Freyasgrandad

Thanks to Pete and Gary for their replies and to anyone else who might have intended to reply. This thread is ended as I found my errant trim hiding in a drainage ditch this afternoon..

My Vitesse had a full set of "fake Rostyle" wheel trims until this afternoon when at about 60 along a nice country road this afternoon the offside rear trim chose to jump off the car. Sadly it was not safe to stop immediately and it was half a mile or so before I could pull of the road and walk back along the verge to the area where we had parted company. Despite a very thorough search of the verges and undergrowth on both sides of the road I could not find the escapee trim. So here is where I seek the advice or help of my fellow members, there is a set of trims on ebay but they are described as being for 3.5" wheels only, I assume from a 1300TC, as they have the hole in the centre to locate the globe badge. I know one of my trims has the badge hole and so I am wondering if the ebay set will fit the Vitesse, does anyone have any idea? Or does anyone have one, two or a set of trims they would be willing to sell me? Please PM with any response. Steve

Thanks Clive, \i have read about Nick's conversion using MGF bearings but got the impression he was not doing them any longer. I plan to fit a Quaif ATB diff which is a direct replacement using the original CWP case and bearings. I was considering the Canley aluminium uprights and having them machined to take FF sealed ball races inner and outer with the Jigsaw CV drive shafts. Lots to do before that though. Steve

Thanks Gary, I don't fault Koni just think they are over priced. The open and closed lengths are also most useful but don't help source Bilstiens as they are set for bump and rebound at build and need spring rate, corner weight, unsprung weight, mounting angles and lots of other data to valve them up accurately. Plus custom builds are scary expensive. John I am interested and will try and PM you now. Steve

Food for thought indeed, I am indebted to you all for this information. I agree with Clive regarding damper makes, having raced cars fitted with Spax, Koni, AVO and Bilstein and found little difference apart from price on all but Bilstein. Sadly the Bilstein are not adjustable and need to be valved to suit the car and they don't have data for the Mk2 Vitesse for obvious reasons. Looks like GAZ or AVO for me. As for the CV conversion, that is for next year along with an LSD but I am researching replacing the hub bearings with Formula Ford style items first.

Thank you gentlemen My concern was the lip where the inner wheel arch meets the floor pan as I have read reports from people who had to cut part of that away, not a good idea in my opinion unless you are a competent welder. My plan is to buy the brackets from Jigsaw, calculate the open/closed lengths and then get AVO to make them up for me, unless I can find a suitable Bilstein option. Steve

I'm thinking about fitting the telescopic rear damper conversion to my Mk2 but I've read a lot of conflicting reports about this. Please can members who have done this already offer their advice and opinions on fitting the kit and whether there is any benefit or not. In particular I would like to know if there is any cutting or removal of metal work involved. Thanks.

Thanks Pete, Had her out again today, no issues with any gear but gear lever has started to rattle and has become quite loose. Suspect a razor edged cup washer might be the main issue. Also noticed that my copper pipe to the slave cylinder lives awfully close to the exhaust manifold, I'm sure incorrectly so this could also be a source of problems. I'm rebuilding the carbs soon so I'll reroute the pipe and change the fluid at the same time. Steve

Hi Pete thanks for the reply. Definitely not clutch drag as a) could get 2nd and above without fully depressing the clutch and more significantly, couldn't get first with the engine off either. Looks like I shall be examining the remote linkage doesn't it? Any reason why this only happens when hot and will this explain why I have never been able to select reverse with the engine off? Steve

I took the Vitesse to the Duxford meeting last weekend, it was her first proper outing since I have made a few minor adjustments and fitted the correct size Michelin tyres. What fun, I'd forgotten how good these cars really are, she howled along the A505 easily keeping up with (and then some) modern traffic and I must confess I did give her some stick. Thanks to good luck, Triumph Six pot torque and overdrive I really didn't need to go below 2nd until I got caught at traffic lights in Letchworth. Then 1st was very difficult to engage, the stick being very stiff and heavy but only into 1st and after dropping her into 2nd and going back down the box I got 1st. Drove back to the garage where I found 1st was stiff again and when I put her into reverse the gears appeared to grate but once again 2nd 3rd and 4th all selected smoothly and quietly. There was no evidence of clutch drag, the clutch was replaced less than 4000 miles ago and the bite point remains about half way up the pedal travel. When I did get reverse she backed into the garage fine and came out of gear easily but still wouldn't get 1st and grated into reverse. Now comes the odd part, next day she went in to every gear without issue. The receipts I have suggest that the box was rebuilt when the clutch was changed, a new slave cylinder fitted along with new hydraulic lines. Any suggestions?

I had previously used an Accuspark unit on a modified Rover P6 with a Lucas 25D4 with great results, so I bought one for the Vitesse. I can't comment on this unit as it never worked as such. The pick up is positioned about 40 to 50 degrees in advance of the original points firing point I could retard the distributor enough to get the motor to fire up but it had no power and pinked viciously. Problem was that the tachometer drive prevented me from getting any more retard. I gave up and sent it back, I know I could have taken the distributor out and re-set the drive gear but I think things should work properly. Lumenition Optronic or MSD CDi seem like the way to go, not cheap but for a reason.

Thanks for the advice everyone, looks like I shall be watching Ebay and trying Quiller Triumph for a while. I know some people don't like fly offs and they can be unreliable in the brake on position but having had a BMW 120 Convertible I don't trust any handbrake anyway.

Browsing my workshop manual I have noticed that it seems to indicate that some or all GT6 have a "fly off" handbrake lever. I rather like fly off levers and wondered how difficult it would be to swap one from a GT6 (if I can find one) on to my Vitesse, or conversely can the fly off parts be retro fitted to the Vitesse lever and ratchet. Anyone know, or already done this?

Hi Richard, Canley are my generally my first port of call but in this case they are showing No Longer Available and not showing a price, It is only a spring and only £4 plus postage so well worth it to sort out the awful bodge that mine sports at the moment. Steve

Thanks Gary, like to keep it fairly original. Plus that's £4 I won't have to give Rimmers. Steve

Can anyone please tell me if the Vitesse Mk2 should have a return spring on both carbs or just the one from the cable linkage on the back carb? My car only has one on the back but the fast idle plate on the front carb is also drilled for a spring to be attached. Personally don't think one is needed as will be fitting new integral springs when I rebuild the carbs shortly but willing to be persuaded otherwise.

A number of years ago I tried on of these ceramic exhaust coatings on the manifold and collector of my Toyota F3 car. As this was a mid engine single seater under bonnet temperature was not the issue, but here is a summary of what the makers promotional material said: "Traditional cast iron exhaust manifolds retain more exhaust heat than tubular steel versions and in this respect they are superior in terms of performance as the retained energy accelerates the exhaust gasses through the system improving inlet flow during valve overlap. However cast manifolds seldom provide the optimum flow and pulse matching of tubular versions. Coating your tubular manifold with (brand name I won't mention) will retain energy in the exhaust that would normally be lost as heat thus offering the advantages of a cast manifold to the superior design of a tubular one." In practice I found it to be very difficult to satisfactorily apply according to the instructions and less than attractive when applied. Did it work? All I will say is that I ended up with a chrome plated system (and no this doesn't retain the heat). One thing my engine builder did confirm as true is that cast iron manifolds are better than tubular if they are properly designed. The example he used was the Dodge "Ram's Horns" as fitted to early Hemi engines that were still the holy grail of Pro Street drag racers years after they had gone out of production. If under bonnet heat is your main concern then thermal wrap is the best solution currently available and therefore does also retain heat in the exhaust.

I had a similar issue when buying a new cap for my Vitesse Mk2, my local motor factor had it listed as 7 psi as well. Happily he also had a suitable 13psi cap, when I read my workshop manual it does appear that some GT6 and Mk1 Vitesse did run 7psi caps. As an aside, would you believe that someone could or would even be bothered to bodge a rad cap? Because they did on mine, the return valve was missing and the centre spindle had been soldered to the cap.

Just an observation about fuels here, back in the 70s when they were new I used to drive several 2.5 P.I s and Rover P6Bs rather quickly on open roads, city streets and heavy traffic. The Rovers required to run 5 Star leaded but the P.Is were 4 Star only, the fuel grade being determined by compression ratio. Later when the SD1 V8s arrived they ran lower compression engines and were 4 Star as did the MGB V8 and Range Rover. As the star rating was a sliding scale of Relative Octane Number (RON) 4 Star could be as low as 96 RON. Given that 95 RON unleaded has ethanol added it is probably better that 4 Star in terms of calorific value. I run my Vitesse Mk2 on either Elf 95 or Tesco 99 and can't detect any difference in the car's performance between them. Most importantly is that as classiclife says, if it runs right that's what matters.

Thanks to everyone for their advice, I investigated things yesterday. The box needed about 50ml of EP90 to dribble out of the filler, so probably not that I reasoned. I moved on to clean the filter but was sure it would be fine as the box and overdrive are both exchange units less than 4000 miles ago. I suspected that the actuation system would need adjusting and was about to start on that when I noticed that one of the leads on the inhibitor switch was hanging on to the spade connector by about two strands. Needless to say it promptly broke when I tried to disconnect it, so out came my stock of connectors and the gas soldering iron. Having fitted the new connector and cleaned the switch terminal I reconnected the wire and ran a static test to ensure that there was power everywhere there should be and with that successful carried out a brief road test sans tunnel cover. Success! Although not the fastest engagement ever the overdrive now comes in smoothly. Was it the connection or the minute amount of oil needed? Think I will never know for sure but that's part of the joy of cars of this age. With the overdrive seemingly fixed I took the opportunity to fit a new dynamo pulley that I found at the Knebworth Autojumble on Sunday. My original pulley had the original separate fan plate which had been badly mangled, presumably when it was removed to fit the recon dynamo I have a receipt for from 2008. When I pulled the pulley I found that the fan plate had been incorrectly fitted as well. The new pulley is a one piece assembly with the fan and as such is dynamically balanced (you can see the drilling marks) and the pulley itself is a slightly larger diameter than the original (about 1.5mm). As the old advert said "the difference is amazing", the dynamo runs smoothly and silently and still delivers full charge across the rev range and no odd untraceable noises from the front of the engine any more. With that done I took the opportunity to get the tyres changed yesterday. When I acquired the Vitesse it was running on 165/70 13 budget winter tyres, they had plenty of tread but the ride and handling were rubbish. It also sat a little low, threatening the exhaust at every speed bump. My motorsports experience means that I don't like stretching or especially squeezing tyres on rims so I went for 155/80 13 Michelins, not the cheapest but what a result. The ride is lovely, the steering light and the handling superb. The car turns in beautifully, diving for the apex with minimal input and the back end can be controlled with the throttle. It's GREAT. Next jobs are carb and dizzy rebuilds. but that will wait until winter. Peter, thanks for the invitation Steve

New to TSSC and this forum but have had my Standard 8 for several years now and experienced similar problems with reproduction parts. I try to buy new old stock parts when ever I find them, working on the principle that I'll need them one day. With the Vitesse I have only used Canley Classics for mechanical parts so far and had excellent results, particularly pleased with their SS not quite standard exhaust system. One explanation for poorly performing replacement parts, I recently had a conversation with a chap who imports and supplies parts for classic motorcycles, he has them made in China and says that the quality of materials and workmanship is fine but that there can be problems if they are given old parts to work from rather than original or accurate drawings as they won't know what the proper dimensions and clearances are.

Thank you gentlemen, I shall check/change the oil first before going down the adjustment route. My Standard 8 has an appointment at Knebworth this weekend but I shall get it done for Duxford.

Hello everyone, I've recently acquired a 1970 Mk2 Vitesse Saloon and just joined TSSC. 3000 miles ago but in 2008/9 the car had a very thorough rebuild including a full transmission rebuild with a reconditioned Overdrive unit fitted. When I drive it the overdrive is very slow (several seconds) but also very violent to engage. Once engaged there are no issues and it disengages smoothly and instantly. Does it just require running in, or might there be adjustment or other issues I should investigate? Steve