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May 2005
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Well, the engine is at MotoBins being tended to. I also managed to forget the flywheel, so had to go back over to
drop it off.
In the meantime I decided to replace the clutch cable. When I built the car I used the one from the donor, but it
was clearly the original and was quite inflexible. The clutch on the car was always heavier than I'd expected, so I'd decided that it was the cable and I'd replace it at some convenient point. As the engine was out and the car was on axle stands, this was as convenient as it would get as to change the cable you have to remove the engine.
When the new cable arrived it was like a spring in terms of flexibility, and removing the old cable and testing how
smoothly the inner ran, it was clear that the old cable really was causing the problem. When changing the cable, slacken the adjuster nuts, use some wood to hold the release arm in it's rearwards position and disconnect the cable at the pedal. The cable can then be disconnected from the release arm when the wood has ben removed and the arm is in its forward position. Refitting is the reverse, but make sure that the release arm end of the cable is fully home in the release arm before trying to fit the pedal end
Final job was to rub down and touch up a few areas where rust was showing through on the suspension arms and
rear mudguard brackets where the coating has got chipped through my enthusiastic exploits with spanners.
I've also altered the mailto feature on the index page. I was getting up to 40 e-mails a day offering me killings on
the stock market (to act as guarantees for) loans (to afford a) p***s extension or Viagra (and whilst I was waiting) women who wanted me to phone them. Of course, when my $30million come from Nigeria the loans will be irrelevant. |
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Progress. MotoBins called on Thursday to say that the engine was ready. When I stripped the old one down I
found lots of metal flakes in the oil filter, so was expecting bad news. It turns out that the crankshaft, camshaft and all the associated gubbins, such as rods, pistons and main bearings were all in great condition. The rear main bearing was replaced to fit the new block, and new bearing shells fitted as a matter of course, and it was all re- assembled. What had been damaged was the oil pump; the clearances were at the outer limits of tolerance so new inner and outer rotors were supplied and fitted. With a new top end gasket set, rotor bolt (original worn) we were set to go. The whole lot came to around £250 and MotoBins have my business for life!
I picked up the engine on Saturday morning, and by Saturday afternmoon, I had ground off the rear mounting
lugs, torqued up the flywheel, fitted the clutch assembly, re-fitted the timing chain cover and the starter motor (this is a pig with the engine in the car). The engine was re-mounted in the car in this state, all of the engine electrics were re-fitted (I had taken the opportunity in the intervening weeks to clean it all up).
Steve at Motobins gave me a tip which saved a lot of time and swear words. Fit the pistons into the barrels on the
workbench, and then attach the pistons to the conrods. This works as the gudgeon pins in the small end are floating and retained by circlips.
So on Sunday, the pistons and barrels were re-fitted (twice- remember the barrel base seal rings and upper
engine stud rings - I didn't - d'oh d'oh!) heads attached (and all torqued up properly) and valve gaps set, the carbs and exhaust could be fitted and the pre-start routine followed. Disconnect the 12V feed to the coil, remove the spark plugs and turn on the starter motor until the oil pressure light goes out and oil drips from the rocker gear. Insert plugs, connect everything up and ..........nothing - battery flat,
After recharging the battery the engine turned over and fired first time. All that is left to do is set the timing
and balance the carbs.
If all that sounded simple, it was really. Total time four hours, including rebuilding the needle rollers in one of
the rocker assemblies (that fell apart in when I took it out of its storage pot - doh!) and half an hour mating the engine to the gearbox.
Next thing to do is set the timing and the carbs, drain and re-fill the gearbox (which I couldn't do with the front
end up on axle stands), set the clutch up and then drive off into the sunset (carefully so that the engine is run in properly).
My apologies for no photos - my camera is duff at the moment. To be honest, the pictures would be the same as
those posted in the past. |
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Last leg on Monday night. First job was to set up the timing, and talk about jammy - the timing was spot on 6
degrees advanced, right where it should be. Having done that I could set up the carbs but once again, they were almost spot on - as I haven't changed the pistons, barrels and heads I suppose that isn't too much of a surprise.
I drained the gearbox fluid and refilled with fresh EP90. What came out was like brown sludge - I suspect
that when I changed the fluid last year it was the first change for some time, and the fluid I've just drained has caught all the muck in there. The magnet on the drain plug had thick sludge on it, but no metal particles.
Final job (which I'd been putting off) was to adjust the clutch. This is a pig of a job due to the way Citroen
designed it, however half an hour saw that done as well.
And finally I could give it a run - it went really well and felt much smoother than the old unit. Shame the
weather has turned bad just as I'm back on the road............ :-(( |