there and fitted perfectly. I did have to go to the motor factors to get a couple of clamps which when fitted appear to have fixed the leak. I say appear as leaks have a nasty habit of coming back when you least expect them!

Oil Leak

For ages I have thought the oil leak came from the sump gasket and have never got around to fixing it. However for once I decided to look at it and noticed that there was a lot of oil on the front of the engine. This seemed strange as oil doesn't normally flow up! It now appears that the rocker cover gasket has been leaking and causing all the problems.

It took me about 3 hours using thinners to wipe all the oil from the top of the engine and then refit the rocker cover with a new gasket held in place with sealant, since then I have only run the car once but the leak appears to have been reduced if not stopped completely - I will report back on this.

Fuel Filters

Not one I have fixed yet but the first fuel filter (between the tank and pump) is very badly clogged up with muck from the tank so that will be replaced soon (it is only a cheap disposable so won't cost much money). At the same time I will also change the pre carb filter as the element in that is getting dirty and probably check the carb filters as well as there doesn't seem to be any point in only doing half a job.

Engine mounts

The engine mounts did need replacement as it kept trying to come out of the engine bay when on full throttle, so something had to be done.

I started off by deciding the best way to replace these would be to put the front of the car up on ramps and then use my engine crane to hold the engine whilst I replaced the mounts. It would then be an easy job to lower the engine back into the car. Well that was the theory...

Putting the car on ramps was fairly easy, however I then found that the engine crane legs are wider than the gap between the ramps so one of the legs had to go through the base of the ramp, this severly limited manuouvering room. The other big problem was that the engine doesn't have any lifting brackets - a fact which I will rectify the next time I am browsing round a scrappy. Because of this the only way to lift the engine was to use an exhaust header and the inlet manifold with suitable chains. Once this had all been sorted it was fairly easy to lift the engine and remove the old misshapen mounts, replacing them with the new ones. For reference the part numbers are Quinton Hazell PB670 for the exhaust and PB672 for the inlet side (I need a taller mount to allow the carbs to not smash themselves into the chassis rail.

Once the new rubber mounts were fitted onto the tiger metal engine legs the fun really started with a large engine deciding that it didn't want to be in the correct position and was a lot happier sitting at an angle. An hour of struggling later and I finally got one side to drop into the hole in the chassis, once that had been done it was easy to fit the second side and tighten the engine up.

The pictures below show the job being done.

Equipment to change the engine mounts Another view (with the porsche sneaking an appearance)

Fuel Filters

As mentioned previously the first filter between the tank and the pump was rather clogged, this you can see from the pictures below (I think you might be able to work out which is the new filter). Changine it was very easy as I had run the fuel tank almost dry first. In fact I ran it so dry that the fuel pump wouldn't prime without having to put some more fuel in!

Seriously though, the car might develop more power as it is no longer trying to suck fuel through the muck in the old filter. I think for the cost (£1.50) it would be better to change this filter every year as a regular service item.

Is this the old filter? Must be this one then!