Darren Groves

Ok, you win! How did you manage that? Ben - Yes rings were gaped. Clive - No, I didn't get the block skimmed, just checked for flatness, but that could certainly be the reason for the failure between 1&2. This engine was troublesome from the off, partly because a well known Triumph supplier who sold me the Newman Camshaft gave me the wrong settings so it was running 5° out for some time. That aside, it run hot for a while when new then settled down, done a few compression check in it's first year as I was trying to fix what wasn't the smoothest idle (not knowing the camshaft was timed wrong) and they were all good, so the broken rings didn't happen in the first few thousand miles. Compression started to drop a couple of years ago, I noticed the crankcase pressure was high. Richard - I have spoken to FW Thornton's before when I was trying to source some NOS pistons for the engine that's just gone in. I always use a guy called GBH Spares down here in Devon, he holds shed loads of NOS engine parts and companies like Thornton's often go to him to get there stock. The new engine has County pistons in BUT the rings were swapped with a set that GBH Spares have made as they don't trust the County ones, so even some of the traders are aware of quality issues. I did also have the block skimmed this time and the cylinders lined so it could go back to standard pistons, and the Fast Road camshaft has gone and replaced with a MK3 Spitfire one, so hoping it'll be smoother and last a little longer....time will tell.

Block was rebored and new pistons & rings fitted, so no lip to do any damage.

Decided to strip down my 'old' engine, when I say old its probably not done 10k miles but has never been a 'happy' engine. In the last couple of years compression has been down and its suffered from excessive crankcase pressure, hence the reason for rebuilding my original engine. I never did like the fast road camshaft I put in it either. I took the head off and there were signs that the gasket had started to give way between cylinders 1 & 2, it did this a year ago. But when I took the pistons out, the top ring on each of them was broken, these were new County pistons and rings. Now I have read that County rings aren't great, but to have 4 break and the same ring on each piston seems odd. I guess it doesn't really matter why as the new engine is now in, but curious as to why it would happen.

I'm in the silicone camp, my brakes are the best they've ever been and no spongy pedal. I suspect some blame a spongy pedal on the fluid when the problem lies elsewhere.

OK, so I have won the award for numpty of the week. Pete, you need to get a stock of new T-Shirts for me I think. Oil leak wasn't from the pressure relief valve, but from the 4 missing oil gallery blanking setscrews I forgot to fit, put those in and oil pressure light goes out immediately.....what a tw*t! On a slightly different issue, I started the engine and it was running nicely and had been for 5 minutes or so, then a strange noise and was only running on 3 cylinders. Identified it was No.3, popped the rocker cover off to find one of the rockers had jumped off the pushrod. I had set the valve clearance and the lock nut was tight so hadn't come loose, anyone had this before? Darren

It's been freshly painted so maybe an uneven finish. Will clean off to bare metal and try again, but will use the valve from the engine that's just come out. Darren

Thanks for the reply Clive. My original post was done very quickly as I had to go off somewhere, so was going to add that I have another valve from the engine that I have just taken out, so a known good one, that I was going to try. Just wondered if a faulty valve would give way and dump what was a fair bit of oil or could there be anything else that might cause this?

So new, rebuilt engine in and it starts, oil pressure light stays on, so switch off quickly. Get out of the car to find it's dumped a load of oil which looks to have come from the pressure relief valve. The valve was definitely done up tight, so must have been under some pressure for it to leak past the copper washer. What do we think the problem is? Darren

Not exactly as there are a few minor differences, but looks close enough to be worth a punt. Mine was from a '94 Micra so fits within the date range of the one you've linked to. Cheers Darren

The Micra fans spin the correct way, it's the VW fan that some have used which spins the wrong way but there's no point reversing it as the fins are angled for one direction only. Both fans need modification of the heater box. I have used a VW fan in the past and now use a Micra one, you can read about it here: http://triumphherald1360.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/heater-fanblower.html Darren

Thanks all. Will go for the 1200 heater set-up and blank off the extra end. Next question....Whenever I refill the coolant, I always have to raise the front end as high as possible to get it into the heater the rad sits lower when on the level. The process would be easier if the top heater hose had some kind of filler. Anyone tried doing this? Darren

Thanks Pete & Colin. Ok, so if I plumb as per 1200 that does away with the pipe I don't want, but the under manifold water pipe on a 13/60 has a t-piece were the 1200 one doesn't. So options would be to blank off one of the T's and have no circulation when the heater valve is closed, or 'T' into the head to heater valve hose and create a route for the water. I wonder why the circulation when the heater valve was closed was added to the later cars? Cheers Darren

This is the only image I could find on Google, but does seem to show a feed from the cylinder head and return on the pipe to the rear of the water pump hosing. No heater valve or bypass, but that should be simple enough to work out. Darren

Thanks Pete. I was trying to work out how the early Herald's were plumbed as they didnt have the heated inlet manifold and one of the heater valve hoses go direct to the head. I was hoping that if I could find a way to lose this hose I could have the 2 temp senders (1 for the gauge, 1 for the EFI) side by side in the water pump housing, would just be neater. Darren

So now the Herald is running EFI, the water pipe that used to run through the inlet manifold to warm it is now not needed. To keep things circulating I just used rubber hose to maintain the circuit (see pic). So what are my options to get rid of this pipe completely? If I just removed it and replaced the t-piece by the heater valve with a straight connector, that would stop circulation I guess? So what if I used the blanking plug which is at the back of the cylinder head to join into this t-piece by the heater valve, would that keep the flow correct to the heater? Darren

Are there any Stag owners out there that could possibly take a photo of how the exhaust mounts to the back of the gearbox. I didn't take it off and the owner/friend can't remember how it went. Apologies for the poor quality photo. Thanks Darren

The modified fuel tank is in. I had a minor worry at one point that the spare wheel wouldn't fit but it does with room to spare. The new in-tank pump is much quieter than the previous one, the filter being in the boot is neater also, so all-in-all very happy with this set-up now.

That's quite normal, nothing to worry about.

Is a D-Type Overdive on an MGB or any other car for that matter the same as those fitted to a Triumph? Clearly the adaptor plate will be different, but how about the actual OD Unit?

Hi Roger, The in-tank pump is much neater, just hope there are no leaks! The tank sealer kits are pretty good, so it should fill any pinholes in the weld, if there are any. Looking forward to the extra capacity the banding should give. Yes, have been following on the Sideways forum, glad the trusty old EDIS unit has at least identified where the issue was, hopefully it saved your sanity, for now at least! Interesting option the VW Coilpack, will look forward to hear the results of this and the 1bar MAP sensor. I had some issues getting the tacho to work. I have used the Tacho Out (Pin 35) and tried all the various 'fixes' that are on the web, but in the end I had to send the Tacho to Speedycables for them to convert, but still had to use a pull-up resistor. Darren

The new tank has now been painted, sound deadening stuck on, pump in place and new sender unit in - ready to fit!......but not until next week, no time til then

Give me 5 minutes and I could probably find a longer thread about someone with carb issues..... One good thing about EFI is that once it's set, that's it, no more going out of tune two weeks after you've spent all weekend getting them running right. Short term pain for long term gain, but each to their own, EFI is not everyone's cup of tea. The conversion is not to be undertaken lightly and definitely not for the faint hearted or those without some degree of perseverance. Roger, yours is a bit of a mystery, mine worked pretty much out of the box and only needed the engine constants, priming & cranking pulse changing to get a good start and idle.... I know you wanted to move away from the Ford EDIS & Coil Pack, but I would have been tempted to leave them in place until the fueling was sorted, one less new bit of kit to add to the potential issues. Could you not get the car down the the guys that Phil at ExtraEFI recommended, they advertise as Megasquirt specialists, maybe they'd even come out to you? My modified fuel tank is almost there. The tank sealer kit is done, this is a tedious job but pretty essential given my welding, needs 96 hours to 'set'. It's had a couple of coats of POR-15 paint to keep the surface rust at bay, flatted and will get sprayed in a black 2K over the weekend. I have some bitumen sound deadening pads to attach to minimise any vibration from the internal pump, then will be ready to fit.

Another vote for 063 size and Eurocarparts. Bought a Halfords one before, started to fail after a couple of weeks, but that was a few years ago now.

Hi Roger, Given what you have tried, that you are running batch and have tried different banks and injectors, are you sure it's not a ignition issue? Doesn't sound like fuel, maybe you have 2 & 3 leads on wrong? You changed from Ford EDIS & Coil Pack to ignition drivers, maybe they have gone faulty? When you went to the newer version of the firmware, did some of your ignition settings get changed? Just some thoughts. Stop mentioning the 'Carb' word, it's something simple I'm sure. Keep the faith! Darren

IIRC - The old 3 pin Lucar units there was a live, feed to the indicators and then it earthed through the warning light on the dash. When I fitted my electronic relay (from Autosparks) it would't work that way, so I wired up with a switched live, one wire to earth and one wire to feed the indicators. To get the dash warning light to work you had to tap in to either side of the indicators, which went to either side of a capless bulb which replaced the warning light on the dash.