Darren Groves

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.

Hi Roger, The instructions I got with the kit said to wire Injectors 1 & 2 as bank 1 and 3 & 4 as bank 2, but the megamanual said 1 & 3 as bank 1 and 2 & 4 as bank 2, I done the latter. As you are doing it as batch fire rather than sequential I don't think it really matters. Are all the TB's balanced, maybe 1 & 4 are slightly more open and therefore working that bit harder? Happy hunting at Stoneleigh, I like that event but just a bit too far from deepest Devon. Darren

Hi Roger, If you have air leaks before the 02 sensor I don't think you'll be able to tune it, so I would say you'd need to sort the exhaust out before trying anything. I am using the same injectors as you, can't remember if you are a 1300 or 1500, but these settings in the images are mine and work well to get the car running. When cold she consistently fires up after 2-3 seconds of cranking, when warm 1-2, never fails. The megamanual recommends starting the priming & cranking PW% on the lean side, then keep increasing until starting improves as it's easier to recover from a failed over lean start. So after a failed start see if the plugs are wet or dry and then go whichever way is needed. Mine PW%'s are higher than I expected, but work so I'm not too worried. It took me about a week of starting, checking & adjusting to get to something I was happy with. If you haven't got the IAC valve sorted yet, you'll obviously have to keep the revs up manually until the engine is warm so you can then set the warm idle, then once you have a steady warm idle and can tune that, then you can Autotune the warm-up enrichment. You could try these plugs: http://r.ebay.com/hXNT2z they have worked well in mine. Resistor type plugs are better for our set-up, less noise to the ECU. Hang in there, it will be worth it. Darren

Hi Roger, Nobody said it was going to be easy :-) I don't think the Firmware is too much of issue, there's unlikely to be any major changes from the version it shipped with. Despite all the steps backward, you are still making progress. Have you had any chance to look at the IAC valve yet? I have 2 alternatives to the Bosch I originally bought, but if I have no joy with those I may well rig up a manual cable to increase the idle when needed, after all the ECU is look after the mixture. A bit more progress on the fuel tank today, tidying up the outside. The sealed up holes are in preparation for the tank sealing process.

A little more work done on the modified fuel tank today. All now fully welded.

Hi Roger, The shape and orientation of the Herald tank is like the attached image, the black rectangle represents the pump, so even at very low fuel the pump pick-up is going to be submerged. Nothing scientific was done like for yours in terms of baffle design, just a bit of added assistance to stop the fuel sloshing around. The wide/flat design of Spitfire tank means that it's a bit more tricky for you, so I can understand why you spent more time If the gauge it working you've wired it up correctly, it's only one wire back to the ECU so I suspect it's something to do with the unit. Send it back, get a Spartan 2, good price and very simple to set up. Darren

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Hi Roger, If it's a single cable from from your old alternator I suspect it may be 42amp, I would add an additional cable or replace with some 50amp Thin Wall. Darren

Got a bit more on done on the fuel tank today. I've added a baffle around the pump pick-up, this will help at very low fuel though I rarely let the tank get below 1/4 tank. The fuel pump flange, the rest of the banding and the side are now all tacked in place. I now need to fully weld/braze, patch where the drain tap was, seal the inside of the tank and paint.

One thing I wasn't too happy with was the Fuel Pump and Filter arrangement. The high pressure fuel pump and pre-filter are on the boot outrigger and the main filter in the engine bay, these are quite large canisters and difficult to secure properly. I liked Roger's solution to his fuel pump as it was in-tank, so have decided to follow his lead, this allows for the main filter to be relocated into the boot and tidies up the engine bay and the under boot area. I would like to thank Roger to making the fuel pump flange for me, nice job! As the Spitfire and Herald/Vitesse tanks are quite different, I would need to be a little more drastic in making the pump fit. The pump Roger & I have used is from a Classic Range Rover and in the Spitfire it's slightly too tall, but for a Herald it's quite a bit too short so I've had to lengthen it. It's obviously quite important to get the pick-up at the lowest point in the tank and as close to the bottom as possible, to make sure you have access to fuel at low level. Here's the pump extended,I used a 3/8" socket rail as the donor extension as it was a similar shape. I wanted to remove the drain plug as all this does is make fitting the tank harder, so this has been cut out. I'll need to add an additional baffle around the pump pick-up to help when fuel is low, so all this was going to be easier with full access to the inside of the tank, so decided just to cut the side off. If you ever wondered what the inside of a Herald/Vitesse tank looks like this is it: Whilst the side was off this was an opportunity to enlarge the tank, so I will be adding an additional 7cm to it's width by welding/brazing a band all the way round. My back of a fag packet calculations make the new capacity to be around 11 gallons, so should provide a pretty good range when on longer journeys. Here's a couple of photos of the banding going in and an extension for the original baffle. More to follow!

That's all looking very good Roger, can't be long now until you try and start it!

Sorry, that's me only half reading the original post. If you want to remove the rear valance then you will need to take off the overriders, but if all you want to do is remove the chrome bumper strips then as Ben has said just drill out the rivets.

Overriders need to come off I'm afraid.

Never seen that section as a panel. It'll need to be fabricated. Darren

Getting it perfect out of the gun is very tricky, flatting and polishing will remove orange peel and any dirt that's landed in the paint, it makes for a better end result.

Today was the first drive, done around 40 miles and used Analyze Live to improve the tune. At the end of the run the car was driving nicely and a quick check of the plugs and they're the most biscuity brown I have ever had in 20 years of owning the car. So without too much effort I have an acceptable idle and it feels good when warm. The car sounds different, I guess it's lost the noise of the induction through the twin carbs? It's still a bit tricky to get going from cold, I keep pushing up the cranking pulse but obviously can only test once a day. She drives well during warm-up, but as it's lacking the IAC valve idle is naturally too low until warm. I bought 2 more IAC valves the same as the original for not much money, so if I end up with 3 I can't do anything with then I know it's not the units themselves. Can always keep them for stock or sell on. Everyday a little more progress!

After spending an hour trying to set-up the IAC valve and failing, I decided to just get the engine warmed up and idling by using the adjustment on the Throttle Body. This is just using the fuel tables that were on the ECU, so needs some work yet, but doesn't sound too bad as a starting point.

https://www.facebook.com/mike.papworthtriumph or http://www.classiccarwebsite.com/mike-papworth-triumph-parts

I would definitely recommend Autosparks. They would probably do the loom in thin wall cable if you asked them.

Got a little more time on the car today, enough to set the fuel pressure at 3 bar and there are no leaks , the only slight downer here was the fuel pump, as it is noisier than I hoped. It won't be heard when driving I'm sure but it's noticeable, though for now as long as it works it's something I can live with and revisit later. I then tried to start her up, a little splutter but nothing. Had a little while trying to see how to set up the Fast Idle valve then thought I'd try again and this time she burst into life. Wouldn't run without keeping the revs up, but happily restarted several times and revved quite happily, had to call it a day as I needed to add coolant and time was getting on. Now the fun begins....

Hi Roger, I did put a baffle behind the new tube, but the clearance to the rocker shaft is less on this side so had to taper it a little. Incidentally the Alloy cover I have doesn't have anything. I think there are pros and cons for mounting the MAT sensor both near the TB's or further down near a remote filter as I have done, Nick on the Sideways forum did explain, don't think it matters too much. I've used PTFE fuel line to and from the fuel rail, but similar R9 spec as you've ordered everywhere else. I found the 12-14mm hose clips fitted the best, just in case you haven't got those yet. Darren

Haven't had that much time on the conversion recently, but I did do a little on the crankcase ventilation. My engine has suffered from excessive crankcase pressure for a while (have another waiting in the wings), so as I needed to make a blanking plate for the now redundant fuel pump I thought I'd add a 16mm breather tube to it, this should help expel some of the unwanted pressure. I also decided to swap back to a standard crankcase cover rather the the current alloy one, this is because I wanted to increase the size of the breather tube from 13mm to 16mm and have it exiting from the other side, it was easier to do on a steel one. The original 13mm tube will be removed and blanked off. Both breather tubes will vent to atmosphere via rubber hoses run to under the car, I may decide to add a catch tank at some point, but that's a job for another day.

Hi Roger, Undoubtedly your tank mods are very professional in their appearance, so well done. I'm not entirely happy with my pump being where it is on the boot outrigger, but it was the simplest solution to the problem. Might re-investigate at a later date but as long as it's functional for the moment. Had to do a new double fuel pipe run on mine also as it was originally 1/4". Strangely my old Vitesse tank which i removed was a 1/4" tube on the pick up, but the one I bought to modify and subsequently fitted was 5/16" so didn't need to be changed. Presumably Triumph used a mixture of fuel line sizes. Darren

Well done Roger, looking good.