Project 1994 Rover 414SLi - Fin.

[vulgalour]

You are asking the wrong person, I haven't a clue as to the exact reasons why 16 valves would be better than 8.  I imagine it's something to do with making things smoother which probably has a knock-on effect of offering more power at a wider range without compromising economy too heavily.  I imagine.  I don't know that and someone else will.

 

Engines are utterly baffling to me.  Stuff goes in, bangs happen, and then you can drive.

[dollywobbler]

In short, more valves means a great volume of air/fuel mixture can flow in, and it's better to have several small valves than one great big one. The Honda 1.6 has one cam and four valves per cylinder (like a Dolomite Sprint) but it's easier to do it with an extra camshaft.

[twosmoke300]

16 valves = more revs - higher outright power figures .

8 valve = lower revs and more useable torque

[Dave_Q]

2 small valves have a greater area than the one large valve you could fit into the same space, therefore you can get more air & fuel in.

 

Also, to get more in through one big valve you have to open it further compared to how much you would open the 2 small valves to achieve the same flow, opening valves takes time therefore the smaller relative opening of the 2 small valves is achieved more quickly hence why they rev more quickly.

[MikeKnight]

I do love working on K Series engines, I'd describe working on them as easy but fiddly.

 

If you ever buy a K Series car where the HG has been replaced and the guy re-used very old stretch head bolts or goes "huh?" when you talk about angle tightening, RUN AWAAAY.

 

The only thing we didn't do was fit the uprated oil ladder that lives in the sump, but honestly that's not really needed unless you're doing a higher output block like a 1.8 or VVC.. and it's a lot of extra faff.

[vulgalour]

I'm home after my fortnight away in The South. Set off at the end of December very nervous about how the car would behave on the 300 mile motorway trek so close to Christmas Day. Initially things seemed a bit lumpy but shortly after a little break at Wetherby Services to check the fluids and whatnot, the car smoothed out and performed faultlessly for the rest of the journey. Indeed, at motorway speeds it was less revvy than before the engine work and generally a more pleasant place to be.

 

While I was in The South the car was used very lightly and continued to be a good old thing, with no cause for concern. I did fill up and find my fuel consumption was higher than I'd anticipated but still reasonable, I suspect the ECU is re-learning the best fuelling for my post-HGF fix driving and over compensating a little.

 

With much less nerves I set off home this morning for another 300 miles. It became an absolute chore for the last 100 miles with plenty of variable speed rain, road grime and salt spray. It also became uncomfortably apparent that my headlights are rubbish in modern night time traffic, something I tend to avoid anyway. At times, the flood lights fitted to moderns behind me were so bright they were over powering my headlights and illuminating the vehicle in front of me, leaving me totally blind when they weren't there until I could adjust my night vision just in time for yet another round of Close Encounters road users. The most alarming episode was on the unlit country road near home with my headlights offering very little in the way of forward vision to be replaced by utter blindness when Wankertron 5000 comes around the corner and just obliterates any reference points with their monstrously bright headlights.

 

Got home safe enough. Only a few minor incidents of lorries not seeing me when merging and other road users trying to drift into my front corner when exiting the motorway late - the usual stuff - and pretty worn out. Car appears to have used no oil or water (other than copious amounts of washer fluid to keep the windscreen clear) and has performed impeccably well for the entire journey.

 

The only fly in the ointment is a grumble that has all the hallmarks of early wheel bearing failure. A bit of a drone that increases at speeds in excess of 65mph, accompanied by a very slight wander and a very feint buzzing vibration through the pedals. It's really specific when it appears but doesn't appear to be tyre pressure, wheel weight, tyre flaw, driveshaft, gearbox or brake related. The other thing it might be is the backbox disintegrating which will be getting replaced now I have the time to do it, the drone of the current backbox at certain speeds was pretty wearing.

 

Short version: car mostly good, driving on motorways at night in the rain entirely horrible.

 

Next job is going to be giving the poor old thing a wash, it's shamefully dirty.

 

 

[vulgalour]

It got a wash and the mpgs calculated;  41.21 mpg on the way down and 45.91 mpg on the way back.  I wasn't eco driving particularly, just chugging along and occasionally overtaking things so I'm quite happy with the figures its returning.  I've since been driving it about doing my usual errands and the grumble is intermittent, though more noticable turning left, particularly if the front right corner is loaded so I still think it's probably a wheel bearing but I expect there's a lot of life still left in it so I'm not in a rush to replace it just yet.  If memory serves, it did have new rear wheel bearings fitting not long before I bought the car so it's probably that the front ones just haven't been done yet and are getting ready.

[Cavcraft]

41 and 45mpg is brilliant for an 'old' petrol car.  Great thread this by the way, one to enjoy reading through.

[vulgalour]

There's not a great deal out there that can equal it really, they got these just about right.  Around town the very worst it's returned is 26mpg which is thoroughly respectable and before the head gasket failed I did get 52mpg out of it on an eco run.  Keeping a Fuelly account is really useful to see just how much it's really costing me.

 

I just hope I can keep on top of all the little maintenance jobs as it gets older as I don't really want to change it for anything else now, there's very little that it can't do exactly how I want and that's just down to it being a four door saloon instead of an estate really.

[Noel Tidybeard]

some tyres sound like a boloxed wheel bearing if you can be bothered/are fit enuff you could always do a bit of swaparound to see if noise changes

[vulgalour]

Having had wheel bearing and tyre issues and given that the front tyres are pretty new and free of visible defects, I'm still more inclined to point the finger at a bearing on this one.  I learned all about horrendous tyre noises with the Princess with its four mismatched tyres, one of which was a mid-90s remould and another a directional that was on backwards.  That was fun.

[vulgalour]

Well, that noise I was worried about has gone away so I've no idea what it was.  Consider that a self-healing element then.  One thing I've been waiting for a warm and dry enough day to do is put the side trim inserts back on that fell off ages ago, finally got that done today.

 

 

Other than that, nothing to report.  Car continues to use no oil or water.  Now the weather has warmed up the noisy-at-first-start belt has shut up too.

[purplebargeken]

Gets better mpg than the bloody modern i10 FFS.

[KruJoe]

So Ken, you know what you need to do.

[vulgalour]

 

Ken's Amaranth R8 chariot is out there, somewhere.

[purplebargeken]

I've known what to do with it for a long while. It's just working out a story as to how it was nicked and torched.

[vulgalour]

Tonight, Mike and I bimbled over to the first North East area meet for the Rover 200/400 club.  I had just enough time to throw a bucket of water over the car before we set off.  We were meeting at The Angel Hotel which is quite a nice venue.

 

 

There were some other cars of note, but only one other R8, it's a bit early in the year for some of the nicer examples to brave the roads.

 

The only other R8 there this time was a very clean 200 on 16" MG alloys.  The two cars look a lot lower and higher than normal when parked next to one another.

 

 

So that was that.  Car is still fine.  It was nice to meet some new folks and see some interesting local cars.

[vulgalour]

MoT happened today.  Drove over to scaryoldcortina since he's weird old car friendly and willing to let me see what's going on underneath the Rover.  End result?

 

 

BIG FAT PASS

 

Advisories on:

1 - exhaust back box - I took a replacement with me but it wasn't even close to fitting so we couldn't do that.

2 - Suspension bush worn (see below)

3 - Rear tyre is really old and crap - I sort of did know about this, it's the ancient spare, I was planning on fitting new tyres in a few weeks when I thought the MoT was due.  This wouldn't have been on here if the MoT was due when I thought it was, rather than when it really was.

 

So all in all, that's quite a result.  My suspicion that the headlight aim was low was sort of right too as the passenger side one was and would only just come up to the height needed for a pass as the adjusters are a bit seized.  Emissions highlighted that I really need a catalytic converter on it too, but again that's on my shopping list and will get done at the same time as the backbox.  I did think the head gasket failure would have took the cat with it, I just haven't the means to check that myself.

 

For that rear bush, the play has only just started and it's one of the rear suspension items I didn't do when the back end was renewed as I'd run out of money and they were okay at the time.  By next MoT it may still only be an advisory but I'd rather it be right before then.  I want MoT #3 to be a clean sheet if possible.  Here is the bush, handily pointed out by scaryoldcortina.

 

Other than that, the underside is still remarkably clean, I was expecting to see some problems surfacing but it's all nice under there.  Well, as nice as the underside of a daily driver gets, at any rate.  I've only put on about 3,000 miles this year too, it's not a huge amount, and mostly the same the year before.  I've not been out visiting people or shows or that sort of thing which has kept the mileage down, that and it having a couple of periods of being in bits while I used another car.

[loserone]

Best. Tyre. Advisory. Ever.

[Anthony]

Fate-O! I remember having a pair of them on the rear of a 205 GTi I bought a decade of so back - the result was much as you'd expect on a car with a reputation for being tail happy on the limit, making for much hilarity on every roundabout and the occasional buttock-clenching moment when you ran out of steering lock...

 

Well done on getting another years ticket on the old girl and echoing the above - top marks SOC for the advisory.

[scaryoldcortina]

Was nice seeing you - the other tester was impressed with your car too, he wanted a look because he used to PDI them when they were new!

[loserone]

Even better than 'cracked, ancient and generally a bit on the horrid side'

 

https://youtu.be/KPjonn6Bs6s?t=122

[vulgalour]

He seemed most impressed at the lack of rust which I suppose is fair.  Were they really that bad when new?

[scaryoldcortina]

Within a couple of years of being new, yes.

[320touring]

Excellent news on the Pass Vulg - this is a wee peach of a motah:)

[vulgalour]

It's more Autoshite than I could have imagined.  I certainly never planned to see it through two MoTs and be making plans to pass a third!  Must be a keeper.

[oldcars]

Great news indeed, and cracking advisory. 

[vulgalour]

Since the MoT I thought I might be bored of this car.  I'm not, as it happens, I'm just not used to this level of reliability.  I've got the exhaust parts I need on order and they should be arriving sometime this month, I hope, and I hope they're the right parts too.  That'll get rid of the irritating exhaust buzz and should mean the emissions are easier to pass next MoT.

 

After that, it'll be a pair of tyres, I've just not decided which ones to go for yet and I've used the car so little this month, the Fate-O hasn't tried to kill me or anything so that can wait.  I'd also like to get the wheels refurbished this year, something I could do myself since the alloys don't have any corrosion of note, they're just quite scruffy.  I need to decide if I'm painting (cheap) or powder coating (expensive) them and if I'm going silver, gold or copper, I can't make up my mind and mocking up photographs hasn't helped me decide.

 

I've got the rear arch to repair when we've got some welding gas and workshop space and then I need to seriously think about paint.  Colour choice isn't a problem there really, I just need to get some quotes because I'd actually rather someone else did it.  I hesitate to say I want a "quick blowover" but that's kinda what the car needs because of the remaining lacquer damage, the dings in the doors and the little bits of rust that need attending to on the doors.  I've been keeping an eye out for a set of decent red doors, but can't find any better than what's on the car.

 

There's nothing I really want to do to the car that I haven't done already now.  I'd still like to install the Concerto rear lights at some point, I've just been holding out for a Concerto tailgate or bootlid and the trim pieces that go under the rear lights to make the whole job easier. The Concertos I have found always seem to have had those specific parts sold by the time I ask, which is annoying.

 

So yeah.  Essentially it's still being a great little car and ideal for what I need most of the time.  Occasionally I still wish it was an estate car or even a hatchback purely for the sake of practicality but... it's fine.  It's just really good at being a car.

[vulgalour]

Let's get this one up to date too then.  I've been rather busy over the last few months.

 

April 2017

 

PARTS!  I've been amassing what the car needs as much as I can.  I've since learned the catalytic converter is the wrong one for my car, even though it's the only one outside of Rimmers (who want in excess of £100) listed for it.  Might just put the flange from the old one onto this new one so it does fit.

 

My battery decided to die so I fitted a new one.  We had some weirdness with the car flattening the battery after it was started which made absolutely no sense.  It wouldn't take a charge at home either so we took it back, it tested fine in the shop and on putting on charge at home, it took a charge.  Was then refitted to the car and has been fine ever since.  Very odd.  Then Rimmers had a sale at exactly the same time as I got paid for some large commissions, so I bought things.

 

[/b]May[/b]

Found a Concerto under-light trim, FINALLY.  Just need to find one more and ideally a tailgate/boot lid I can chop the bit of metal off I need to do the light swap.

 

Got some practically new Firestone tyres from a nearby R8 enthusiast so I could replace the slippery-when-wet Corsa 122 front tyres and deathtrap ancient McCrumblyrings on the back.

 

Finally dealt with the dodgy paint on the roof.

 

 

Did some rust-busting on the doors.

 

 

Bit of fresh paint too...

 

Repainted the BRAND NEW rear bumper.  BRAND NEW!

 

Annoyingly found out the old bumper brackets were TOAST.  Typically NLA too and different for the saloon/estate bodies.

 

Ended up trundling around like this until I had new bumper brackets made.

 

Found the old rear Imp bumpers that used to be on my Mk2 Polo had suitable bumper irons that could be adapted.

 

 

Got the ex-Chompy front wing out of storage too.

 

Which was given the minor repair work it required before being prepped for paint and then, obviously, painted.

[vulgalour]

The rear bumper fitted, the front wing not yet because I hadn't had time to devote to that and the front bumper still red, the car's new persona was beginning to appear.  This was a big risk but I had faith in my Photoshop mock-up.

 

Some gold made it's way onto the wheels.

 

 

Then the tyres could be fitted.  This did away with almost every weight that was previously on the alloys, now only need a few sticky weights on the back of one rim.  The car was ready for its next adventure just in time.

 

Mike bought a Rover and needed to get to it so we had a Rover day.  Steepest cul-de-sac in Doncaster (and perhaps the world) proved my Rover's clutch and handbrake work just fine.

 

Then, it was pointed out I was Gold Leafing the Rover.  Lols.  Sticker time!