A Parisien Recommendation

This is not the site for a tourist guide for Paris; in any case; the "City of Light" should need no plugging from me, although I must say I do love the place.

Should you be fortunate enough to find yourself there, and fortunate enough to be in the 15th arrondissement then I can recommend with great confidence a bar/restaurant on Rue de la Convention. The bar is called Carpe Diem and is located directly opposite the church of St Christophe about 150 yards from Le Pont Mirabeau - the Mirabeau bridge for you non-francophones.

The other night, my girlfriend and I enjoyed a spendid meal: she had a superb salad with salmon and many other things followed by a Moelleux au Chocolat, whilst I enjoyed three courses starting with a very good chevre chaud, then a fine piece of rumpsteak in a good sauce with excellent sauté potatoes and a mousse au chocolat (also excellent) to finish - and of course a coffee. We drank four beers, 75cl of a very drinkable Bordeaux and ended with a couple of digestifs.

The bill? just 58 euros, about £39, a bargain indeed especially in view of the quality of the food and the very friendly service.

Carpe Diem has only recently opened under its present management, take advantage whilst you can still get in. The French Foreign Ministry will soon be taking over the recently refurbished Imprimerie Nationale next door. I expect that when this happens, Carpe Diem will be packed with fonctionnaires!

An Itinerant in England

The All DHT Amplifier in Early Testing Form

Well, I am finally back in France after an interesting trip.

This of course commenced with my attendance at the three days of the Goodwood Festival of Speed or Mud as some called it especially on the very wet Sunday. I suppose I had better not mention rain any more as I feel that my English readers will be angry!

I have not mentioned so far, another of my other "talents" or at least, abilities. I have warned in the past that this blog will contain articles other than about Fulvias; this is one of them.

I have spent a number of years designing and building Valve ("tube" for Americans) amplfiers for hi-fi. I have even proof-read a couple of books written in the subject (Valve Amplifiers 3rd edition and Building Valve Amplifiers both written by Morgan Jones)

On arriving at a friend's place in London I was offered work building a couple of amplifiers that would use (my friend's predilection) Directly Heated Triodes. For those not in the know, these are very old valves indeed dating from the 1930s and sometimes even earlier. Afficionados of these insist that the resulting sound is more detailed and revealing of the music than that obtained with more "modern" valves. Transistors in these circles I should add, are not considered...

The first of the amplifiers was just a straightforward line stage or pre-amplifier. The second was a more ambitious design. The order from the customer was for two of these - one for each channel. The specification called for an all direct-coupled three-stage design. This necessitated a considerable amount of effort and study of valve data plus many calculations. And then came the labour of planning the layout - that is finding space for all the bits, which is always tough. Here's a picture of the underside:

Experts will notice that there are transistors present, but they are there for "housekeeping" purposes, just to make conditions correct for the all-important valves.

The client came to hear the amplifier and was delighted with the sound and is very keen to know when I can return to England to build the other one!

The experience has rather inspired me to build something for myself, which I may well do when I have the time. Indeed I have already done most of the design and do have the valves I need to build it.

As they say "Watch this space".

Finally watch this space, as I have a report coming up about a 1600 Fulvia belonging to a new client who lives in France and on which I worked last weekend.

A bientôt

Rallye Rochois

Sorry for the lack of postings; recently I have been in England for a while.

However, I can report that the Fanalone ran very well on the Rochois - partly thanks to my preparation and largely thanks to the excellent driving and preparation of my client.

She was placed fifth in VHC (historic cars) - behind four Porsches, the Porsche 911 being the popular choice for these rallies.

Well done I say

A "smoke-free" England

I am at present in England, following a wet but interesting Goodwood Festival of Speed.

Here, finally the fascist nannies have won: as from today, 1st July 2007, smoking in public places has been banned in England & Wales.

Expect a further enormous outpouring of patronising, smug, self-congratulatory words from the "great & the good" - as they ponder the next area of individual behaviour to sanction. Take care all ye passionate anti-smoking types; see how you feel when your favourite activities are banned on largely spurious grounds.

For me, the end of years of style & elegance thus:

The global warming types are another variety of the species - be ready to defend your old Lancias!

Morgan et Moi

Yours truly enjoying the experience

One of the advantages of being freelance or perhaps itinerant (!) is having the chance to take pleasant opportunities when they arise.

A friend of mine, another English ex-pat., has a business based near Toulouse in south-west France. The company is called The Classic Route; it rents Morgan cars to holiday-makers who wish to experience the pleasure of motoring in some really lovely countryside. Here is a link to the website.

My friend contacted me to say that he had two new Morgan Plus 4s awaiting collection in England and would I like to join him in driving one of them to Toulouse? You can imagine that I had to think long and hard about this chance...

My friend explained that such a trip made economic sense: first it actually costs less than having the cars delivered - despite the fact we took our time and stayed in decent hotels with secure parking. Second, the cars are run in properly by the time of arrival and any minor niggles can be identified. And third, there is also the pleasure of driving an open car in France.

So I flew from Geneva to Gatwick on 17th May, a happy date because it coincided with the monthly meeting of the Lancia Motor Club which takes place at the Abinger Hatch pub near Dorking. An excellent chance to meet some friends after two years away, and enjoy a glass or two of good real ale. My friend (a former Fulvia owner) and another and I travelled in a hired FIAT Punto 1400. This model must have the slimmest horses ever found in a motor-car.

The best-laid plans of mice and men etc... On the Friday, various business matters delayed our arrival at Richard Thorne's establishment near Reading and we didn't set off until nearly 8:00 in the evening.

Two nearly ready to go

Initially I found the Morgan Plus 4 rather strange. It is many years since I sat so far back in a car, with a rather nice long louvred bonnet stretching out in front of me. However I did find straight away that Morgan has improved the damping considerably (compared with my previous experiences of the marque) and the ride except on extreme bumps is very good. It took me a few miles (conscious of the responsibility) to adjust to everything.

En route to catch the last shuttle to Calais just after 11:00 p.m., we were passed on the motorway by a chap in a Ferrari 360. In our open cars, we were able to appreciate the splendid noise it made. We met him again at the terminal and he told us he removed the cats - hence the noise! Naughty but nice...

Our first stop was Rouen, we finally went to bed at about 5:30, so Saturday was a rather late start - about midday.

Saturday

Saturday treated us to lovely weather, during the day at least, so despite having to observe a self-imposed rev limit of 3500 the driving was most enjoyable. We stopped for lunch at Le Mans where the cars attracted (as in fact they did everywhere we went) a lot of interest. We had to answer quite a lot of questions e.g. "Is it a replica?" "How fast does it go?" etc. My friend answered all these with great patience and a smile (a born PR man I think).

I didn't expect to see this at Le Mans!

Our evening stop was at Angouleme where we relaxed over a good dinner and a nightcap in a very lively bar.

Sunday was perhaps the best day. We were able to move to the Routes Nationales et Departmentales and with the cars having covered nearly 1000 miles, we were able to start enjoying the Morgans as they are meant to be enjoyed - and believe me they are enjoyable, especially on sweeping curves... Our trip took us through the famous wine-producing areas around Bordeaux, where we stopped for lunch in lovely St Emilion. Continuing south we drove through the valley of the Dordogne with its excellent scenary, chateaux and pretty towns and villages.

The Dordogne

Sarlat

Soon after Sarlat, it was time to take the Autoroute once again for the last leg to Toulouse, where we garaged the undamaged (thank God!) but rather fly-speckled cars and settled down for a fine dinner, in my case including excellent Magret de canard for which the area is so famous. Toulouse itself is a very attractive city, with an active cultural life - well worth visiting.

There will not be any more Morgan trips this year, but there are plans to expand the fleet to include a couple of classic Triumphs or MGs. I sincerely hope to be asked for those!

And if the above appeals, you can meet The Classic Route at its stand to be shared with Richard Thorne (Morgan and classic Lancia dealer) at the Goodwood Festival of Speed at the end of June.

Fanalone Update

Source: Here

You might remember that I changed the camshafts on the Fanalone. Well the results have been very good.

Last weekend the owner took part in the Rallye Vins Mâcon. I was not there myself (I usually am) but again the car ran well. Unfortunately the exhaust system cried enough aftersix years, so there is some more work to do before the next rally, a local one, Le Rochois. Local knowledge counts for a lot in rallies, so we are hopeful!

More soon.

A Long Silence?

Dear readers,

So sorry for the lack of activity here over the past couple of weeks. I have been away, working on various things, the most recent being an interesting trip to England, where I had to collect a new car and drive it down to Toulouse.

The car in question was unusual and I shall be writing this up shortly.

Thanks for your patience and loyalty

Fanalone Trouble

A short while ago I mentioned that it was time once more to roll out the Fanalone for another season. The owner prefers not to run the car in the winter – especially here in Haute Savoie where so much salt is put down on the roads.

I began with a road test as is traditional in all servicing procedures. Whilst the car went quite well I thought that it was perhaps not “au point”.

First move some cars!

I removed the cam cover (I regularly check the torque setting of the head bolts with the engine warmed up) and noticed damage to one of the lobes on the exhaust camshaft. Turning the engine revealed damage to a lobe on the inlet camshaft too.

The two damaged lobes may be clearly seen here

With an invitation to open the Rallye Beaufortain for this weekend, action had to be taken.

The camshafts were special ones – the ex-works profile that Barry Waterhouse used to offer at Evolution Engineering. These are quite fierce with 100° of overlap and 11.3mm lift (4.3mm at TDC) and it has to be said that they are a bit brutal with the valve springs, although I ran a set for some years with no problems. The carburettor jetting is modified to take account of the camshafts of course. The only option was to remove the camshafts from my own car. These are not quite as extreme as the originals but have 86° overlap and 10.5mm lift (3.8mm at TDC).

On dismantling, the cause of the trouble was quickly found: the hardening had failed on some of the rocker faces. More dismantling was necessary: this time the spare Fanalone engine was “visited” and some of its rockers removed to replace the damaged ones.

With all re-assembled, the engine fired eagerly and immediately, always very satisfying. After warm-up, only very minor adjustments were required to the idle settings. The subsequent road test showed the car to be smooth and with good torque and willing to rev quickly to 7000. There is evidence that the valve springs are reaching the end of their life making a built-in mechanical rev-limiterJ. They will have to be replaced providing an opportunity to lap the valves and have a look around – after all the valves have not been touched for six years and 22 rallies!

As I write, the owner is at Beaufort for the rally and as the 'phone has not rung, I assume that all is well… Incidentally, the rally is for modern cars only, but the French club La Scuderia Lancia was invited to provide cars for opening and “sweeping up” (voiture balai). Amongst those providing these services apart from the Fanalone, are some Evos and an 037 stradale, a touch of class amongst all the moderns I think.

Nora - the Feline Pianist

Amazing I think - and great fun.

Back in Action

Yes, for another season (the fifth) without an engine overhaul, the Fanalone has been dusted off. Its first engagement is an invitation to open some of the stages at the Rallye de Beaufortain.

Those who you who a fortunate enough to be in the area will have the chance to see an 037 Stradale, two Evos and the Fanalone in action - in opening duties that is.

Next week I shall be putting a spanner here or there on the Fulvia to ready it for its outing.

The Beaufort (sur Doron) area is stunningly lovely, nestled in the French Alps. I drove through a couple of years ago on my way to Milan; a rare treat it must be said. Another link here.

More on the upcoming rally programme when plans are completed.

Amal Carburettors and the Parker-GN

Well, would you like to try it?

Those of you who have read my series on developing the Fulvia engine, might recall that in Part VI, I mentioned as a possible option, the use of Amal motor-cycle carburettors.

The Amal carburettor is a simple but effective device. Fuel is regulated by means of a single needle and jet arrangement, as in the S.U. carburettor, and the Amal too has a piston free to move vertically. The difference is that whilst the S.U.’s piston is raised by the manifold depression, the Amal’s is lifted by the throttle cable – there is no butterfly - so at full throttle there is a completely clear passage. The carburettors were available in bore sizes of up to 42mm.

Apart of course from motorcycles, the Amal was used on cars before the Second World War, notably by the extraordinary Freddie Dixon on his very fast Rileys that raced mostly at Brooklands. And in the 1960s it was possible to buy tuning kits for Minis that incorporated a pair of Amals.

Perhaps the most successful application, certainly in terms of achievements, was in the Vanwall four-cylinder 2.5 litre Formula one car in the late 1950s. However, this was an application with a difference: the carburettors were used solely as throttle bodies, since the engine was fitted with a Bosch fuel-injection system. Sorry about the small picture but larger versions are available from the source (at a price).

The Vanwall engine with its Amals

It seems that Amals are are still available here and here although I suspect that the larger ones might be difficult to find, but there are also modern Japanese carburettors manufactured by the likes of Mikuni and Keihin which are similar in many respects. Another possibility is Dell'Orto which still manufactures single choke motor-cycle carburettors. Remember that because the Amal presents a clear path a smaller diameter will probably suffice.

To conclude this short piece I should like to add a little about the formidable racer whose pictures appear here. This car is known as the Parker-GN. GN (Godfrey and Nash) was a small company that manufactured “cycle-cars” in the early 1920s. Usually powered by a vee-twin Matchless or J.A.P. engine, the cars featured a very effective gear-change mechanism and chain drive and thanks to their light weight, went very well for the time. Around 1925 the founders, H.R. Godfrey and Captain Archie Frazer-Nash separated, with Frazer-Nash going on to make the famous cars that bore his name which, up to 1939*, still used the chain drive system; later he designed various hydraulic devices including a famous gun turret. Godfrey went on to make H.R.G. cars which achieved some fame ceasing some time in the 1950s. They, like Frazer-Nashes, are very valuable now.

The Cirrus engine showing the four early Amal carburettors

The Parker G.N. is rather different: it is, rather improbably it must be said, fitted with a Blackburn (or De Havilland) Cirrus aero engine. This is an air-cooled four-cylinder of around six litres capacity, and as may be seen in the pictures, fitted with four Amal carburettors. I have seen this car racing several times in the capable hands of Richard Scaldwell and believe me, it is seriously fast!

There are some brave men around.

Sadly I have never heard of anyone fitting a Fulvia with Amals, but the principal appeal is that by staggering them the disadvantage of the uneven length ports could be overcome.

If any one has heard of a Fulvia being thus equipped I would love to hear about it.

* The company had since been bought by the Aldington brothers who founded AFN, the famous Porsche dealers (AFN = Archie Frazer Nash).

Land-Rover Antics - Part III

In Part II of this short series, I mentioned that being an ex-military vehicle, the wiring arrangements were rather different from standard. One might add “and how”!

Bill pointed out that the vehicle was fitted with a heated windscreen which had never worked. Indeed the windscreen must have been a costly item: it had very fine (for obvious reasons) heating wires inside the glass running from top to bottom. SII Fulvia owners will recognise the idea as it is similar to the heated rear window fitted to those cars.

The Land-Rover had been an army radio vehicle, so there were many now unused fuse places in the large fuse box – find that fuse!. I knew also that there had to be a relay somewhere – I had already checked the windscreen heater for continuity and it was fine. Bill has a factory workshop manual which showed some details but not all – and no locations!

As is quite common with electrical faults, I spent many hours trying to trace the circuit. This was subsequently found to be even more complex as there turned out to be an internal short-circuit to ground somewhere inside the military wiring harness which is practically impossible to dismantle. Secondly, the control relay – a very special high-current item, which I eventually found buried in a stack of wires behind the instrument panel was controlled by a voltage level unit. Quite ingenious, as this means that one cannot drain the battery since once voltage drops to a certain point, the relay will be shut off. Typically, the damned thing didn’t work!

So I rewired everything behind the instrument panel and ran additional cables to the windscreen heater with an in-line fuse. The ammeter confirmed that all is now well.

I then did quite a lot of the same concerning the heated rear window!

From time to time Bill had experienced a fuel starvation problem. This is nasty on diesel-engined vehicles as of course once there is air in the system the engine stops and that’s it! The installation as I mentioned in Part I was not very nicely done, and this included some rather hit and miss “modifications to the fuel lines not to mention something similar in the turbo piping (more on this later). Bill decided that he would take no chances in future and so he purchased a Facet electric fuel pump to assist the lift pump that is installed in the injection pump unit. I managed to fit this (just) on the bulkhead under the driver’s seat right above the fuel tank, together with a relay and a small fuse box which will provide a useful additional source of current should this be required in the future. There is a reassuring lack of air visible in the piping now.

A useful feature on an expedition-type vehicle is an inverter to provide 230v A.C. so that e.g. a laptop computer can be run. The one installed had packed up, so Bill bought a better-quality one which inevitably was rather bulkier. With the amount of accessories fitted space was becoming increasingly in short supply. I devised a neat solution: behind each of the windows is a security grille, so we hung the unit from one of these. The installation which Bill did, is very neat as may be seen in the picture below.

The final electrical task was to persuade the front side lights to work. This turned out to be due to the horrid “bullet” connectors so beloved of British manufacturers – I have experienced vast amounts of grief with these on Jaguars, Austin-Healeys Triumphs etc., etc. As usual one or two had corroded – not behind the lamps where one would expect of course, but once again buried underneath a pile of coloured “spaghetti” behind the central switch panel…

Next time: Turbo pipes, half shafts and other bits and pieces.

Browsers

You will see that I have added a few words to the header on this blog.

The reason for this is that I have discovered that people using Internet Explorer sometimes have strange text appearing in my posts and also some of the features on the blog do not work.

The answer is simple: install Firefox. It takes a couple of minutes, it's free, is much better than IE (probably safer) and incorporates a number of useful and user-friendly features.

Find it here in English ou ici en Français

A Little More 1486

Given that the 1486 project was a qualified success(!) I doubt if many of you you feel inspired to try something similar.

However if you do, the attached drawing, prepared by Justin (the owner) might be of interest. Drawn up for 82.4mm bore, this shows the impact of V-angle changes on the overlap between the cylinders.

Click on the image for full size

And just for a bit of fun, here's a factory drawing of the BMW tii Kugelfischer installation...


It's a bit more complicated than our installation on the 1486 Fulvia!

Land-Rover Antics Part II

One of the attractive features of Land-Rovers is the modular construction; the vehicle can be reduced to an enormous number of component parts. In England, Land-Rover enthusiasts are well served by the trade with almost everything being available. I was surprised on looking at the specialist magazines for the first time in my life, how cheap the parts are – engine bearings from about £12 for example. Used as I am to paying over £80 for set of Fulvia big-end shells I was quite shocked.

Work began in installing the revised oil cooler piping. There was to be no trouble in future: Bill had been busy since last autumn. Having experienced the miserable business of changing the oil filter, he had acquired a remote oil filter mounting, fitted in a place that allowed easy changing of the filter. In addition he had bought an oil pressure gauge, a notable lacuna in his complement of instruments; the sender for the gauge fits conveniently into the remote filter housing.

The remote filter, showing new pipes and gauge sender

On fitting the original filter mount with its take-offs for the new cooler, I found that the Daihatsu engine already has an oil cooler of the water/oil type. Inspection showed that the water hoses feeding this were past their best so I made up new ones. The discovery of this cooler explained why I had noticed rather low oil temperatures on our journey to Paris (despite the fact that a thermostat is fitted). Bill decided that the new cooler would be held “in reserve” for hotter places and made up a simple blanking panel that can be quickly removed when necessary. The new hoses are industrial quality, made from PTFE with stainless steel brading and with proper threaded fittings; they will give no trouble.

Finding a source of “ignition on” power for the oil pressure gauge was not simple: the military Land-Rovers have most of their cabling enclosed in tough sleeves and all are connected via elaborate multi-pin connectors. I eventually broke into the heater circuit to find a suitable source, and at the same time re-wired the voltmeter since previously this had been on permanently.

The next task was to mount the gauge. There was very little space available, but finally I made an aluminium bracket to hold the gauge and managed to squeeze it in to the left of the speedometer panel. On firing up the engine later, we were happy to see that the oil pressure was absolutely to specification showing that the engine had not suffered from its near-death experience last year.

A view of dashboard, note (round) military lighting switch
and oil pressure gauge on the right

With the oil system now complete and in order, I turned my attention to the cooling fan. Since the engine conversion there had been no mechanically driven fan. The previous electric fan was rather small for its job and had failed. The vehicle has a Land-Rover 2.5 Tdi radiator fitted; this allows space for the very nice aluminium intercooler – also a Tdi part. Now whilst the rated power output of the Tdi engine and the Daihatsu are about the same (c. 110HP) the Daihatsu is 2.8 litres whilst the Tdi is 2.5. I suspect that the greater capacity was the cause of the overheating oil that had prompted the purchase of the new oil cooler – the Daihatsu probably needs a bigger radiator, although Bill assured me that the water only starts to get above normal temperature when long climbs are being undertaken. However I did recommend that a bigger radiator should be considered. Meanwhile Bill had bought a very powerful Kenlowe fan; its size can be guessed when I say that it consumes 25A! Mounting this was straightforward. I made up some brackets which fitted to the easily removable radiator housing; these are much nicer than the curious Kenlowe system that uses plastic clips that pass through the radiator core. Bill had already fitted a nice adjustable thermo controller, again much better than the Kenlowe one. So I reorganised the wiring with suitably thick cable to carry the large current and that was another job on the list ticked off! The fan produces a very powerful flow of air and should be most effective on those alpine passes I think.

The in-line thermostatic fan controller

Powerful Kenlowe fan mounted

Next time: more electricity...

A Word from Colette

Source here

" Il n'y a pas de chat ordinaire."

You could translate this I suppose as "There is no such thing as an ordinary cat".

Land-Rover Antics In England

Or:

“It’s never too late to learn something new”.

So often when searching classified advertisements for “Lancia” I have found myself in the Land-Rover listings, they being obviously the next in an alphabetical sense.

Well this time the proximity is more than alphabetical.

I have mentioned elsewhere on this blog that I had to journey to England to attend to a Land-Rover. Well so I did and now back in France I propose in relating the story also to demonstrate a degree of versatility on my part!

Background

My client, Bill, purchased in 2001 an ex-army Land-Rover Defender 90 intending to equip it for expedition use. The arrival of the vehicle meant that he now had two Defender 90s, the other being a production “County” model.

The ex-military Defender 90

As standard, both were fitted with rather gutless 2.5 litre normally-aspirated four-cylinder diesel engines. Whilst these have good slogging power, performance is really rather underwhelming. The first step was to replace the engine in the newly arrived vehicle with a Daihatsu 2.8 litre turbo-diesel that was originally fitted to the “Four Track” model. Unfortunately the company that performed the conversion made a pig’s ear of the job, resulting in clutch failure due to a poorly designed adaptor plate. A visit to another firm provided a better job. Subsequently the gearbox failed so an uprated one from Ashcroft was fitted. After these expensive adventures, Bill proceeded to modify the vehicle himself with long trips in mind.

Chassis Plate. Note "Winterised" and "NSN -
Nato Stock Number - "99" means UK manufactured

I came into the picture last year – in September – when Bill arrived here visiting us on his way back from Greece. Naturally, he invited me to look over the Land-Rover. This I did, taking in many of the elaborate modifications, such as the split charging system for the two batteries, roof rack with tent on top, additional instruments, GPS system and so on. He then showed me the newly fitted oil cooler. He had fitted this since he had noticed the oil getting very hot when climbing Alpine passes. I remarked that I didn’t like the way the hoses were fitted with worm-drive hose clips and also that I considered the tubing to be very hard – especially with that type of clip. I showed him the installations on my Fulvia and also on the Fanalone we have here and he agreed that he would adopt this approach on his return to England.

He set off for home, but was back after about 40 minutes. He had stopped to fill up with fuel and had noticed a film of oil on the back of the vehicle. So we took the Land-Rover up to our garage to have a look. We found three things: first a blown damper that had sprayed its oil around (the cause of the oil on the back) second a weeping brake wheel cylinder and third a pool of black oil under the engine – one of the oil cooler hoses I had criticised had blown off! He is a very lucky man; there was about a litre of oil left in the sump. Had the damper not failed when it did, then the engine would have packed up about a kilometre later! I observed that a rethink was going to be necessary if the vehicle was going to be used for serious expedition work.

He was able to source a set of special Australian dampers (“Old Man Emus”) locally from an expedition vehicle specialist at Sallanches so we fitted these together with a steering damper of the same make. We renewed the rear wheel cylinders and bled the system. I remounted the oil cooler hoses as best as I could using double clips where possible and renewed the oil and filter (a real pain in access terms – frequently encountered with engine changes). Finally I persuaded him to drive to England via Paris – this I way I got a lift to see my girlfriend who lives there and of course I was able to monitor and check things on the 550km (350 mile) journey.

All went well on the trip and I was duly dropped off at Porte Maillot. Later I heard that Bill had reached home in Suffolk without problems.

From time to time I received some progress reports and then I was invited to go to England to do some work on the vehicle; there was quite long list. How this went I shall cover next time - or perhaps the next TWO times! I can say right now that I found the experience interesting and instructive.

Aston Martin

Aston Martin must be able to claim a record for the number of owners it has had since the company was founded in 1913 by Lionel Martin. The first company was called "Bamford & Martin". In just a few years in the 1920s, building cars in a mews in Kensington, it managed to lose £50,000 - about £25,000,000 in today's money; not bad for a mews operation.

Not long ago it was said that had Aston Martin never made a car but instead given each customer £50 it would have lost less money!

Well once again, the company has changed hands. Acquired by the Ford Motor Co USA in 1987, the sale was confirmed on Monday - to a consortium headed by David Richards of Prodrive fame.

A 1924 Bamford & Martin Aston Martin
Source: here

Whilst searching for information, I found this - cruel but amusing...

Hub Tools

In my post on Feb 19th I promised to provide some pictures of tools for the front hub bearing job.

Here they are.

Hub nut tools: SI left, SII right
Note that he SI tool is retained by the large cap screw,
whilst the SII one has a support retained by the wheel bolts

Hub Puller

Tool nut

Ball joint separator

The 1486 Project - Part II

I must now try to explain at least in broad terms, how the Kugelfischer system functions, since this has a bearing on subsequent problems and work. Kugelfischer mechanical injection was used well into the 1980s on the Porsche 956 cars that ran at Le Mans, on the BMW M1 Le Mans cars and on F3 cars up to the end of the 1980s, long after the appearance of electronic systems.

In this picture may be seen the throttle bodies and Kugelfischer injection pump
together with the throttle linkage (see text)

The system is quite elaborate and superior in many ways to the Lucas type on my own car. In essence it functions rather in the same way as a diesel pump with four plungers, one for each cylinder pumping fuel at high pressure to the injectors. The high pressure ensures excellent atomisation – a boon on a Fulvia with two of its inlet ports being so long. Fuel control is determined first by the control lever which is connected to the throttle linkage. Inside the unit this basic setting or more precisely, its curve, is controlled by a three-dimensional cam (nicknamed “the potato”). The “potato” is also free to rotate and its position is determined by engine speed this being achieved by an aluminium disc influenced by a magnet acting against a long clock spring. It is difficult to imagine how the “potatoes” were manufactured on a production basis. They are made from hardened steel and are very complex in shape. One can imagine that many, perhaps hundreds of hours were spent in finalising the shape of the three-dimensional cam.

Naturally we had no intention of making our own “potato”…

With the engine assembled, we realised that installing it in the car would also require a great deal of special work. So we decided to have a break and run the engine literally on the bench! This was quite easy to do: a fuel supply and radiator etc. are easily rigged up. We had many happy hours running the unit and probably poisoning ourselves with exhaust gases at the same time.

The testing was worth it however. First we found that the engine, despite our worries ran remarkably smoothly, but we also found that it appeared to run rather lean. We tried adjusting the clock spring to dampen the movement of the cam but this seemed not to help. Finally I designed a little lock plate which fixed the cam in one position (the richest) with a second plate available which would be slightly leaner. Effectively it was now running in Lucas mode with a simple cam – i.e. one curve on the “potato”. It was now time to confront the problems of installing the engine into the car so we could try some road testing.

Installation

The first problem we encountered concerned the cooling system. Whilst a lightweight aluminium cross-flow radiator (ex-Metro turbo) was installed, there was no room at all for even a thin cooling fan since the injection pump and pulleys took up much of the space in that area. The problem was solved in a rather ingenious albeit eccentric way. A radiator from a 500cc motor-cycle was purchased second-hand, complete with its electric fan. This was mounted at an angle behind the LH headlamps. Justin fabricated some elegant aluminium ducting for this, with a louvred section being let into the inner wheel arch to provide an exit into a low pressure area for the hot air.

On first trying the engine in the car, we found circulation problems. Various piping arrangements were tried until finally we arranged the pick up to the water pump from the link pipe between the two radiators (notionally at the “bottom”). The little fan is just enough to keep the engine cool, but I wouldn’t bank on it in tropical conditions.

View of engine compartment. The aluminium ducting may be clearly seen,
with the breather bottle mounted upon it

The rest of the installation was not difficult; just a question of mounting the Uno Turbo fuel pump at the rear and the Lucas regulator and filter in the engine compartment. A fuel return was necessary of course for the "spill" from the regulator. An exhaust system was made up to mate with the manifold, so all was ready.

Another view showing the oil cooler installation
Note the opening in the top of the wing to provide an air supply
(there is normally a cold air box and filter mounted)

Initial Results

On trying the car we believed that we had what was a major success; the engine was powerful and had a surprising amount of torque – this we certainly had not expected given the rather extreme valve timing. And the engine was also very smooth as the bench tests had suggested; this again was really quite a surprise.

The one flaw was a very jerky take-off. We later found that there was an error in the bell crank ratios in the throttle linkage which incidentally may well have caused the apparent leanness in the early tests.

There was a track day at Brooklands at this time and Justin entered and had great fun. On the way back on the M3, whilst I was cruising happily in my Dedra at 115mph, Justin simply sailed past me in the 1486 with a big grin on his face.

Just after this Justin invited Barry Waterhouse to try the car. He was impressed and reckoned that it had “at least 140bhp”.

Nemesis

With various minor tweaks, Justin was really looking forward to the Lancia Motor Club track day at Goodwood. My own Fulvia being in pieces at the time, I followed him down in my Dedra. Sadly, near Godalming, he stopped, with the temperature gauge off the clock and clouds of steam. We hoped that it was perhaps just the head gasket but sadly it wasn’t: the sump oil had turned to yoghurt…

Back at our workshop we eventually found that one of the cylinder bores had cracked; obviously the overbore had been too much.

Justin had the damaged bore lined, but this failed too – there was not enough material to support the very thin liner.

Some time later, Justin had another block bored. This time, he selected a slightly wider angle – about 12° I recall. Unfortunately, this block which had been bored with great care by a specialist who understood what was being attempted, failed very quickly indeed.

Subsequently, Justin had the bottom sawn off this wrecked block and straight away we could see that the cylinder bores were not concentric with the walls. Obviously when cast as a 1300 block, there is plenty of margin to allow for core shift, but of course we were rather “pushing the envelope”. It was very frustrating, as some of the cylinders were fine; it was simply that the bore was off-centre in one place. There is no easy way of telling where the limits of the cast cylinders are.

The second block, with the bottom sawn off. Note the extreme thinness
Of the cylinder wall on No 4 (top of picture)

The section that was cut off: the red circle shows the problem on No 4
Note also that the other cylinders are much better in this regard

At present the car has a 1300 engine installed, still running the Kugelfischer injection and with the nice exhaust manifold. It goes quite nicely, but nothing like the 1486 which really was a flyer. I am also certain that there was more to come from that engine if only it had stayed together.

I believe that if 81mm pistons were made, the project would have a reasonable chance. Of course this would be a “1437” and not a 1486.

One last thought: some of may know that the Squadra Corse under Tonti experimented around 1967/8 with an 80mm bore version of the 1300 engine giving 1401cc. This was known as Variante 1014. I recall that they had head gasket problems with this engine. We had many problems as I have outlined above, but never a problem with the head gasket. Funny that…