Call me stupid

[Tanky]

Hi all again. So, got the horn working (wire disconnect) Got the wipers working (stuck switch) they are not brilliant so might invest in new wiper motor. Thing is, and this is the stupid bit, There are no fuses in the fuse box! I know the PO must have done something, but what? 

[Badwolf]

That is slightly worrying. Is there anything in the fusebox, tin foil,6 inch nail, anything or just the empty fuse cradles and fresh air?

[yorkshire_spam]

Is it time to try the tradition spitfire owners maneuver of sticking you head (face up) in the passenger footwell with your feet over the back of the seat holding a torch in your mouth trying to see up the back of the card glove-box to see what the previous owner has done to it?

 

In my 1500 there''s a 12 fuse, 3 relay box bolted in the passenger footwell... which means that the engine bay box does nothing but hold fuses that do nothing.

[daverclasper]

1 hour ago, Tanky said:

so might invest in new wiper motor.

I think the brushes can be replaced in the Lucas ones, if that's the issue.

Dave

[Badwolf]

The beauty of putting a new 10way fuse box in the engine bay is

1. You know that what's inside does something

2. It is safer than the original

3. You can easily replace the blown fuses in the rain/snow/sub-zero temperature

4. On the very popular model used by many of us the blown fuse should (not always) illuminate a handy led indicator

When you track down any fuses I seriously recommend a new box.

[Tanky]

Hi, Thanks. There is nothing but fresh air in the fuse holder under the bonnet. I'll have a dig around at the weekend and see if I can find something that looks like a fuse box.. it could be anywhere and I don't know what I'm looking for! I'll let you know.....

[Pete Lewis]

While upside down dont forget to  try varifocals and blood pressure monitor

And  Keep the  sticky plasters handy 

Pete

[Tanky]

Sounds ominous!

[Peter Truman]

Pete's a tenth Dan, who knows everything Triumph & by experience he knows it's going to hurt! A lot of my doctors visits have been Triumph related! cuts, burns, bruises, even scalping of the forehead!

Good luck yours is only 12V, our first NEW house in Yorkshire still had power to everything with the fuses removed, NEEB (late 60's) were there in 20 min to investigate & rectify. I was going to wire in power and light to my garage so had removed the fuses to do the hook up! NEEB did it all for me including a separate fuse box in the garage, extra power points and lighting gratis. 

Peter T

[Badwolf]

14 hours ago, Tanky said:

Hi, Thanks. There is nothing but fresh air in the fuse holder under the bonnet. I'll have a dig around at the weekend and see if I can find something that looks like a fuse box.. it could be anywhere and I don't know what I'm looking for! I'll let you know.....

The good news is that there's not much room behind the dash to put a fuse box... the bad news is that it will be full of wires and previous owners scotchloks/modifiations. I suggest searching on the forum for Doug's Gt6 colour circuit diagram which also slightly different should be near enough to a Spit 1500 to help you trace various circuits. There should be a fusebox somewhere unless the PO has put everything on in line fuses.

[Mjit]

Hopefully just looking at the back of the fuse box will make everything clear.  Unless someone's gone really OTT with a custom rewrire of the whole car the wires that would have made up each side of the fuse box will now be connected to something else...or just to each other.  Hopefully not the latter!

[Pete Lewis]

or NO fuses 

[dougbgt6]

Here is the link to the coloured wiring diagram, and yes, there's several Spitfire versions, although they're American so have things we don't have like panel dimmer?

http://triumphspitfire.com/wiring.html

 

Doug

[yorkshire_spam]

I did an OTT rewire on my Spitfire 1500, doing runs across Europe etc. I need the electricals to be 100% reliable.

I modified the wiring diagram as I went along, here's what I ended up with:

And I made this up and mounted it directly beneath the coil inside the car in the passenger footwell:

 

Then I cut the loom  open and replaced the lines out to the headlight so that I could use high current thin wall cables, allowing me to replace the bulbs.

It was a huge amount of work and I never got to the stage where I'd consider it 100% complete (engine, diff and gearbox rebuilds always seemed more important) but it's been 100% reliable for the last 6 years.

 

 

 

[thescrapman]

If the wipers are slow, pull the rack and thoroughly clean and regrease. Also rotate wiper spindles 180 degrees and put rack back in other way round, that way you get unworn teeth meshing (assuming it has not been done before.

for a proper job you need to remove and clean spindles, much more time- consuming. 

[Peter Truman]

Call me Stupid! When my daughters Spit had the Fuel Vaporization issues ie running badly & stalling before finding the float bowl issue I checked everything electrical & came to the realization that there was NO EARTH STRAP on the engine for 10 years at the time since 2001 that we'd had the car the engine had been earthing out through the choke cable! It now has TWO engine earth straps one at the timing cover to chassis and another from the upper bell housing to the body at the bulkhead.

Marvellous what we blame PO's for! When I brought the Dolly Sprint from a friend who has restored many cars to concour, the horn didn't work, no earth wire at the horn! heater fan didn't work, no earth connection! heated rear window, similarly earth connection missing, rear tail lights intermittent , inadequate earthing, fixed with individual earths to each light!  I was looking at his TR4 and similarly found a  couple of missing earths, I now call him EARTHY as Dopey is already taken up by another club member! Oh by the way I'm Grumpy!

In the late 90's my daughters Spit was restored by a Mech Eng, & he did a good job but obviously he only had metric taps and dies coarse thread too boot so sometimes you come across a rethreaded bolt or captive nut which isn't UNF it can be very frustrating, when I find them they get drilled and heli-coiled to the correct sized UNF, but I'm only a Civil Eng.

Oh by the way re fuses the Spit has the std two fuses reduced to 25amp fast burn, but I have added an additional 6 point blade fuse box 3 battery and 3 ignition taking their power from the input side of the original fuse box and feeding some existing and new elect items. Similary the Vitesse has been done, but the Dolly (76 and still only 2 fuses??) maybe this summer.

An English couple here in a local club who brought their Spit 1500 over to Aus when they immigrated has a multi fused system like the Stag but they fully rewired the car when rebuilding it in the UK, its mounted on the bulkhead behind the battery box, the fuse duty is clearly marked and it looks great.

Peter T