Zel's Fleet Blog - BX, Jag XJ-S, Sinclair C5, Mercedes 208D & 230TE, AC Model 70.

[Gibbo2286]

A report on the new scanner would be interesting to me.

[Zelandeth]

A report on the new scanner would be interesting to me.

I'll try to put together something. It seems to do what it says on the tin though.

-- -- --

Some of you may remember me picking this contraption a few months ago.



Progress on its revival was abruptly halted by the power supply losing interest in supplying power. Which I have finally decided to have a look in to.

Took a bit of time to figure out how to get it out but I soon had it on the desk. At which point I said some very unpleasant things about some IBM engineers.

The power supply has a plastic structural case - which has an RF shield RIVETED on to it.

Swearing and violence ensued.



Revealing a pretty busy unit which isn't exactly the easiest to work on I've come across.



Little daughter boards sticking out of it all over the place, and so far no useful documentation. The most common issue apparently is this STR81159 regulator though, so swapping that and a basic re-capping session will be our first port of call.



As seems to be a common theme for me, I can't easily just swap this unit for something off the shelf because we have a couple of awkward rails. We need +5V, +12V, -12V those are simple enough, but there's also a HT rail supplied for the plasma display. Which so far I've seen listed as anywhere between 100V and 600V. Obviously I need to do a bit more digging to find out what that rail actually needs to be. On the plus side I can reverse engineer that at least as this uses exactly the same panel as several Toshiba portables I own and have in working condition so I can just measure that. The other one which annoyingly isn't present on modern off-the-shelf PC supplies is -5V.

So if we can revive the original supply that's likely to be the least hassle in terms of having to fabricobble something together to supply all that lot. If we need to at least there's plenty of space to work with compared to the last project!

[Zelandeth]

Had a call early on this afternoon to say the P6's heads were ready for collection.



That looks a bit better.



Certainly a lot better than I was ever going to manage by hand. £54 each after the VAT, which was a lot less than I had expected. Seem to remember it cost me more than that last time I had a head skimmed, and that was 20 odd years ago.

They'll definitely be getting the job when I get the head pulled from the Renault then.

Hopefully will be able to start getting it put back together tomorrow. I had to resist the temptation to start today as it's a job I'd really rather not run out of time or steam halfway through, making the mistakes which then inevitably happen when I start rushing.

[MattBLancs]

Looks spot on that, and I'm surprised soo cheap! I wonder if they are similar enough to one another that getting the machine set up is dead quick for the second head, so time saved helping with cost?

[Gibbo2286]

Get the right engineer and they are often surprisingly cheap, I have a commercial Karcher pressure washer, it started spewing water out of places it shouldn't, took it to pieces and found that the three pistons were chrome plated, the plating had lifted and torn the seals. Karcher wanted £42 each for them so I asked the local engineer if he could make copies in stainless steel, he did so and when I asked "how much" he said "give me a fiver"

[mickthemaverick]

I don't know if this floats your boat Zel? It's in a general sale rather than a specialist so may be cheaper than normal!

BFTW

Details here

[Zelandeth]

I don't know if this floats your boat Zel? It's in a general sale rather than a specialist so may be cheaper than normal!



Details here

The software and peripherals definitely are of interest, though I do already have an 800XL. Sadly not really in a position to be bidding on anything right now as it's been a really expensive couple of months, so trying to curtail unnecessary spending. I do appreciate the heads up though. On another month that's something I may well have chucked a bid on.

-- -- --

Busy day. I now hurt in places I didn't know I had.

Starting point. Well...actually a few days ago, but I forgot to get a photo before I started.



First up the heads were built up with the new valves. These had already been lapped in ready to fit a few days back.



Briefly interrupted...well actually interrupted for the best part of half an hour, when I couldn't find one of the valve keepers. Which I had carefully bagged up with each valve's hardware. Of course it turned out to be sitting right in front of me didn't it?



Sneaky little sod.

Checked the torque values in the manual before starting to put anything in the car.



Right hand head fitted to the engine and torqued down.



Joined shortly after by the left hand one.



Rocker shafts refitted.



Exhaust manifolds reconnected with new gaskets. Yes, the rearmost bolt on the right hand bank was precisely as much of a pain in the tail to put back in as it was to get out.





Nearside was actually a bit of a faff as the exhaust had sagged a bit while it had been disconnected and holding its own weight for the last couple of weeks, so I had to use a jack to help lift it up to get the first bolts in. If I had a helper I could have probably got them to help lift it, but working by myself I had to improvise a bit.

Then got out the old oil gun and gave all of the cam followers and camshaft itself a thorough dousing in fresh oil as it's all been open to the elements for the last couple of weeks.





Then the valley cover/intake manifold gasket was refitted and the inlet manifold went back on.



At which point, after I'd refitted most of the coolant lines, I realised I'd forgotten something kind of important. These clamps which hold down the ends of the valley cover, which are meant to go on before the manifold.





Oops.

You *can* get them in with the manifold already in place it turns out, but really shouldn't. It's really awkward, especially the front one which is wedged right under one of the coolant lines.

Oil can came out again to give all the valves and rocker shafts etc a good oiling.



A lot of swearing ensued reassembling the Rube Goldberg nonsense of a throttle linkage/kickdown cable nonsense. Why they couldn't just have used a cable I've no idea.



Starting to look a lot more like an engine again.



Things to follow tomorrow:

[] Fathom out exactly how the spring clip that holds the throttle linkage together is meant to go back together.

[] Change engine oil & filter.

[] Refill coolant.

[] Change spark plugs.

[] Refit HT leads.

[] Retrieve the dipstick support bracket from where I dropped it under the car just before wrapping up this afternoon and refit it.

Then cross my fingers that it will actually run again after all of this...ideally on all eight cylinders!

Feels like a reasonable amount of work to get done in an afternoon though.

Definitely will be adding an electric ratchet to my toolbox soon though, that would have saved me a fair amount of time and definitely arm pain. Especially for things like the exhaust manifolds which were slightly too tight to spin up by hand but have quite long threads on this engine. Just a time saver it would be nice to have.

Hopefully we'll be up and running tomorrow. Hopefully!

[CitroJim]

Excellent work Zel A day very well spent! If you ever wanted to check and be sure all is good, I have a compression tester here...

[Hell Razor5543]

Zel, you are one of the most persistent people I have never met. I would not have the patience to rebuild a simple 4 cylinder engine, let alone a V8!

[Zelandeth]

Zel, you are one of the most persistent people I have never met. I would not have the patience to rebuild a simple 4 cylinder engine, let alone a V8!

I have had a bit of a reputation for being stubborn since I was about ten!

Excellent work Zel A day very well spent! If you ever wanted to check and be sure all is good, I have a compression tester here...

Thanks Jim, hopefully won't come to that! These are very forgiving engines generally, so provided it's running properly I'm not too worried about exact numbers. I do actually have a compression tester here, albeit one which was very cheap and nasty when I bought it probably 25 years ago, so is basically only capable of saying "yes there's some compression here" or otherwise. Precision isn't a word you can use in relation to it.

-- -- --

First job for today was to basically finish putting things back together.

Oil & filter got changed. Which was timed well as I got it done right as a rain shower started, so I was glad to have the bit involving crawling around under the car done.

Reconnected this little linkage which attaches the throttle linkage to the carbs. Getting the little spring clip back on was fiddly. Glad I didn't persist in trying to do that while I was tired yesterday. I'd probably have pinged it off into oblivion never to be seen again.



Coolant was refilled. Using OAT coolant as that's what came out. I'd rather see this using old school glycol coolant, and will probably switch back to that when I change the coolant properly. It's quite murky so definitely wants flushed out at some point soon, this job had only drained about half the radiator, so I was just refilling like for like for now.

Changing the spark plugs didn't happen. Simply because the ones I'd picked up were the wrong size. So I just cleaned up the ones I'd got.

Then reconnected the HT leads, having had the forethought to mark number 1 before I took things apart. Rotor rotation is clockwise.



Before I actually connected the coil I did crank the engine over just to make sure we didn't have any noises coming from anywhere and actually had even sounding compression - which we did. No big obvious skip when it was turning over.

Fast forward a couple of minutes...



This isn't actually the first start - there's a couple of minutes run time already on there. I didn't have anywhere where you'd have been able to see anything I could have wedged my phone, and I didn't want to miss something important because I was concentrating on recording video.

We did have a couple of coolant leaks initially, one from the lower heater hose and one from the top radiator hose. These are quite old hoses so I needed to ensure the hose clamps were lined up where they used to be. A new set of hoses is on the to do list.

What we also had was a hell of a lot of smoke from the exhaust manifolds. I knew I'd spilled some oil, coolant etc on there while the heads were being removed and the block cleaned etc. However I was quite surprised by the sheer volume of smoke that was generated while it burned off.

Proof the car has moved under its own power again.



Which allowed me to retrieve the things I'd dropped while working on the car. One washer from a carb base, a thousand old exhaust manifold gaskets, and the bolt from the dipstick support. Not bad.

We did a quick bumble round the block. So, so much smoother as you'd expect. Though seemed very hesitant on a light throttle after a minute or two.

Ah.



Initially I figured this was my leak from the top coolant hose having returned, but quickly realised this was actually petrol pouring out of the bowl vent from the offside carb. Yep, that would explain the lumpy running. This is why it's really important to ensure the drain tubes on those ports are properly fitted as it meant this harmlessly drained down onto the ground rather than dumping it over the top of the engine.

Gently tapping the fuel inlet to the carb in a highly technical manner with a screwdriver handle has restored it's continence for now, but I figure they're both probably going to really want a proper inspection and clean. In fairness that carb has been sitting upside down in the boot for the last couple of weeks so it's well within its rights to be a bit grumpy.

Idle speed is quite high, but running a lot smoother now.



I'll be doing a little more testing etc over the next couple of days.

After a few heat cycles we will go back and recheck the head bolt torque as things settle.

First trip to an actual destination more than a mile away will be to get the tracking sorted. Currently there is a ridiculous amount of toe out, and that needs seen to!

Hopefully it's onwards and upwards from here.

[mickthemaverick]

Well done Zel, a nice purr to perk the mind!!

[CitroJim]

Excellent Zel That's absolute magic and great to see Just a few teething troubles to resolve now and you'll be ready to waft!

[MattBLancs]

Excellent work, sounds lovely

[c16rkc]

What a great revelation that it's run under it's own steam!

You make this all look so easy

[Zelandeth]

What a great revelation that it's run under it's own steam!

You make this all look so easy

In fairness, this is about as simple as it gets for work like this. This is very much a classic case of "an engine" as you'd see in a textbook from the period. Especially being an OHV engine so I don't need to worry about messing with the timing components.

A couple of awkward bolts and figuring out how on earth the throttle linkage worked were about the most difficult bits.

Excellent work, sounds lovely

Interesting sound to it, the long straight front exhaust section does ring quite noticeably, just like on my last Saab. I get the impression from the limited testing so far that the noise that comes out the back will be suitably throaty under load. I tend to go more for quiet these days...but I'll make an exception for a Rover V8...

Excellent Zel That's absolute magic and great to see Just a few teething troubles to resolve now and you'll be ready to waft!

Fingers crossed. Imagine there's going to be a fair amount of gremlins to be evicted yet. Getting the tracking will be high on that list so it doesn't feel quite so sketchy when going in a straight line at more than 10mph. Oh...and replacing the tyres from the 90s. That is going to sting a bit. Okay, sting a lot.

-- -- --

Started straight up today...and promptly started pouring fuel out of the *other* carb.

Service kit for both has been ordered. Probably just need some slime cleaned out of the float needles, but I'll at the very least need bowl gaskets if I open them up, and it would be maddening to realise I needed something else 90% of the way through putting things back together. I really need carb to manifold gaskets anyway as the head gasket kit didn't come with them.

I'll swap the fuel filter at the weekend as well in case it's breaking up internally and shedding stuff into the system.

Yesterday was the first time I'd been aware of this issue, but if it's been ongoing for a while this could go a long way to explain the ridiculous amount of fuel contamination we had in the oil when the car arrived here.

I do appreciate Rover/SU having made a really good effort to provide a safe drain in case of a sticking float rather than just dumping it over the engine. Something which really shouldn't have been needed in normal use, so they could have just had the vent left as it was, but no they were nice enough to put a line running well clear of hot areas before dumping the fuel.





Oil and coolant levels were exactly where they were left yesterday at least which was good to see.