Mjit
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Posts posted by Mjit
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A lot depends how much you like to tinker.
If the suspension's just tired and needs a refresh then yes to poly bushes (I've used both Polybush and Superflex and both seem like new after many miles) but probably just standard dampers.
If you like to tinker then 1" lower springs at the front and a 1/2" or 3/4" spring spacer at the back work well, along with adjustable shocks.
- Koni's are fine but boy are they a PITA to adjust - you basically have to strip the suspension down every time you want to adjust them.
- I've got Spax on the rear of my Spitfire and they've given the bast part of 20 years trouble free service. Adjustment can be done on-car but is a bit of a pain as it's via a slotted screw type adjuster and you can never seem to be able to quite get the screwdriver in and to turn enough to adjust without removing the wheel, which means jacking the car up.
- Personally I'd recomment Avo's, which I have on the front of my Spit. and rear of my 2000. Both have given trouble-free service, probably 15 years on the Spit., and both can be adjusted easilly on the car too (knurled knob for firmness and a 'C' spanner for the adjustable seats on the Spitfire fronts.
When I was looking at different shocks I found roughly equal number of people who swore by, and swore at each brand.
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A spot of back-of-the-fag-packet maths says:
31lb = 14kg / 18" = 0.46m (trying to do engineering calculations in imperial units is a form of Sadomasochism)
14kg under gravity exerts a force of 137N
137N on a 0.46m moment arm is a torque of 63Nm, or 46ft lb.To give that some context - 10 nuts torqued to 46lb ft is enough to keep an air tight seal between the engine block and head under the force of 200 little bombs going off every second (I THINK my maths is right there - 6,000RPM = 100RPS, and 2 cylinders fire every rvolution?)
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23 hours ago, dougbgt6 said:
Easier to say than do!
They are buggers to get out particularly with a wire attached. And why would you want to re-use them as they are part of the problem?
Doug
They are just held in by a plastic 'tang' and yes, if you wanted to re-use the fuse box they WOULD be a bugger to release. If you're scrapping the old one you can just jam a small screwdriver down there from the fuse side and break the tang.
While the existing connectors can be part of the problem that's just due to surface corrosion which is easy to clean when they are 'between fuseboxes'...and it's a much lazier option.
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16 hours ago, dougbgt6 said:
Pete,
1500 Spitfire will be like iana's and the wires crimped. So you'll have to cut and re-crimp if you're going for like for like. This box has a fixing screw on each corner. Worth checking out the 10 blade conversion threads on here.
Doug
If doing a straight like-for-like swap then you don't need to cut/recrimp, just release the connectors from the old fuse box (with more or less predudice considering it's scrap) and after a quick clean slot those in to the new box (binning the new connectors that came with the new fuse box).
Experience has told me you'll end up swearing while trying to get the foam gasket to compress enough for the plastic fuse box clips to clip, usually resulting in one catching/another not quite catching, overloading the caught one and snapping it...
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1 hour ago, Tanky said:
It has MX5 seats but I get the originals with it which will have to be refurbished and recovered. Any ideas?
Unless you're:
- Looking to make the car as original as possible.
- Just drive it a few miles to the local country pub on a Sunday.
- Tall.
keep the MX5 seats!
Even freshly rebuilt with new foams the standard seats start to show that the Spitfire was built to a price on a longer drive, and nowhere near as comfortable as the MX5 ones.
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So external feed removed and blanking plug fitted. Not tried a start-up yet, due to assorted other jobs going on at the same time - but should try it some time this week and will update...
Currently been distracted by finding that the random brown wire that starts on the battery positive terminal goes...direct to the gear stick O/D switch, then on, direct to the solonoid. Having player the game of replacing a failed inhibitor swich with the garbox in situe before I can't ay it's a job I'm looking forward to tackling, but one that needs doing before anything else (like me forgetting).
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OK, so here (for people to either agree sounds sensible or scream NNNNNOOOOOO!!!!! at) is my current plan.
- Assume the feed was just bolted on with no restrictor/blanking grub screw in the head/block.
- Remove the feed/fit the blanking plug.
- Remove the rocker cover and give everything a solid wipe down with blue towel, to remove all visible oil.
- Start the car and run for a few minutes, so the oil has had a chance to build pressure and get pumping around everywhere it can get to.
- Switch off and remove the rocker cover again.
If it's still bone dry, assume there IS a restrictor in the block, mumble a bit, then refit the external feed (with new crush washers).
If it's once more slick with oil 'up top' assume there ISN'T a restrictor and go for it.Worst case I can swap the engine for the one in the parts car.
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Removing based on experience with the one on my Spitfire. Great for oil consumption and spraying the bonnet of the car behind at start-up but not much else. Even more so on the 6 cylinder as, unless it's the Kastner spider version, you take oil from the marginal crank feed to over oil the rocker shaft. And I mean, when was the last time you saw people complaining about excess rocker shaft wear on our engines...?
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OK, so working through the to-do list on my new 2000 and got to removing the external oil feed...
Now these can be fitted properly, with a restriction in the internal oil gallery, but usually aren't. Obviously taking the head off and looking is the sure fire way to check but...well that's just a ball ache. I'm tempted to just remove it but does anyone know how much oil you should see under the rocker box?
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Some other options:
- Just use 1 speaker/1 of the speaker wire pairs - not much makes major use of stereo, and wit the general din in a Spitfire you probably won't notice.
- Make up some boxes and put separate left/right speakers down in the footwells, sat on top the sill 'shelf'.
- Fit Mk 1 MX-5 seats (with in-seat stereo speakers.
- Fit a pair of bigger speakers in the panel in front of the fuel tank.
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13 hours ago, johny said:
No need to go electric as that introduces even more complication. How about a rebuild kit for your old pump?
Perhaps if you have an original Triumph pump but I'm going to swap to electric over the coming months as I'm getting through repro pumps at the rate of about 1 per-year (they just start leaking everywhere) - and the repro pump designs seems to change subtly every year so you order a rebuild kit and it isn't quite right for the repro pump you bought from the same supplier last year...
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Guess it depends if you car has drain taps in both the radiator and block or not. My Spitfire doesn't so "drain coolant" means "cover every available surface in coolant, catching mybe 10% in a tray".
Drain taps with a bit of pipe in to a bucket should work to recycle though?
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You're now at the point I'd never use a waterless coolant - while I accept the science and they they are technically better than water+glycol they are a hell of a lot more expensive...and you now need to drain yours to replace the water pump. Doh!
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Do poly spring eye bushes make much difference? I've polybushed most things on my car but took one look at the spring eye bushes and how tightly they were in and decided to leave them, as even the (probably original) ones on the nackered spring I was replacing looked to be in good condition and I wasn't getting any clonking (from there).
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1 hour ago, Pete Lewis said:
One can only guess they introduced the front spoiler to counteract blocking the air flow with the reg plate in an attempt to scoop
Having fitted a 1500 spoiler to my Mk4, so driven it both with and without I very much doubt that's why it was added. Adding the spoiler makes a huge difference to the net lift generated over the bonnet and so at motorway speeds the steering's nice and firm, rather than rather quite light without.
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A semi-matt/semi-glass was what I'd assumed - but it's BL in the 70s we're talking about, so quite possible what it was MEANT to look like wasn't even the same as what it did look like by the time the new car got to the dealership 😁
Thanks for that link Mad4classics - I'm using Rustins Plastic Coating (based on an big saloon Courier article from 2012) and while I found lots of info online about getting a high gloss finish I struggled to find much beyond "Use steel wool for a matt or satin finish.".
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Hi,
Is there anyone from 'back in the day' who can remember how glossy or not the wood dash finish was when our cars were new?
I'm in the process of revaneering my '70s 2000 and Spitfire wood and unsure where in the cloudy matt to mirror gloss spectrum it should be.
Or was cloudy, yellow, and pealing how they left the factory? 😁
Thanks
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20 hours ago, dougbgt6 said:
db
Doh, missed that bit.
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Unless you're adjusting them on a slope/a very small space just shove it in 4th, take the hand brake off and roll the car to turn the crank.
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I lost faith in my torque wrench too so went digital - https://www.machinemart.co.uk/p/040215238/
Can't remember the last time I went with one of my old style torque wrenches - not least because I can set the digital one to lb/ft and not have to convert the workshop manual lb/ft to N/m for my torque wrench. Also found I can get it in to a few spaces there just wasn't room to swing the big torque wrench but needed a higher torque than my small one goes to.
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As it's a caravan I'd try contacting a caravan dealer for advice, or going for a propriatry tar removing - and reading the bottle very carfully.
While most of the products suggested so far should be fine for auto paint on a metal car body I'd be less confident when it comes to the coloured plastic body panels on a caravan...
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On the many, many times I seem to have had to take the spring in and out on my swing spring Spitfire I've always used the following and never had any issues:
- Spend time trying to get it in and over the diff. This is usually the hardest part.
- I use a 3/4 lowering block so with the spring in about the right place but not seated fight that in.
- Jiggle everything to get the diff. studs in.
- Torque down spring to diff.
- A little gentle jacking under the vertical link, then wiggling a drift through the upright/spring eye holes to get them lined up and hen add/torque up spring eye bolt.
- Pop on damper and torque up.
- Drop jack and repeat on other side.
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Think the PO took the "revert back" option off the table many years ago, which is why I went the route I did and didn't just use the eBay H4 relay loom's 'piggy back' H4 plugs and sockets.
There may well be a new loom in the future anyway. I'm just glad not to have live wires dangling around when I put the headlights on!
I think "getting to know" my new car has already improved fuel consumption. I mean I've taken a good half kilo of wires that didn't do anything out of the car...
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OK, so sorted out the headlight nightmare on my big saloon last night, with the help of a relay kit and the world supply of bullet connectors but left wonering what to do with the now unused wires.
For background a PO had managed to fit 2 relays, fed via a direct, fused supply from the battery and mounted to the inner wing. So far, so good. From there they'd butchered things behind theheadlight panel so each relay was controlling a single main beam-only lamp, with connectors snipped off and relaced with blades and some extra wires Scotchlocked in, I assume to feed some long departed spotlights - and the still live wires just left hanging...
Anyway, I was able to change things so the butchered main beam feed now triggers first relay, which feeds the main beam side of all 4 lamps (had a spare set of lights from another car). I also snipped the dipped beam feed on the passengers side and used this to trigger the second relay, with feeds the dipped beam side of all 4 lamps. This leaves me pondering what to do with the now unused wires. At the moment that's and unplugged outer lamp H4 connector and inner lamp bullet in a single bullet connector on the driver's side and an outer lamp H4 connector with just main beam and earth wires connectred on the passenger's side.
- Just leave them hanging.
- Wrap them in tape and leave them hanging.
- Snip them, wrap them and leave them hanging.
- Snip them and plumb them in as additional feeds to the trigger side of the relay.
- Something else (but I'm not taking the whole loom out to strip unused wires!).
They are buggers to get out particularly with a wire attached. And why would you want to re-use them as they are part of the problem?
** ON TO THE NEXT BIT ** Nose to Tail - 1972 Spitfire MkIV restoration upgrades!!
in My Triumph Restoration Project
Posted
And of course while you'd use a series of spot welds along a joint you wouldn't use a series of adhesive blobs, rather a continual line, meaning a greater joining area and a stronger joint.
Lotus have been using structural bonding on their cars since the Elise was released in '96...