Peter Truman

Whipper snappers I’m 76 in a month and like Iain I sometimes have to look at a calendar to check the weekday but the date nah forget that no hope that’s what my trusty 60 year old watch is for ! Fortunately my wife is extremely organised and puts everything on the calendar even when bills have to be paid and birthdays except hers never forgotten that. Oh and I remember our anniversary by the fact it’s the day in the early/mid 60’s my Sprite had to be roadworthied, funny how your mind works. A COVID 4 month lock down really upset the date/time issue

A fellow clubmate here in Aus has a ring of LED's around his outer dipped beam lens on his beautiful and fast Stag, effective but looks horrible!

Don’t think dads 1973, 164 had the dipped beam driving light function! My son brought a 3yr old Mits ASX ex Govt which always had its dipped beam lights on when ignition switched on we assumed it was a Gov’t requested mod but when he put it in for its first service they replaced under warranty the defective light switch/controller now no driving lights on!

Another Triumph inconsistency my 68 Mk2 which I’ve owned 50 of it’s 52 years has the throttle lever spring and anchor rod items 9 & 10. the bar/rod has a Z bend in it so the spring tension can be adjusted by tightening the bends in the Z. Without this extra spring installed the throttle cable nipple at the pedal on my Vitebsk can be dislodged ie disconnected quite easily.

I’m the second owner of my Mk2 Vitesse if you exclude the Triumph garages where I assume it was a demo, or traded in, the previous private owner to me was the Marquis of Zetland estate, where it was a year fill in vehicle for his young lordship till his MGB GT arrived obviously they had NO Class!

Correctly if I'm wrong but we seem to be concentrating on the pedal and cable restraint, when I undo the carb throttle cable lever at the rear carb the nipple always falls out of the pedal & won't stay in there (no clip) until I refit the throttle lever return spring items 9 &10 on the Kipping pic, the individual carb return springs aren't strong enough to keep the cable tension tight. So does your arrangement include the throttle lever return spring and retaining rod (coat hanger type rod) that clips under the sump flange behind the starter motor. when I refit this it keeps pressure/tension on the cable and the cable nipple on the throttle pedal is held securely in position. It's just my thought to ensure the cable is held tight & the nipple doesn't fall out of the pedal.

Pete thanks for the thorough easy to understand explanation, why do some Strombergs use a spring and others a bolt on heavier weighted annulus on the piston, but not both. Ref your comment re use engine oil I've always used auto trans as the engine oil looked a little heavy compared to the Penrite special SU dashpot oil. I need a couple of springs for my Spit 1500 dual 150CD carb conversion, who has the largest range & any idea which spring to start with, I currently have the extra weighted pistons.

Dwarf, Swarf what the Heck! bl++dy predictive text! Merry Christmas to All irrespective of persuasion, nationality, gender, religion, colour, politics, and all variations thereof, it is the season to be Merry! I hope you in the UK, and northern suburbs of Sydney cope with the isolation, Living in Melbourne been there and done that for 4 months continuous, a real bummer! My Triumphs have done less than 100klm this year. Re diff plug insitu, when I pulled my diff down I found the planet gears brass hemi-spherical shims had sheared and only half the shim was still there, all still working OK, I did replace the shims with like.

Ref diff drain plug surely it can be done insitu as the dwarf will drop down and anything that remains in the diff can be flushed out thro the new drain hole and a magnetic plug will catch anything that there could be there!

In the 60’s we lived on the NY moors and I believe there were adders which were moderately poisonious but not lethal to us humans only small animals I never saw one!

Knew that'd get a response from Ahebron hadn't realised they were such a big problem over there in NZ, the ring tails are very small kitten sized, but the normal possum can be quite big but still protected here, the Leadbeaters Possum is the Victorian Animinal Emblem. We've had them in the roof a couple of times "Peter the Possum Man" catch's them and moves them onto a new area supposedly a fair distance away BUT ??? We had a Tassie variation one time and also a white albino which ended up at Melb Zoo, not saying anything in case!

The PO did my Dolly Sprint with a similar product it looks great but I’ve found the extra thickness of the resin in the instrument holes and esp the cubby door which has extra build up on the aperature and door edges caused fouling and required some sanding of the edges to make for a good fit

Colin not so easy when i did a friends Spit 1500 in a farm shed by taking only the front off to get the diff rebuilt, job was logical and progressed well until I looked over my shoulder to see a Copper Head snake curled up around a meter away, I was lying on my back under a mini hoist (tyre repairers hoist), I tell you I cleared out very quickly for a then 70 year old! Copper Heads are extremely poisonous & in Indy's words "I hate Snakes". The shed was home to a couple of small ring tail possums & the snake probably fancied them, Possums are protected in Aus but Ahebron is from NZ where there hated and I believe they hunt them! When I put the diff together I had loud music on, snakes hate noise!

Whilst rebuilding a 1500 engine recently I replaced the shaft and all rockers because the originals were scored, I replaced with std from Paddocks bushed were available but the annual mileage of a classic is limited so std will last forever! Eons (79) ago I had 6 potter (76, 2500 TC Mk2) rocker ie seize due to the locating countersunk Phillips head grub screw coming out but it didn’t fall down the pushrod holes thankfully.

Non Member thanks for the explanation I’l have to digest. Someone might correct me but the single speed mod to twin speed I suggested for the square motor I think results in the fast speed being faster. I’ll try and find the article and post, it might take me a little time.

I have looked at modifying the std Vitesse single speed square wiper motor to run slow and fast by modifying the internal wiring as per seperate web advice, but i want to try it on a spare motor and haven't got one yet to experiment on. I have a later GT6 style 3 position rotary switch for that purpose, this has also been modified for electric pump push contact use also. Alternatively 'non member' with your obvious electrical knowledge can you see are there issues in wiring in the Quascar AS8093 variable speed controller with the later Gt6 3 position rotary switch which is normally, off, slow (fixed speed), normal speed, with the Vitesse ground-side switched wipers. So that the 3 position switch becomes off, intermittent variable, normal or fixed speed, keeping the ground sided switching operation. Hoping you can help/advise any issues Regards PT

can't load the video gaphics on my computer but it all ran OK on the iPad

Colin re Denso great stuff and your covering should be adequate but they also do a Denso Paste that is to be used in conjunction with the tape. The purpose of the paste is to fill in any voids or air pockets and the sharp corners eg round bolt heads and nuts so the tape doesn't get stretched with air pockets underneath and eventually tear thro. This is particularly important when covering bolted pipe flanges and the assembly is going to be buried, the weight of the backfill earth could tear the tape over the sharp edges. The tape is messy but the paste is 10 times worse, & it takes for ever to get off your hands, definitely a rubber glove job!

In recent times I’ve left the pin and split pin in place and pulled the old tensioner spring out intact by rotating it around and opening the two blades of the spring a little similarly I put the new spring in by opening the two leaves a little to enable the sleeve part of the spring to push past the locating pin. I haven’t had any subsequent issues as before fitting the timing chain cover the two leaves of the tensioner spring are slightly sprung apart, I assume the pressure exerted by the spring closes the two leaves of the spring up! Time will tell but it’s relatively easy to remove the timing cover and fix! I have a new set of duplex cam and crank sprockets plus timing chain (origin unknown) do I need a special timing chain spring tensioner? Is it wider

Doesn't specifically relate to the Le Mans Spitfire GT's but here's an Australian slant to a prototype Spitfire GT4, GT6's were never CKD assembled in Aus or sold direct only personnel imports. The veracity of the AMI prototype cannot be proved as Toyota brought AMI out & stopped Triumph production and subsequently destroyed all the AMI records of Triumph CKD production, which covered Heralds, Spitfire's, and the 2000/2500 saloons.

We have a Mk2 Spit which is a pleasure to drive, with fantastic legroom & I'm 6ft 2 and portly, relatively easy to get into and out, it has a comfortable seat even tho basic, & we can drive 3 hours without a stop, so I presume the GT6 is similar, except access with a fixed roof may infringe access for the taller person, I know getting into the passenger seat ain't easy, but that I think is normal for all cars when your used to being the driver! By comparison I have frequently driven a Series 2 E Type roadster, its hard to get into and the legroom is at best restrictive, power oh yeh plenty, but long trips are a NO NO! Price comparison here a good GT6 $30k, vs a good Series 2 E Type roadster around $200k, the one I get to drive is concour and worth $250k, and yes I prefer the GT6, style and easy/cheap to fix, I'm a practicalist. Re looks the E Type Coupe is beautiful, the roadster not so attractive, but the GT6 also has style but not it's beauty, and Oh Yes I prefer the Gt6 Mk2, ie roundtail style with rotaflex.

I did the conversion using an early full Australian Herald convertible 1960 CKD rear tub, which had no rust onto a 68 Mk2 Vitesse body, had issues with some bracketery besides the Mk2 handbrake guides (rotaflex) and cables. the earlier rear tub appeared to have some extra brackets maybe from the earlier Herald type chassis, I did have to file out the slotted convertible to chassis upper diff leg mounts over the axle by about 1/8in to get the bolts to align and ensure adequate door gaps don't know if that was due to my early vs late chassis configuration. One advantage of the Herald/Vitesse modular construction is its meccano like ability to switch between saloon, conv and estate.

Ooh it's on, should be an interesting family Christmas part Ha! & a GT6 vs Spitfire a lively discussion.

Had a Mk1 Sprite great fun but the suspension was why I went to Triumphs! Ooh and getting the spare tyre and tools out WHAT a pain! Luggage was worse.

Yes it was, as it also ran an evaporative cooler which cooled the top floor of the quite large house. Package also included selected ducting I remember getting into the roof and measuring up so he could order the hardware. I reckon it was the only house in North York’s which had cooling.