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GrahamB

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Everything posted by GrahamB

  1. My experience with a 175/70 on a 4.5J.13" rims on my Spitfire as purchased was although they fitted, they were too wide leading to lateral instability (wobble). They were replaced by 155/80 tyres which improved the handling. 175 tyres would be better suited to the 5.5" rims.
  2. I have a metric set of ratchet spanners with an articulated head and a A/F set with a fixed head. I find the fixed head much more secure in use whereas the articulated head can sometimes flex and slip off. Occasionally I find a nut that only the articulated head will reach but then I do not apply too much torque in case I come down with a case of "ratchet rash".
  3. The rear suspension does settle quite a bit after a few miles even without the extra ballast. I used the 1/2 spacer, the smallest size available, in order to obtain slightly more negative camber and it works perfectly. You can fit this spacer with the standard studs (on a Spitfire) but I have read that longer studs are required for the thicker spacers.
  4. When fitting a new swing spring to my Spitfire, I bent the bar on my vice squeezing the spring into the pivot box so I know what you mean by a pig of a job. Once mounted on the studs, I added a 1/2 inch spacer from Canley Classics under the spring so as to give the desired degree of negative camber and tightened the nuts so that everything was securely seated on the diff. The spacer is machined so as to support the whole area under the bottom plate. Adding washers to the studs sounds a bad idea. I would tighten the nuts progressively until the bottom plate is securely seated on the diff.
  5. The heater hose is connected to a T-piece on the end of the inlet manifold which is the arrangement on the 1500 (and late MkIV?). Earlier engines had the connection onto the rear of the cylinder head. The throttle linkage is identical to that on my 1500.
  6. You only need a warning light in parallel to show that the reversing light is on so you do not annoy others by dazzling a following car. If the bulb fails you will soon realise when you try reversing in the dark and cannot see where you are going. Placing a warning light in series will severely affect the light output of the reversing light unless you incorporate some electronics to detect the voltage drop due to current flow to the bulb. Yes
  7. I was driving west on a dual carriage way section of the A27 near Chichester. On the inside lane was a HGV followed by a motorhome. The motorhome driver decided to overtake the HGV and as I was approaching accelerated to 60 mph. All of a sudden there was a load bang which caused me to brake hard, and I was still 60 metres behind the motorhome. One of the rear tyres on the motorhome had exploded. I guess that the tyres on the motorhome were little worn but had been sitting out in the sun for many years so as soon as they were put under stress one had catastrophically failed. He managed to pull onto the hard shoulder with no further damage. Last year I replaced all four tyres on the Spitfire as, although little worn, had been fitted for 10 years even though kept in a dark garage.
  8. GrahamB

    Vitesse price

    You are not going to damage the engine by just running on 97 octane E5 petrol straight from the pump. There is, reputably, a possibility of increased wear on the valve seats but I have never experienced this after many thousands of miles in my Spitfire. If wear is detected by the valve clearances continually closing up, then consider having the expense of fitting hardened valve seat inserts.
  9. I have probably still got one in the bottom of my reserve tool box !
  10. The air movers that we used relied on a low flow of air at 50 psi to induce a large flow of air, several hundred litres per minute, at atmospheric pressure. As such there were no moving parts to be clogged by paint or dust and definitely no sparks to ignite any vapours.
  11. I used one at work for dust extraction from a chamber. It worked well and did not clog from the dust.
  12. Just ordered one. Another toy to play with although delivery is not scheduled until the beginning of March.
  13. GrahamB

    Wow!

    Someone, somewhere, must have thought that the interior looked nice...
  14. I am using a similar device bought from Maplin when they still existed. Probe is clamped to the inlet to the radiator. The switch on point is adjusted by a control knob scaled 1 to 10 so I do not know the exact temperature but adjusted so that it switches on when the temperature gauge exceeds half scale. The problem was that I had to add some hysteresis to stop the relay chattering , switching on and off rapidly, as it reached the set point.
  15. I had read that disc brakes should be bled before starting on drum brakes. But which is the caliper furthest from the master cylinder? The n/s wheel is furthest from the master cylinder but because of the brake pipe routing, at least on the Spitfire 1500, the o/s front caliper has the longest pipe run. I have tried bleeding the o/s front first and also the n/s front first. It did not appear to make any difference so the exact order does not appear to be critical. After recently changing just the master cylinder, I bled the n/s front caliper first thinking that any air bubbles reaching the four way connector would rise up the vertical pipe run to this brake first. It appeared to work as bleeding the other three brakes made little difference to the feel of the brake pedal.
  16. GrahamB

    Garage Heater

    Some of the surveys from colleagues houses have been a waste of time; "Floor not inspected due to the presence of fitted carpets" "Roof space not inspected due as there was no ladder" "None to my knowledge but purchaser should commission further testing" The result was that when I purchased my present property about 6 years ago, I performed my own survey using the knowledge I had gained over the previous 40 years of home ownership and DIY. As mentioned earlier is the roof line straight, have any rafters been cut in the loft, any cracks around windows/doors etc. As it was a cash purchase, no building society was involved. If I had found anything of concern, then I would have sort expert help but fortunately no faults were revealed and nothing has come to light over the last six years.
  17. I purchased a discounted metric flexi head set of ratchet spanners from Halfords when my son worked there as a holiday job assembling cycles. I latter bought a fixed head imperial set when they were on offer. I have had no issues with either set but prefer the fixed head as the flexi head spanners can bend when you do not want them to do so, seriously reducing the torque you can apply to the nut. If the fastening is very tight/seized, I tend to use a non ratchet spanner to free the nut (hit with a hammer or extend the leverage) then use the ratchet to speed removal.
  18. This reminds me of a friends Escort, random banging from the rear. When jacked up for inspection, the suspension was on full droop and everything appeared tight. However, when viewed with the car's weight on the wheels, the handbrake cable could be seen to be loose so that when driven over a rough piece of road it banged against the boot floor. It may be worth checking for loose components with the suspension loaded. If the shock absorber bushes are loose, this may not be apparent with the shock absorber under tension from the weight of the wheel.
  19. In line with most responses, I only remove the sump when necessary to perform other work. I cannot recall ever finding much in the way of deposits in the sump. When changing the oil, I first go for a short run to get the engine up to temperature before carefully removing the sump plug. I then leave the oil to drain for several hours with the car jacked up to ensure the drain port is at the lowest point while I get on with other tasks.. On refilling the engine oil, it can be difficult to assess the oil level on the dipstick as the oil is almost transparent and it remains clear for many miles so I am confident most of the debris has been removed.
  20. My wife's Toyota is the same. Drive from Wiltshire along the M4 without stopping to Chiswick. Stop at the traffic lights and the engine does not stop. Message "Battery Charging" is displayed !
  21. My friend had a narrow boat, the diesel engine of which had Hot Bulb starting. Before attempting to start the engine you placed a blow lamp ( a proper brass one with a pump built into the paraffin tank) on a shelf attached to the side of the engine. The flame was directed onto a metal rod that passed into the side of the combustion chamber. Once the rod was hot enough, you could attempt to manually start the engine by spinning the massive flywheel. Once running, the blow lamp could be removed. Glow plugs and electric starts are just not fun.
  22. Nitrogen pressure will alter with temperature the same as any other gas upto about 300 bar, 1500 psi, when non ideal interactions become significant. This assumes there is no change in state, gas to liquid or liquid to gas. One of the advantages of nitrogen may be that it does not cause degradation by oxidation which will be greater on the inside of the tyre compared with the exterior as the partial pressure of oxygen will be approximately three times higher.
  23. I did a quick calculation on my modern which gives an inflation pressure of 32 psig which equates to about 3.18 bar absolute. Assuming that the tyre was inflated with air at 20 deg C, 293 deg K, then ignoring any change in volume of the tyre, it equates to about 28.8 psig at 0 deg.C
  24. I took my live feed from the starter solenoid to a 4 way bullet connector where it splits into separate high and dipped circuits, both of which have in-line fuses prior to the relays. The relays are mounted on the engine side valance and earthed at the radiator support strut.
  25. I should have spent more time studying the diagram !
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