Stratton Jimmer

The GT6 was fitted with a pair of HS4 SUs by the PO. I'm enclosing two pictures of the result. Having finished the gearbox remote rebuild and the CD driveshaft mod my next task was the non-working OD which I found to be a caused by a bullet connector being open circuit. So this week I moved on to the carbs. Removing the two pancake filters which were holed, revealed that the two carbs have different jets. Only the front carb is connected to the choke cable and there is no linkage between the two. The jet on the rear carb is held in position by the fuel line as the choke arm is not connected nor is it connectable. The beast was running rather rich and I have turned the jet stops back to the weakest position possible. The front carb's choke didn't return to an off position when the choke knob was pushed home. It didn't do it when the mechanism was manually moved either. There appears to be some stiction causing the jet to stick in a slightly lowered position. A slight upward press with a finger seated it properly. The carbs have not been balanced nor the mixture adjusted accurately. Now despite all of this, the engine runs quite sweetly and motors along very well with a good throttle response. Starting isn't as good as I would like it but with choke only working on half the engine that is to be expected. I think the way forward is to change the rear carb jet to match the front, get a new set of choke linkage bits and start from scratch. The throttle cable is also an issue as it enters the fray vertically from above! Does anyone have any thoughts as to why the front jet doesn't fully rise with the choke cable slack?

An advertisement has appeared in the local Facebook "for sales". It is for a Mk1 Vitesse - C reg 1965 with a note saying it is sound but in need of some TLC. The owner has advertised the price at £3500. If anyone is interested, contact me and I will endeavour to put you in contact with the vendor.

Love this thread. That is very perceptive work Josef.

I too run around in a 1200 Jazz which is now 13 years old. Its original set of rear tyres lasted 56,000 miles and fuel economy is typically around 44mpg around town but can go up to 60ish on a run. The current wife has a 2.0L Golf mk6 Sportline Estate which averages 56mpg but once when travelling Swindon to Hemel Hempstead via M4, M25 and A41 with cruise control set at 60mph, recorded 81mpg according to its trip computer.

I finally managed to get to talk to Richard. His landlord is vastly upping the charge on the premises which makes running the business from there unaffordable. He is looking for alternative premises but is doubtful of finding any. In consequence, he is taking the steps described to sell off his stock. If anyone should know of a suitable barn or warehouse in the vicinity of Swindon, Wiltshire, let me know and I will pass on the details to Richard. He is a difficult chap to contact at the moment as he is contracting at the Post Office.

That must be one of those skunk works colour schemes from the USA!

BTW, I sorted the sun visor this morning. Drilling out the headless set screw wrecked the old thread as I expected and so I trapped the hole with a 1/4 UNF, drilled the visor's hole out to 6mm and bolted it up with an Allen head set screw which was the only 1/4 UNF that I had which was short enough / long enough to do the job. The PO had put a rubber strip along the bottom edge of the hatch door which I have removed to reveal a few rust patches along that bottom edge. I don't know what adhesive he used but it was the very bugg3r to remove! It looks repairable but I'm out of Kurust at the moment so it will have to wait.

Inca yellow looks like a happy compromise between "NC" and Mimosa. I do like that thanks Mathew.

You can buy replacement commission plates. Thanks for your comments and Mimosa definitely looks better than Saffron... Decisions, decisions!

Investigations have now revealed that the car started life in Saffron Yellow, was then painted black by a would be racer and then repainted in Delft blue by its last owner. I rather like Saffron yellow so that looks like a long term aim. The battery tray is shot and there's a clunk from the diff / propshaft area which I will be looking into. One of the sun visor bolts is headless. I have drilled it out and am working on a fix for that. 1/4 unf tap at the ready!

I will have a chat with him and find out what the plan is. It's tricky to contact him at the moment as he refuses to use a mobile phone and isn't at home often.

Richard is a pal of mine and ex-colleague. He has been ousted by his landlords hence the sell off.

My sixpot Spit has roller rockers and NO additional oil feed. They seem to be perfectly well lubricated so my vote goes for the NAY sayers.

I would advocate ditching rotoflex couplings and investing in the Classic Driving Developments (CDD) CV drive shafts. I recently did this to my Mk3 and it is a very pleasing update. You will have less worry about the "sweep" of the doughnuts too.

I don't havethe nack either but my friendly local auto glass man does. Great Western Windscreens, Bradford Road, Swindon.

Now you have got me worried... I can't find a front diff on either of my motors.

Thanks Pete Truman. That is what I call a definitive reply!

The website says "Sold £40,500".

My thoughts are that if it isn't shown in the Highway Code, it should not be allowed.

The nearside drive shaft has now been fitted. It took less than half as long to do as the offside one. That is the benefit of hindsight and having found out all of the pitfalls already. Bleeding brakes is the next job followed by carb tuning (HS4s) but meanwhile there's a meeting of the North Wilts branch tomorrow evening. Yet again there were no shims, only a single spacer but the endfloat was comfortably within limits.

I am in the process of fitting the second (nearside) CDD shaft to my Mk3 GT6. It's a relatively straightforward job. The manufacturer says that if the bearings are not changed, the existing shims and spacer will be correct. My offside shaft had no shims, only the spacer and when checked for end float proved to be correct.

I see it now thanks Alex.

Each shaft has one of those but in the book it is designated as being an oil seal. I will see if I can post a photo of the drawing...

That is useful Alex as the workshop manual doesn't show the assembled hub in this way, only the exploded diagram (p. 4.120). What ths diagram doesn't seem to show though is the inner oil seal unless it is here described as a "spacer".