Six Cylinders Motoring Notes

[chaseracer]

10 minutes ago, hairnet said:

ello

need to do an oil change to mx5

are there any places in buckingham that would do that on saturday morning - due to issues up here dont wanna take car to place here - not them or car related)

have oil have filter

thanks

We could do it at the FoD... ?

[hairnet]

how much cake and tea would i need to sort

 

[Andyrew]

7 minutes ago, hairnet said:

how much cake and tea would i need to sort

 

Depends on quality of the tea and biscuits. 

Choose wisely. 

Tetley tea and own brand rich tea biscuits = cross threaded oil filter and the sumplug left loose. 

 

[Zelandeth]

Went to start the Trevi up having replaced a vacuum hose that was found to be decomposing. *Click* then there was no electricity.

Didn't take long to find the thankfully simple cause...

Sorted now!

 

[hairnet]

10 minutes ago, Andyrew said:

Depends on quality of the tea and biscuits. 

Choose wisely. 

Tetley tea and own brand rich tea biscuits = cross threaded oil filter and the sumplug left loose. 

 

never done tetley and no dis rich tea biccies - own brand you get more and they last longer (how?)

i dont have fortnum and masons ones :D

obvs pieces of paper with the queens head will be available :)

 

[Tadhg Tiogar]

9 minutes ago, hairnet said:

.... pieces of paper with the queens head will be available

What, second class stamps?

[hairnet]

13 minutes ago, Tadhg Tiogar said:

What, second class stamps?

Don't think he'd take these

[Talbot]

38 minutes ago, Andyrew said:

Depends on quality of the tea and biscuits. 

Choose wisely. 

Tetley tea and own brand rich tea biscuits = cross threaded oil filter and the sumplug left loose. 

 

What would a decent twinings tea or maybe Yorkshire tea plus a pack of chocolate hob-nobs achieve I wonder...

[Andyrew]

30 minutes ago, hairnet said:

never done tetley and no dis rich tea biccies - own brand you get more and they last longer (how?)

i dont have fortnum and masons ones

obvs pieces of paper with the queens head will be available

 

Happy to chuck the oil suction pump and an oil filter tool in the car to bring with me if you wanted to change it. 

Im over on the sunday.  Ping me a message if you needed an other service parts. 

[hairnet]

7 minutes ago, Talbot said:

What would a decent twinings tea or maybe Yorkshire tea plus a pack of chocolate hob-nobs achieve I wonder...

ask chris about the blue riband that he didnt get a look on

 

[LightBulbFun]

2 minutes ago, Andyrew said:

Happy to chuck the oil suction pump and an oil filter tool in the car to bring with me if you wanted to change it. 

yes please! 

am planning to hopefully maybe get an oil change done on REV so that would be handy I think?  

[Six-cylinder]

I told them to have the Jag ready for the blag!

Anyway in the real world a year ago the Daimler Sovereign S1 Automatic lost the use of 3rd gear and since then there has been talk of checking it was not an external linkage before we put it in for an expensive rebuild. In the end I drove it in 2nd gear to Milton Keynes gearboxes today and there warned me it was not likely to be a quick fix. This evening at 17:42 I got a call to say your car is fixed and can you take it away tonight as we are short of parking! @flat4alfa A vacuum pipe had fallen off causing the problem so a nice quick fix.

They had left it in the road when I said I was coming over and it did look like a scene from The Sweeney where it was parked.

I love the dash on this.

[hairnet]

23 minutes ago, Andyrew said:

Happy to chuck the oil suction pump and an oil filter tool in the car to bring with me if you wanted to change it. 

Im over on the sunday.  Ping me a message if you needed an other service parts. 

itll have had filter and plugs by friday i dont have ramps to do oil

i might only be there on the saturday :(

thanks for offer tho

[Andyrew]

18 minutes ago, LightBulbFun said:

yes please! 

am planning to hopefully maybe get an oil change done on REV so that would be handy I think?  

Yours would be a drop the sump plug change. Oils too thick for a vac pump.  Warm ish 10w40 takes bloody ages!

[richardmorris]

12 minutes ago, Six-cylinder said:

I told them to have the Jag ready for the blag!

Anyway in the real world a year ago the Daimler Sovereign S1 Automatic lost the use of 3rd gear and since then there has been talk of checking it was not an external linkage before we put it in for an expensive rebuild. In the end I drove it in 2nd gear it to Milton Keynes gearboxes and there warned me it was not likely to be a quick fix. This evening at 17:42 I got a call to say your car is fixed and can you take it away tonight as we are short of parking! @flat4alfa A vacuum pipe had fallen of causing the problem so a nice quick fix.

They had left it in the road when I said I was coming over and it did look like a scene from The Sweeney where it was parked.

I love the dash on this.

Happy to give it a long drive if needed!

[Floatylight]

27 minutes ago, Six-cylinder said:

I told them to have the Jag ready for the blag!

Anyway in the real world a year ago the Daimler Sovereign S1 Automatic lost the use of 3rd gear and since then there has been talk of checking it was not an external linkage before we put it in for an expensive rebuild. In the end I drove it in 2nd gear it to Milton Keynes gearboxes and there warned me it was not likely to be a quick fix. This evening at 17:42 I got a call to say your car is fixed and can you take it away tonight as we are short of parking! @flat4alfa A vacuum pipe had fallen of causing the problem so a nice quick fix.

They had left it in the road when I said I was coming over and it did look like a scene from The Sweeney where it was parked.

I love the dash on this.

Calendar shot!

[Mrs6C]

6 hours ago, Andyrew said:

 

It is very much like that one, yes.

Here it is on Dolly, looking rather tired...

 

Here it is on the bench, after a bit of a clean:

 

It's a Lucas 76766M, with the central moulding for the starter button, but no actual button...

 

[richardmorris]

12 minutes ago, Mrs6C said:

It is very much like that one, yes.

Here it is on Dolly, looking rather tired...

 

Here it is on the bench, after a bit of a clean:

 

It's a Lucas 76766M, with the central moulding for the starter button, but no actual button...

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GENUINE-LUCAS-SRB325-76766-4ST-12V-STARTER-SOLENOID-CLASSIC-CAR-TRIUMPH-MINI-/231191266102

https://www.autoelectricalspares.co.uk/lucas-srb325-76766-76772-4st-external-solenoid-genuine-92-p.asp

https://www.malpasonline.co.uk/oem/76766/Lucas

https://www.amazon.co.uk/130872-Starter-Solenoid-replaces-SRB325/dp/B07DN26NQF

 

[Zelandeth]

Trevi update!

Finally got a chance to have a proper look at the car today once the rain stopped and made myself a to do list.

Things I'd observed:

[] Heater inoperable.  Fan would run, but while it made noise there was no airflow.

[] Spurious tail light failure indication.

[] Offside indicators slow down when tail or brake lights are lit.

[] Several dash illumination lamps out or intermittent.

[] Switchgear illumination very dim.

[] Dash warning lights for parking brake & rear fog lights inoperable.

[] Very rough idle.

I started out intending to look at the tail lights as I reckon a dodgy ground is probably to blame.  There's signs of water ingress in the clusters, probably because the lenses are quite badly crazed and there are a few actual cracks.

Didn't actually get as far as looking at the clusters and their wiring closer as I noticed the moment that I opened the boot that there was a significant amount of water in there.  This is because the rain is literally pouring into the boot through a rust hole in the surround.

Bodywork isn't really my forte and I don't want to get involved in plastering a car that's not mine with filler or anything.  I did want to do something quick to keep at least some of the weather out though.  So I grabbed the ally foil tape and made a patch.

It can just be peeled off and any residue removed with some solvent cleaner when a more permanent repair is done.  This should keep at least most of the rain out though in the interim.  If Six-Cylinder would like I can give the area a dousing in Vactan as well, but didn't want to make assumptions.  I will be going back in there to re-apply the patch anyway once the area is fully dry as I don't expect it will have adhered fully given it had been raining five minutes beforehand.

Seeing that I'll need to strip quite a bit of trim out of the back of the boot to get to the tail light wiring I decided to come back to that and see if I could find any obvious candidates for the lumpy idle.

Straight off the bat I found a vacuum line which had started to decompose.  It didn't look too bad in situ but once looked at more closely...

Thirty second job to replace. 

Sadly it didn't have any noticeable impact on the idle.  However I spotted a very likely candidate for the dead heater.

That black cylinder is a vacuum accumulator and is part of the heating system...and one end should be connected to the inlet manifold.  That vacuum line (and anywhere for it to go) was completely absent.  My guess is that back when this car had twin carbs there would have been a dedicated tap on the manifold for it.  There was an additional attachment for it available though, just needed the blanking cap to be removed.  I could then route a vacuum line for it.

Once this was hooked up I was happy to see that the push buttons controlling the air distribution now work correctly, and the heater seems to be mighty effective.

The party trick of the system has to the fact that when you switch it to cooling mode (which would probably bring the A/C on if the car was so equipped) that it automatically returns the temperature control to full cold.

That is something which will no doubt provide plenty of entertainment when stuck in traffic in the future.

Once I had confirmed this was working I tidied up the hoses I'd just routed a bit.  When I went to restart the car I was met with a single click and a complete loss of electricity.

Tracking down the cause of that took about thirty seconds...the screws in the negative battery terminal were barely finger tight and the lead was totally free to float around in the terminal.

The end of the cable was pretty mangled as it had obviously been getting hot for a while so I trimmed it back and remade the connection.

When I had done that, I spotted the positive terminal smoking when the engine was cranking!  Turns out the starter lead was connected to the terminal by three or four strands and was ready to break away.  Fine...took that apart and remade the connections too.

I tweaked the alignment a bit so that neither the main feed to the car systems or the starter were jammed against the battery itself.

In the general neighborhood of the battery I found this wire floating around in the nearside wing waiting to short out on something.  No idea what it used to be, but it is long gone.

The barrel connector it was connected to is still there in the loom so it can easily be reconnected if necessary in the future, but doesn't this look better?

That's about all I had time for today other than having taken five minutes to track down where the screws holding the dash together are.  Looks like this shouldn't be too hard to get into to change the dash lamps...the main task I set out to do!

Will hopefully get stuck into that tomorrow. 

I've got a hunch about the running issue.  I note that there's a solenoid on the carb - a solenoid which is currently connected to nothing...and which appears to have an open circuit coil.  If that's something to do with the idle circuit this could be causing all sorts of trouble. 

Can you confirm which model of carb is fitted so I can look up a diagram to confirm what that solenoid is supposed to do? 

I'm not going to waste too much time on this just now as the car is perfectly drivable.  A bit of vibration through the car at idle is the only sign anything is awry really.  I'm also not about to go twiddling things on the carb as I recall it being mentioned that it wasn't easy to get it set up in the first place.  If I can diagnose a possible issue though I'd like to have a clear recommendation to give.  I will stick it on the gas analyser tomorrow though so I can see if it's rich or lean...smells rich, but I've been wrong before.

Only other things I noted down on my notepad from today we're regarding the cooling system.  The radiator is weeping from a couple of spots.  One around the base of the bleed line to the header tank, the other appears to be along the actual seam between the top plastic header and the core itself.

That connection to the expansion tank in particular makes me uneasy as it's clearly already been subjected to an epoxy or similar repair.

On the same subject, the coolant has turned to rust soup again.

It doesn't smell of fuel and there isn't any in the oil, so I reckon it's still just flushing old crud from years of neglect out the system.

Do you want me to give it another flush out while I've got it in front of the garage?  Happy to do it if you'd like.  Only question there would be which antifreeze you're using?  Traditional or OAT.  I've got both in stock so just let me know.

I wonder if the incident in Buckingham the other day where it barfed a lot of coolant out was due to a chunk of gunge getting flushed out of somewhere.

Final task before I locked up and went to cook dinner was to reset the wonderfully 80s clock to the right time following the battery removal earlier.

Tomorrow I'll hopefully get back on mission and get the dash lighting sorted out.

 

[Six-cylinder]

26 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Trevi update!

Finally got a chance to have a proper look at the car today once the rain stopped and made myself a to do list.

Things I'd observed:

[] Heater inoperable.  Fan would run, but while it made noise there was no airflow.

[] Spurious tail light failure indication.

[] Offside indicators slow down when tail or brake lights are lit.

[] Several dash lights out.

[] Switchgear illumination very dim.

[] Very rough idle.

I started out intending to look at the tail lights as I reckon a dodgy ground is probably to blame.  There's signs of water ingress in the clusters, probably because the lenses are quite badly crazed and there are a few actual cracks.

Didn't actually get as far as looking at the clusters and their wiring closer as I noticed the moment that I opened the boot that there was a significant amount of water in there.  This is because the rain is literally pouring into the boot through a rust hole in the surround.

Bodywork isn't really my forte and I don't want to get involved in plastering a car that's not mine with filler or anything.  I did want to do something quick to keep at least some of the weather out though.  So I grabbed the ally foil tape and made a patch.

It can just be peeled off and any residue removed with some solvent cleaner when a more permanent repair is done.  This should keep at least most of the rain out though in the interim.  If Six-Cylinder would like I can give the area a dousing in Vactan as well, but didn't want to make assumptions.  I will be going back in there to re-apply the patch anyway once the area is fully dry as I don't expect it will have adhered fully given it had been raining five minutes beforehand.

Seeing that I'll need to strip quite a bit of trim out of the back of the boot to get to the tail light wiring I decided to come back to that and see if I could find any obvious candidates for the lumpy idle.

Straight off the bat I found a vacuum line which had started to decompose.  It didn't look too bad in situ but once looked at more closely...

 

 

In the general neighborhood of the battery I found this wire floating around in the nearside wing waiting to short out on something.  No idea what it used to be, but it is long gone.

The barrel connector it was connected to is still there in the loom so it can easily be reconnected if necessary in the future, but doesn't this look better?

I've got a hunch about the running issue.  I note that there's a solenoid on the carb - a solenoid which is currently connected to nothing...and which appears to have an open circuit coil.  If that's something to do with the idle circuit this could be causing all sorts of trouble. 

Can you confirm which model of carb is fitted so I can look up a diagram to confirm what that solenoid is supposed to do? 

I'm not going to waste too much time on this just now as the car is perfectly drivable.  A bit of vibration through the car at idle is the only sign anything is awry really.  I'm also not about to go twiddling things on the carb as I recall it being mentioned that it wasn't easy to get it set up in the first place.  If I can diagnose a possible issue though I'd like to have a clear recommendation to give.  I will stick it on the gas analyser tomorrow though so I can see if it's rich or lean...smells rich, but I've been wrong before.

 

That connection to the expansion tank in particular makes me uneasy as it's clearly already been subjected to an epoxy or similar repair.

Do you want me to give it another flush out while I've got it in front of the garage?  Happy to do it if you'd like.  Only question there would be which antifreeze you're using?  Traditional or OAT.  I've got both in stock so just let me know.

The clock has never been set since I have had it.

I have seen the bodge on the radiator, I haven't looked into getting a replacement yet.

It only has water in it since it dumped its coolant so please flush it though. On a car of this age I will use blue antifreeze and I have gallons of it as I buy it 2 x 20 LTR at a time from Andyrew if you need it. 

When I looked at this car it had twin carbs fitted but not part of the deal. This carb was given in exchange and may not be the exact one for the car.

The engine fan has a separate feet to bypass the broken fuse box.

I had not noticed the hole in the boot gutter until Saturday when I cleaned a load of leaves out of it while measuring the boot strut to order a replacement. Yes please with the Vactan anywhere there is bear rusty metal you can't make it any worse.

and the moral of the story boys and girls is you should not get drunk, happy and see cars though rose tinted spectacles!

Thanks so much for all you are doing to this car.

[N19]

3 hours ago, Tadhg Tiogar said:

What, second class stamps?

The rate they're increasing, won't be long until we start using them as pound notes... 

[Zelandeth]

7 minutes ago, Six-cylinder said:

...and the moral of the story boys and girls is you should not get drunk, happy and see cars though rose tinted spectacles!

Thanks so much for all you are doing to this car.

If it wasn't for moments like that though you wouldn't have such wonderful oddballs like this in the fleet though.  Reckon she's very much beaten the odds ending up with you has this car.

I'll give it a bit if Vactan action around the tailgate aperture then before I reapply the patch.  It probably won't be perfect but anything that helps keep the weather out has to be an improvement.

Will add a couple of coolant flushes to the to do list, see how it goes then.  I'm assuming this has the usual thermostat-in-a-hose setup from this era, if so I'll make a point of gaining access to that while I'm at it to make sure it's not bunged up with rusty slime.

The feed to the fan was noted while I was sorting the battery terminals.  It seemed to be done fine, so all I did was secure the wire so it wouldn't vibrate and fatigue the crimp terminal at the battery end.

I can absolutely see why despite the issues why it's a car you like though, rough around the edges or not it is a lovely thing.

Regarding the carb, it's an odd behaviour.  The issue is definitely on the idle circuit as it's fine when you're on the power...just breaks up badly at idle.  I'll pull the air cleaner tomorrow so I can find out exactly what carb it is beyond "Weber" which is blindingly obvious.  At least then I can eliminate (or not) the disconnected solenoid as a potential trouble cause.

Just thinking about it...I might just have missed it, but I don't remember seeing a fuel filter.  If there's not one I'll add one for you.

Just want to do anything I can to help make the car pleasant to use and more reliable long term.

[flat4alfa]

Stating the obvious...  but that Trevi had the Bosch L-Jetronic injection system from the factory

I have plenty of factory workshop manuals, wiring diagrams and fiches for these cars

[flat4alfa]

4 hours ago, richardmorris said:

Happy to give it a long drive if needed!

Would love to again but I've felt so guilty all these months for returning it borked....

[Talbot]

3 hours ago, Six-cylinder said:

The clock has never been set since I have had it.

It has, just not when you've noticed!

While on the fish-and-chip run we decided that it was absolutely imperative that the clock show the correct time.

[Talbot]

2 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

Stating the obvious...  but that Trevi had the Bosch L-Jetronic injection system from the factory

Are you sure about that?  Wikipedia suggests that both a 2.0 8v carb and a 2.0 8V i.e. engine was available

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancia_Trevi

I know the badge says i.e, but is that original to the car?

 

Also:

4 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

I note that there's a solenoid on the carb - a solenoid which is currently connected to nothing...and which appears to have an open circuit coil.  If that's something to do with the idle circuit this could be causing all sorts of trouble. 

That's most likely an anti-dieseling solenoid.  It needs power from the ignition circuit to allow the engine to idle properly.  When power is cut to it, it's supposed to shut off the idle mixture jet to prevent run-on.  I've had all manner of experience with these twin-sequential carburettors on various Fiat heaps over the years, and have had to rectify some quite awful bodges.  It's possible that if the anti-dieseling solenoid isn't working, someone has attempted to use other adjustments to allow the engine to idle.  Might well be worth seeing if that can be made to work, as it's rather essential to the operation of the idle mixture system on these.

[Zelandeth]

2 hours ago, Talbot said:

...That's most likely an anti-dieseling solenoid.  It needs power from the ignition circuit to allow the engine to idle properly.  When power is cut to it, it's supposed to shut off the idle mixture jet to prevent run-on.  I've had all manner of experience with these twin-sequential carburettors on various Fiat heaps over the years, and have had to rectify some quite awful bodges.  It's possible that if the anti-dieseling solenoid isn't working, someone has attempted to use other adjustments to allow the engine to idle.  Might well be worth seeing if that can be made to work, as it's rather essential to the operation of the idle mixture system on these.

Yep, that's precisely where my logic has been going.  I have a sneaking suspicion that the idle mixture screw has been wound way, way, way open to try to compensate, getting it so the car will just about idle.

Would also tie in with the fact that she really struggles until she's fully warm if she's missing half the idle circuit.

[Six-cylinder]

5 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

Stating the obvious...  but that Trevi had the Bosch L-Jetronic injection system from the factory

I have plenty of factory workshop manuals, wiring diagrams and fiches for these cars

 

3 hours ago, Talbot said:

Are you sure about that?  Wikipedia suggests that both a 2.0 8v carb and a 2.0 8V i.e. engine was available

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lancia_Trevi

I know the badge says i.e, but is that original to the car?

 

Also:

That's most likely an anti-dieseling solenoid.  It needs power from the ignition circuit to allow the engine to idle properly.  When power is cut to it, it's supposed to shut off the idle mixture jet to prevent run-on.  I've had all manner of experience with these twin-sequential carburettors on various Fiat heaps over the years, and have had to rectify some quite awful bodges.  It's possible that if the anti-dieseling solenoid isn't working, someone has attempted to use other adjustments to allow the engine to idle.  Might well be worth seeing if that can be made to work, as it's rather essential to the operation of the idle mixture system on these.

As far as I know no  UK cars were IE. I have no idea where it got it's boot lid from.  I have the original new car order for it and that does not show it as IE. I spent some time thinking it was an IE stripped of its injection equipment, but now I don't.

It has had a new thermostat but seems to take 5 miles to get up to temperature. Once I did start it move it around on the drive for a while, thenn came back to it 1\2 an hour later and it ran nicely.

 

[flat4alfa]

Fair enough, I do still have a boot lid badge 'strip' that I was told was never fitted to UK-issue cars...   My Trevi was carb with the AP automatic box (last one left in UK, no less) and badged as simply '2000'.  This was ten years ago and there was very little knowledge/memory of Trevi specifics in the UK even then

The Trevi was no more than a 'notchback' Beta Berlina Series III; in fact the Berlina III came first.  Having owned both at the same time (I'm better now!), I can confirm that forward of the C-pillar they are the same car, so parts commonality is great; if you can find.  Many of the issues I remember stemmed from the ECU, take one apart and you'll see how brittle and corroded the circuit 'board' has become.  Unfortunately I sold all my ECU/IE and Carb spares years ago and much of that went abroad.  I do have dashboards, headlamps and window mechs still, in storage (I think)

Best place for support is/was BetaBoys forum and parts support from Mark Wastnidge at Chard.  Both my Berlina and Trevi currently live with club members Mark and Theo

https://www.betaboyz.co.uk/

https://353652584127257704.weebly.com/

[flat4alfa]

The 2017 auction listed the engine number as 386819.  If it is the factory fitting, some sleuthing might confirm.  Guy Croft had lists of engines variations at one time

As it is listed at DVLA as fitted with the '115 BHP' engine, that would pretty-much confirm a factory 8V carb 155 PS