micmak

Ahh, great stuff. Thanks for that, Gully.

Pete, you have blinded me a little there with technical jargon. I will assume that if I take a look behind the overrider, your explanation will make sense to me. But that has nothing to do with the door slamming, right? I think I will try to move the rear body tub back by 2 millimetres or so. Steve, yes anti burst catch moves and springs back as I think it should.

Well, I have to say, I am learning SOO much with this little car. I gave it full choke and no throttle, and it started! So, I am assuming that I was able to start it before with a partial choke because it was running so rich? Now that it is leaned out, it simply needs more choke/more fuel to start? Does that all make sense? I had to let it run longer on full choke before it would idle. I pushed the choke in too soon twice and it stalled. But eventually, I left the choke on a bit longer and in the end when it warmed up, the car idled without the choke. So that procedure has changed from how it used to start. OK then! Progress, Gentlemen, making progress.

Ha ha, let’s not get into turkey baster fetishes or weirdness! I will endeavor to get the oil out and replace it with 20/50. But as you said Pete, that will have no impact on the starting of the car, so I will focus on getting the car started first and deal with the dashpots later. Let me pop out now and try it again by not touching the throttle and pulling out the choke all the way. Yes, the choke does indeed fully open the choke assembly. Give me 5 minutes, and I’ll report back…….

Ha ha! The saga continues. I had a look at the dashpots. They have oil, but I have no idea why grade of oil it might be. They are not full of oil, but I understand they are not meant to be full. There is a suction sound when I open them and withdraw the plunger/damper, and there is good resistance when I put them back in. But the car won’t start today!!!!! I didn’t try it over and over and there was no dumping of fuel. I wonder if I might have made it too lean yesterday? I know all cars have their own “personality” but I used to start this car from cold by pressing the throttle down once and pulling the choke out to about ¼ or 1/3 of it’s distance. The car always started well. But according to the workshop manual, you should not touch the throttle and you should simply use the choke alone. But no matter what I tried, the car would not start today.

Hi Gary, Here are a few pics. I adjusted the brightness due to poor lighting in the garage. The bonnet is too high at the front drivers side, so that makes the A pillar gap look all wrong in the first pic. I will rectify that later. But you can see from the other three pics, that the gaps seem reasonable and fairly uniform and even. Sorry about the last pic -- it reflects the Corvette much more than I ever intended!!

Hi Pete, Undoing the rear tub is what I was thinking too. I imagine it is a big task. Not sure that I understand what you mean when you say the tappet screw of the push button and the latch release lever of the lock. When you talk about the lock cam, I presume you mean the part I have pointed out in my attachment. Yes, it does click into position and it stays there.

Hi Trigolf, I doubted if the rubber door seal was causing the problem, but I went out to the car and removed it at the A pillar just to see. Then I looked carefully as I closed the door, and the door actually hits and rubs against the B pillar long before the door touches the door seal.

Here is the video: the door slam.mov

Hi Folks, as I mentioned in a post in another section, my driver’s door needs adjustment. I really, really need to SLAM it closed or else it will not “catch” and stay closed. There is absolutely no way at all that the door will close unless I really swing hard and slam it with serious, serious force. I have looked at the hinges and lock mechanism and nothing looks loose, or worn. There are wear marks, or rub marks on the paint work on the door and on the B post area where the door seems to rub against the body which I presume is stopping it from closing properly. Given some surprises that I have uncovered with this car and shortcuts that seem to have been taken during it’s restoration, I actually suspect that the door’s opening is actually a tiny bit too small or tight, to allow the door to close properly. I suspect the body panels were assembled in such a way that the door opening is too tight! The door actually seems too big to fit into the opening, if that makes any sense. The door doesn’t hang too low or too high, and when it is closed, it looks correct with no obvious gaps. It seems to line up correctly, aside from the rubbing marks that I mentioned. Do I need to adjust the body panels to make the opening a few millimetres bigger? Or is there some other adjustment I can do. Is it a DIY task? I have attached pics showing where the door rubs against the B post and a little video of the door not closing properly.

I’d like to talk more about slamming the door, but as this is a FUEL thread, I will open a new topic in the Bodywork and Fittings section.

Gentleman, thank you all for your comments. I really DO appreciate all the ideas and suggestions. Johny: I kinda assumed there was a venting purpose to those holes. Hopefully this will make a difference going forward. I have what I assume is an original mechanic’s workshop manual for the car. It came along with a ton of paperwork. Pete: I have no idea what sort of oil is in the dashpots. Actually, I have not disturbed them at all, so I don’t know what the oil level is in there. I will check that out in the morning. Josef: I honestly don’t think I have gone too lean. This hesitation was there before. It has been there since I bought the car, so I suspect there is something else going on to cause it. In general, I think that the guy who restored the car took a few shortcuts. I bought the car from a classic car dealer. He had bought it from the restorer. Sometimes I think the restorer must have had no tools at all because there were weird things that kinda scared me from the start. Before I took possession of the car, I asked the dealer to check it over by putting it up on the ramp and giving it a “good going over”! He did so, and reported back that everything looked ok, but there were a “few things” that were not tightened enough. He rectified them. In the following days and weeks, I realized that the steering wheel was only hand tight. The accelerator pedal was only hand tight onto the floor and there was no split pin which would prevent the pedal from coming completely undone from the floor bracket. I discovered loose springs which control the hood when you open it. Also, the brackets holding the radiator in place were also only hand tight!!!!! Kinda scary stuff. But in spite of all that, it is a very well-restored-looking example. So, is the oil correct in the dashpots? Who knows. Why were the carbs set up SOO rich? Who knows. Why do I need to really, really, SLAM home the driver’s door to make it stay closed? Who knows!!! But I am determined to get it all sorted out. It is such a cute little car. Thank you Guys. I really appreciate your collective expertise. .....Mick.....

OK, so I removed the airfilter housing and dried off the spilled fuel from the face of the carbs and below too. Then I tried to start it again, and it the car started. Not sure why this happened today, but I digress. As usual, it ran ok when cold. I let it warm up and started to lean off the mixture, ¼ of a turn each time, and one carb after the other. Well to my surprise, I had to turn the jet adjusters in 6 or 7 revolutions before the engine started to falter!! I was amazed that it took so many turns. I had to adjust the idle screws at times too. I can now rev up the car and there is almost no black smoke from the exhaust! There is still a little but no big black cloud like before. I also noticed something with the air filter housing; The filters, gaskets and backplate were on upside down! I took a photo from the manual to explain. The recessed parts that the arrows are pointing to, were facing down instead of up! I dunno if that would have had any bearing on the issues I have had or not, but I turned them all up, the opposite way, and bolted the housing back onto the carbs. I went for a short 4 or 5 mile drive. The car drives ok, but like before, if I step on the gas, it hesitates a bit and kinda struggles to accelerate. It is not a big problem, but I do think it should be more responsive. Altogether, the car ran for a good 45 minutes or so, and it didn’t stall at all. I turned it off a few times, and restarted it with no problem at all. Have I solved the problem? I really don’t know. I might try to lean it off a smidge more tomorrow and see what happens. As for the performance hesitation, really not sure what to do. The first two images below show the wet carbs which dumped fuel on to the floor. The third is my explanation of the air filter housing.

So today, I decided to further lean out the fuel. I went out to the car, and it wouldn't start! Keeping in mind the fact that I DID lean it out a little the other day, I decided to give it full choke, which I have never done before. It still wouldn't start. I lifted the lid, and there was fuel dripping onto the floor. I removed the air filter housing, and BOTH carbs were dripping fuel, not just the LHS like before. How can there be too much fuel now after partially leaning it out the other day? OK, so the choke gave it too much, perhaps, but why wouldn’t it start with just a little choke like normal?

That is very encouraging, Pete. Thank you. I will take a look at it again tomorrow and try to lean it out more. I feel empowered by your comments. I thank you for that! Not to take from your comments, Johny. But I will take the carb route first and see where it takes me. Thank you both for your suggestions. I will keep you up to date on my progress. Thank you, both! .....Mick.....

Johny; Well, no! I am not particularly confident of anything. I bought the car a few months ago, and I have only done 350 miles in it. I bought it as a “restored” car. It all looks nice and new and well restored. But I really have no idea what exactly was done during the restoration. I will make a big assumption that the engine timing valve clearances etc, are all ok. But I really don’t know for sure. I am guessing that you would say check all those things first, and then look at the carbs? If so, would timing or valve clearances explain good running when cold, but bad running when warm? Pete; Forgive me, but I will have to consult the manual to try to understand what you are suggesting. I expect it will become clear enough when I see the diagrams. I will do so over the weekend. Thank you Gents.

Hi Folks, due to a hand injury and other “excuses” I only had an opportunity to re-visit my fuel issue today. I started the car for the first time in weeks, and it was fine. I let it idle and as it warmed up, it started to struggle to stay running. I increased the idle screws just to keep it running. When I revved the car, there was a puff of black smoke from the exhaust. I removed the air filter housing and there was nothing unusual to see in and around the carbs while it was running. I tightened the bottom jet adjusters – just by one “shoulder” of the fitting each time. There was no noticeable difference in the car’s idle. I probably turned them both clockwise by 1½ turns in total. The car’s idle was then running too high, so I had to adjust the idle screws to bring it down again. At this stage when I revved it up, there was less black smoke – not gone, but less. By now, the car had been idling for about a half hour. It was struggling to stay running. I had to pull against the throttle cable every 30 or 40 seconds to keep it running. Also, the exhaust pipe sounded different. I can only describe it as sounding like it was spitting, if that makes any sense! So I wondered if I am doing this correctly? Should I maybe turn both of these jet adjusters all the way in first, and then bring them out a little and try to start the car? Or should I do it while the car is running; turn them in until the car starts to struggle? I don’t really understand why this problem exists when the engine is warm. When it is cold, it idles fine. Am I going about this the right way? Thanks. .....Mick.....

Hi Guys, Is there a particular type of paint that should be used on a radiator? My Vitesse's rad has ugly, brown, rust-like streaks on it, as if a previous owner over spilled coolant and it ran down the outside of the rad. It annoys me a bit. I tried washing it off, but with no success. Can I use regular flat black paint, or will that impede the heat transfer or air flow through the rad? Thanks. .....Mick.....

I think so, Johny. I mean there is no fuel spewing out anymore and there is no smell of petrol. Both carbs seemed clean, dirt-free and fully functional when I had each one apart, so I think that’s ok. Today’s little drive was to “test it out” and see if any fuel spilled out. I guess I could remove the air filter, start the car, and let it sit there idling. If and when it starts to idle badly, I will see if the fuel is being dumped or not.

That was my guess too, Pete. I have always felt that this car was set too rich. As I said earlier, I have only had this car for a few hundred miles, but very often when I’d accelerate, I’d feel it kinda hesitate or stumble slightly. I assumed it was just too rich. I will take a look at the mixture next, so. I will not have time now until next week. I will post my results then. Thanks. ……Mick…..

I took the car for a little drive today. When I reached my destination about 10 or 12 miles away, I was parking it, and it stalled. I decided not to try restarting it, and I walked away to get a coffee. I came back about 20 minutes later, and the car wouldn’t start. It nearly did a few times, but it just wouldn’t fire. I stopped trying for a few minutes, and tried again and again a few minutes apart. Same result. In the end, it just barely “caught” after about 7 or 8 attempts over a 20 minute period. I drove home and it drove just fine. When I got home, it idled very badly in the driveway. I decided to take a look at my carbs again while it was still running. But by the time I got the bonnet open, it had stalled. It started again but once again idled terribly. So, it seems to me that whatever is wrong, it is not a problem when the car is cold. I wondered about fuel evaporization. But today was not a hot day by any means and I only drove a short 10 or 12 miles. Also, I was able to touch both carbs with my hand, and they were not particularly hot. One more note, when the car was idling badly, the exhaust sounded as if I was holding something against the tailpipe. I’m sure we have all put our hand against the tailpipe to see if it the emissions are black. Well, that flapping-type sound that you get when doing that, was evident when the car idled badly. If I just touched the throttle to increase the revs, the sound went away for a moment until the revs died back down and the erratic idle returned. I first noticed this sound last week but I thought it was the exhaust fumes firing against the number plate of my other car which was parked just inches away from the tailpipe. Obviously, that idea is wrong. Not sure what to do next…. …..Mick…..

It looks new, and the car was totally restored a few hundred miles ago. I bought the car a few months ago and I have only done 300 miles or so. The pump looks brand new and it probably is. .....Mick.....

Thanks Pete. Hmmm.... Well I will leave it for now and see. I plan on taking the car out today for the first drive since this issue became apparent. If it happens again, I will look at getting a weaker pump, if that is possible. I presume there is no way to throttle down the existing pump? .....Mick.....

So, I opened BOTH carbs again. There was no dirt at all in either bowl. I removed the float valve from both carbs, and blew them through in both directions. The little plunger operated just fine, closing off the flow when pressed down. But there was no sign of dirt anywhere. I reassembled everything and the car runs perfectly. But I am still unconvinced that dirt caused this issue. Why did I not see any dirt at all? Not even the tiniest speck of dirt. Can I “trust” the car now? Will it do it again and leave me stranded somewhere? Is there any other reason why fuel was dumped out from the air filter housing? Thanks. .....Mick.....

Pete, Brake fluid is MORE flammable? Really? I didn't know that. So if fuel evaporates on the exhaust, am I worrying for no reason?