Zel's Motoring Adventures...Volvo, Renault, Rover, Trabant, Invacar & A Sinclair C5 - Updated 13/11.

[Zelandeth]

3 minutes ago, SiC said:

Don't forget to check all the other basics like tappets. Would be awful to pull it apart to then find that it was simply a tappet too tight. I'd be tempted to take the rocker arm off and give them all a tap to make sure they're moving freely. Could also be a sticky valve if it's sat a long time and that cylinder happened to be the one left open.

Finger on the spark plug hole when turning over will also give a quick indication of amount of compression on a cylinder without digging out the tester. 

As I understand it there's no easy way to adjust things here as the tappets are hydraulic - and setting the preload is basically a case of trying to get the closest average across the whole bank as it's set with shims under the rocker shaft pedistals.

A valve that's hanging up just open a fraction would definitely fit the symptoms.  

For that very reason before I buttoned things up this evening I gave around the valves (must be exhaust I reckon as we've not had any unpleasantness spat back through the carb) a dousing in PlusGas.  Probably won't do anything, but equally I doubt it will hurt either.

[PhilA]

Check the valves are actually being operated on that cylinder. 

Hopefully it's not a dead lobe given the lack of twinkles in the oil, might just be an utterly collapsed lifter as a result of a stuck valve.

Either way these are freakishly easy engines to work on and get bits for. 

[Zelandeth]

6 hours ago, PhilA said:

Check the valves are actually being operated on that cylinder. 

Hopefully it's not a dead lobe given the lack of twinkles in the oil, might just be an utterly collapsed lifter as a result of a stuck valve.

Either way these are freakishly easy engines to work on and get bits for. 

They are definitely moving, I can't see any difference in the amount of lift being provided to any of the cylinders on that bank with the naked eye, so I'm reasonably confident we don't have a wiped cam lobe.

[Shandylegs]

Great purchase. These have been on my bucket list for many years,  but it’s one I suspect will never now be scratched.

Looking forward to see where this goes.

[Zelandeth]

Thermometer was showing 32C in the shade here so I wasn't expecting to be up for spending much time outside, and sure enough I wasn't.

My main intention was to try to track down the reason that we were popping 25A fuses on the ignition switched circuit.  Of course today that has behaved impeccably.  Right.  That's going to be one of *those* problems then.  The fact that everywhere in the car I look I keep finding blown 25A fuses suggests to me that this has been an ongoing problem for a while.

On a related note I investigated the temperature gauge - and there's no life from it.  Nor any voltage getting to the sender.  Given that both the fuel and temperature gauges are showing absolutely zero signs of life this makes me suspect that we may have issues with the voltage regulator in the instrument panel.  Of course I don't have one in stock currently so will need to get one ordered.  I also need to look up how to get the instrument panel apart as it's not immediately obvious and I don't want to go pulling on or levering things given that we're dealing with plastic which has probably gone quite brittle by this age.  I need to ascertain if the clock is getting power as well as that's also on the "not working" list at the moment, so that's another reason I need to get into the panel.

One thing I did successfully do however was fix the radio.  Yes I know that was about item number 3498093453798 on the priority list...but it was an easy quick win I could tick off, and I wanted to know if the head unit actually worked.

Which sounds precisely as bad as you would expect it to through what appear to be the cheapest speakers that anyone could find in the late 80s.  Someone has already cut a couple of holes in the parcel shelf, so I'll probably (discreetly) fit something a bit more modern there to do the heavy lifting (and to fill the holes in the shelf).  Not going overboard though.  At least that's what I'm telling myself.

There was no power getting to it from its original feed (which was spliced into another factory looking line I need to hunt down on the wiring diagram - as that could be the source of our short potentially), so I nicked a feed from a mystery wire which looks like it goes to some long-dead alarm type unit buried behind the dash.  At least I know exactly where that's coming from rather than relying on mystery wiring.

Bit of a shame it's lit amber rather than green, but given the panel above it is also lit white it shouldn't look too jarring at night.  Obviously I'll need to update that photo once it's dark too.

[SiC]

Pet. Res. = Petrol reserve?

Surprised they continued with that tradition if it is! Probably the last rover with it?

[Zelandeth]

9 minutes ago, SiC said:

Pet. Res. = Petrol reserve?

Surprised they continued with that tradition if it is! Probably the last rover with it?

Yep.

Has exactly the same thermal controlled choke light setup as on the P4 as well.

[Zelandeth]

Update.

That doesn't look too bad.

Switch panel being green over white helps make it not clash.

Definitely something funky going on with the headlight wiring or switch.  Mainly in that the headlights come on in dip mode as soon as you move the switch to the sidelight position.  Plus only one headlight is working.  Will investigate that tomorrow.

[High Jetter]

5 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

we may have issues with the voltage regulator in the instrument panel. 

Quite likely, they were a consumable back in the day. May feed the clock too. Let me know if you need any part numbers.

[Zelandeth]

23 minutes ago, High Jetter said:

Quite likely, they were a consumable back in the day. May feed the clock too. Let me know if you need any part numbers.

Thanks for that.  Would be useful to know what part number the regulator is, as I know there were a couple of different types used.  

[mat_the_cat]

The dim main beam warning light is actually a plus IMO - you're likely to be using it most with low ambient lighting, so one of equal brightness can almost dominate your vision. The LT has a dimmer warning light for main beam I assume for this reason.

Does this have the mechanical fuel pump? They can leak into the sump, but is it more an issue with water in there?

If an SD1 engine has been fitted then it should have the later, bigger oil pump, although I do have the kit to upgrade the early pre-'76 pump if you wanted. If it doesn't have the outer third row of head bolts that will further help to date it, although can't remember when they were deleted. Certainly looks pretty clean internally for an RV8!

[High Jetter]

34 minutes ago, Zelandeth said:

Thanks for that.  Would be useful to know what part number the regulator is, as I know there were a couple of different types used.  

I'll try to get the right cat out of the lockup then. It's a 3500, right?

[Zelandeth]

20 minutes ago, mat_the_cat said:

The dim main beam warning light is actually a plus IMO - you're likely to be using it most with low ambient lighting, so one of equal brightness can almost dominate your vision. The LT has a dimmer warning light for main beam I assume for this reason.

Does this have the mechanical fuel pump? They can leak into the sump, but is it more an issue with water in there?

If an SD1 engine has been fitted then it should have the later, bigger oil pump, although I do have the kit to upgrade the early pre-'76 pump if you wanted. If it doesn't have the outer third row of head bolts that will further help to date it, although can't remember when they were deleted. Certainly looks pretty clean internally for an RV8!

Agreed.  Just made it hard to photograph!  Think Saab's approach of having a very dim light aside from the single cyan dot, just enough to see under most lighting conditions was a good solution.  Know others did this as well, but Saabs were where I first saw it myself.

I think that contamination in the oil is actually mostly fuel.  It's been sitting since early yesterday morning and hasn't settled out even a little bit, whereas I'd have expected oil and water to have at least started to separate out by now.  Fuel pump I think will be replaced as a precaution anyway...Given their tendency to decide to expire at the least convenient moment possible when revived after a long period of disuse.

[Zelandeth]

Just now, High Jetter said:

I'll try to get the right cat out of the lockup then. It's a 3500, right?

Correct!  Thanks, really appreciate it.

[SiC]

I'd be surprised if the clock uses the 10v regulator as those electo mechanical regs are pretty inaccurate and not very power efficient enough for ignition off. The regulators use a bit metallic strip to alternate on/off roughly to make it 10v average over a second or two. 

There are solid state ones around on eBay but you're basically paying for a 7810 in a box.

Clocks usually are a little solenoid that clicks back and forth to continuously wind up a mechanical clock movement. Or this may almost be new enough to start having a quartz clock (or had one retrofitted).

[SiC]

A p5 voltage regulator (often referred to the 10v voltage stabiliser) conversion here which gives a decent view of what is inside the original. 

https://www.roverp5.com/fixing-a-faulty-10v-regulator-on-a-rover-p5b/

I imagine the P6 is a similar unit. Afaik Lucas only really did a couple of styles that mostly just changed the mounting points.

Worth pulling one apart even just to admire the simplicity but operational complexity of it. Often it's just the contacts that are furred up too. 

[Zelandeth]

They really are pretty basic aren't they!  Don't have the spreadsheet in front of me, but I probably even have a couple of 7810s in stock...never realised replacing them with a modern solution was that simple.

[High Jetter]

8 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Correct!  Thanks, really appreciate it.

If you do decide to stick to original, the voltage regulator No. is 555758, and the Smiths No. may be BR 1301/00A. 

Also noticed the HRW switch could either have been a pull switch or rocker originally.

[Zelandeth]

In we go to have a shot at getting the dead instrumentation working.  The manual I've got doesn't give any information in to how to remove the binnacle...however the handbook does!  Imagine that on a car these days...

Hmm...Why do I get the impression that we have, or at least have had something of a water ingress issue in the car?

Those two flat head screws there out and an identical two at the other side out and the faceplate comes off.

Which is actually all you need to remove to deal with any issue with panel lighting as the lamps are all replaceable from the front rather than having to faff about removing the whole panel for that.

Four more screws (the inner Philips head ones) release the panel, and once some cable connections and the speedometer drive are disconnected it lifts out.  The speedometer drive comes in from the side to a bevel drive arrangement which actually makes it really easy to get to...which baffled me somewhat as that's usually the single biggest headache when removing/installing an instrument cluster.  I certainly learned new swear words trying to reattach it to the speedometer in the P4.

Our suspect.

Which sure enough when tested on the bench turned out to be dead as a doornail.  The heater was open circuit so not just a case of cleaning the points.  This is all that's inside one of these.

Just like a thermal flasher unit...which is basically all it is. 

The innards of this one were stripped out and an L7810 10V regulator was attached to the inside of the lid to take its place.

I could have just used flying leads to hook it up and either attached it to the back of the panel or to the bulkhead, but I preferred keeping the original case at least.  Plus this should hopefully be a fit and forget solution.

With everything connected back up and the sender shorted to ground the temperature gauge (very slowly) started to climb just as we had hoped it would.  So the gauge itself and the wiring to the sender is fine.

Under the bonnet I set about reattaching the kickdown cable to the throttle linkage.  I don't have a roll pin the correct size to hand, so a bolt and lock nut has been used for now.

The missing bolts from the brake master cylinder mounting plate were located in the boot and reinstated where they belonged.

Had a crawl around underneath the car and couldn't find anything obviously loose or missing, and made sure that things like the wheel nuts were actually tight.

There are definite signs of (relatively) recent money being spent on this car.  Aside from the paint which looks to date from 2019, the front brake calipers have clearly been rebuilt (or replaced) in the not too distant past.

This brake fluid clearly hasn't been sitting in here for decades either.

Likewise the starter motor looks pretty recent.  Not new, but it's clearly been replaced in living memory.

Rear brakes aren't exactly pretty - but there's evidence that they have at least been doing *something* - which given the car hasn't been properly driven in forever isn't the worst start.

The boot on the Di-Dion tube looks to be in decent shape and there's not oil peeing everywhere...though admittedly that may also be because there is no oil *in* it...Haven't got as far as checking that yet.

Again, the condition of that hose clamp to me suggests that's been worked on pretty recently. 

I think the rear suspension likely will need some attention though given that the car seems to sit lower on the driver's side than the passenger's side by a good inch or so.

The braking system passed my patented "stand on the pedal with as much strength as I can muster and hold it for 20 seconds" test without any drama.  So with this all in mind I decided to take advantage of the lull in activity around here between the school kick out madness and rush hour starting and went for a slow, careful bumble around our block.  This literally amounts to a roughly 300 metre square all on 20mph roads. 

Even locked in 1st, there's no real way to get any meaningful revs involved in a setting like this, so I really didn't expect cylinder number 5 to spring back to life - and sure enough it didn't.  However after a few circuits I didn't really detect any issues.  Brakes are a little spongy, but it pulls up smartly enough and in a straight line.  Gearbox seems to shift as expected, smoothly and without slipping, and despite the lack of a cylinder it definitely seems to pull well.  No clonks, bangs or rattles from the suspension and it seems to waft quite nicely.  Not a bad place to be starting from really.

This allowed me to cover a couple of miles, and to get some halfway decent heat into the engine at least.  However it also allowed me to see where the temperature stabilised - right about here was the answer while bumbling around our estate.

Hot oil pressure?  Meh, we have some.  Which given these engines and the fantastic accuracy these gauges are reputed to have I'll take as meaning "good enough."  The warning light goes out instantly when the engine starts even when at temperature so I'm not worrying about that.

I'll want to make a few more checks on things before doing a slightly quicker test - but that's also something I feel I can only really do at set times as the traffic is so damned busy around here most of the time.  There's a petrol station 0.8 miles away on a route that doesn't involve having to deal with dual carriageways or anything like that, and I'd like to make that a target so I can slosh a decent amount of fresh fuel in the tank.

Also on the subject of fuel, a replacement for this (or a rebuild kit) will be getting ordered this evening as this could also have been a major contributor to why our oil was so badly fuel contaminated.

The diaphragm is highly unlikely to be ethanol resistant unless it's been recently replaced anyway, so it's a job that would want doing anyway.

I'm pretty much resigned to the fact that we're most likely going to need to pull the left hand head off to investigate what's going on with number five, and have ordered a head gasket set to that end.  I'd been holding off that initially while I tried to confirm which engine we had fitted.  I'm now 99% sure that this is an SD1 Vitesse unit based on what bits of the number we can make out.

The fact we can clearly read the compression ratio as 9.75:1 helps a lot as that narrows things down a lot.  The only engines I can see which have both that compression ratio and a number starting "?0A" with the right number of digits.  I'm open to correction there from folks who know these engines better than I do, but that's the result my own deductive logic has brought me to.

[Surface Rust]

If the rear brakes look at all neglected then a rear caliper rebuild is recommended. I had a seal blow on one in my 3500 auto and it was alarming how quickly I lost all braking!

Could have been a lot worse, I was on my way to a holiday in the Lake District at the time with the plan of crossing hardknott pass...

[SiC]

2 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

This brake fluid clearly hasn't been sitting in here for decades either.

@Conrad D. Conelrad

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

2 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

Hot oil pressure?  Meh, we have some.  Which given these engines and the fantastic accuracy these gauges are reputed to have I'll take as meaning "good enough."  The warning light goes out instantly when the engine starts even when at temperature so I'm not worrying about that.

They don't need (or have) any oil pressure at hot idle. I know it's unnerving seeing the gauge resting on zero and the light on, but they're working on volume, not pressure. 

On 9/7/2023 at 5:37 PM, Zelandeth said:

I need to ascertain if the clock is getting power as well as that's also on the "not working" list at the moment, so that's another reason I need to get into the panel.

solder fuse has blown, easy fix

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

46 minutes ago, SiC said:

@Conrad D. Conelrad

 

[High Jetter]

This place.

[SiC]

5 minutes ago, Conrad D. Conelrad said:

They don't need (or have) any oil pressure at hot idle. I know it's unnerving seeing the gauge resting on zero and the light on, but they're working on volume, not pressure. 

I remember @PhilA telling me that too about his Rover V8. 

[Zelandeth]

3 minutes ago, Conrad D. Conelrad said:

They don't need (or have) any oil pressure at hot idle. I know it's unnerving seeing the gauge resting on zero and the light on, but they're working on volume, not pressure. 

solder fuse has blown, easy fix

Yeah, thankfully while I've not actually done much work on these engines, I have driven a fair few things with them - both well maintained and...otherwise.  So provided it's not knocking its arse out I'm not too worried.  We know it's not the original engine, so really haven't the slightest idea how many miles it has on it.

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

3 hours ago, Zelandeth said:

The boot on the Di-Dion tube looks to be in decent shape and there's not oil peeing everywhere...though admittedly that may also be because there is no oil *in* it...Haven't got as far as checking that yet.

There probably is no oil in it. Later cars had greased tubes. The two types are interchangeable, so take a peek on the top (approx in the middle) to see if there's an oil filler. If not, greased. 

[Zelandeth]

4 minutes ago, Conrad D. Conelrad said:

There probably is no oil in it. Later cars had greased tubes. The two types are interchangeable, so take a peek on the top (approx in the middle) to see if there's an oil filler. If not, greased. 

That would do it!  I'll have a look.  It isn't mentioned on the lubricant/fluid chart in the engine bay which is otherwise pretty thorough, so possible this is a later type.  Fact that it's still referred to in the handbook doesn't mean nothing I imagine given that Rover weren't always so big on updating things like that.  No idea for that matter if it's the original handbook to the car either.

[Zelandeth]

Missed a couple of photos I grabbed specifically for you earlier, @LightBulbFun.

Will have a look for any date codes when they're out of the car as I'll likely be replacing these with more modern replaceable lamp units in due course for ease of future maintenance.  Sealed beams are getting kind of expensive these days and NOS ones seem to have a pretty high failure rate.  I assume the "Lucas 75" centre ones are just a general wide beam driving light rather than anything particularly specialised.  They only run when mean beam is on.

[High Jetter]

SBU 7002 & 7004 IIRC.