Fire in the hole!!!
Discussion
AAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!! More progress made tonight, but bizzare goings on, and its still not running as it should....
Tonight we checked the carb settings as per the redline website I posted yesterday, and set it at the base settings. Then we took each of the plugs out (which are brand new NGK V groove) and gave them a clean up. Surprisingly, they were pretty mucky. We gave them a wipe up with some tissue, and there was a fair amount of black residue coming off, and considering it hasn't run properly yet, I didn't expect this at all.
A couple of hours of turning and checking ensued, and we've now checked carb settings, timing (it's not 180 off, well at least now it's not...), leads, fuel pump, sparks from the coil, sparks from the leads, sparks from the plugs, turned the distributor round a bit.... Running out of things to check.
Tried it late on with a bit of choke, and some throttle, and BANG, POP, POP POP BBBAAAANNNNGGG. Well, progress we thought, and gave it a minute. We've discovered that if we give the engine some choke, and some throttle, but not throttle on it's own, it definitely seems to fire into life a little at least.
Unfortunately, this has some interesting side effects:
- Lots of rear end noise;
- Flames in the air filter, followed by a fair amount of smoke (scary when you're holding the throttle linkage open, as Chris will testify...
); - and culminating in a 5 foot flame from the left exhaust........
Something not quite right methinks...????? Is this really normal?
So, need to know where to go from here. I'm hopefully going to take friday afternoon off work to have a go during the day when noise isn't so much of an issue, and if that doesn't work, those going to the Bucks TVRCC meet at the crows nest on Friday may end up with a little project for the evening - we're considering trailering it down to see what people make of it.
In the meantime, if anyone can take a guess at these symptoms, or can suggest anything else, we're all ears! Any suggestions are welcome....
Please.....!
Thanks all,
Tony (& Chris)
www.tvr-3000m.co.uk
Take dist. cop off and note rotation of rotor cw or ccw. Now check your wires to see if they compliment particular rotation and firing order.Firing order should be on intake.Only other thing i can think of if every thing else is right(oh no)is cam timing.Improper relationship between cam and crank angle could cause these symptoms,even one tooth off.You said it was rebuilt by a professional? Another point;you can't keep cranking this thing over without firing!You're washing down the cylinder walls with raw fuel possibly glazzing
the walls when it does fire,leading to poor ring seal and an engine that looks like a crop duster.
the walls when it does fire,leading to poor ring seal and an engine that looks like a crop duster.
An observation while at your site(very nice)I noticed this old rusty crank dampner.From what i can see,it looks like a three piece style to me.A hub,elastomer and outer ring.With age and spinning around a few million times the outer ring,along with your timing mark slips on the elastomer.I have seen it happen many times,driving grown men to cry.You couldn't set your static timing correctly if this were the case.What to do? Get a spanking new dampner and check the relationship of the timing mark to the crankshaft keyway in the hub,the old to the new.Regardless of the outcome throw out the old dampner,these outer rings on these old dampners can fly off causing severe damage,bodily and otherwise.Other method,very carefully insert a wood dowel into #1 while your buddy turns the engine over by hand.When at TDC note position of dampner timing mark to pointer.That binding you felt at approx. every 120 deg.crank revolution were your valve springs.Set your initial timing at 8 deg.A slow turning engine will have greater diffuclty trying to fire at 14 deg.
Thanks for those.
I think, as I've got the afternoon off tomorrow, we'll start right at the beginning and make sure the timing mark is roughly where it should be. Thanks for the advice of checking for TDC on the number one cylinder - that should avoid having to take the covers etc off. Now, we were advised to set the timing to 14 degrees, and we went by the Haynes manual to do this with the 5 marks on the timing cover which now seems wrong. How possible is it that the crank pulley wasn't put back on straight - I can't remember off hand if it only goes on one way or not. I reckon once we've found TDC, we'll be able to find out the correct setting from the crank pulley and get it timed up enough to start.
From scouring the web, I think this is primarily our problem, even though we've checked the timing a number of times already. Once running, we've sourced a strobe timing light, so we'll be able to set up the timing using that.
Is 8 degrees generally a better setting to start the engine than the 14 degrees we've been advised to use?
As you say though, need to get it sorted with minimal cranking, if at all - increasingly aware of all the fuel going through...
We WILL get this damn thing going!!
Cheers all,
Tony
I think, as I've got the afternoon off tomorrow, we'll start right at the beginning and make sure the timing mark is roughly where it should be. Thanks for the advice of checking for TDC on the number one cylinder - that should avoid having to take the covers etc off. Now, we were advised to set the timing to 14 degrees, and we went by the Haynes manual to do this with the 5 marks on the timing cover which now seems wrong. How possible is it that the crank pulley wasn't put back on straight - I can't remember off hand if it only goes on one way or not. I reckon once we've found TDC, we'll be able to find out the correct setting from the crank pulley and get it timed up enough to start.
From scouring the web, I think this is primarily our problem, even though we've checked the timing a number of times already. Once running, we've sourced a strobe timing light, so we'll be able to set up the timing using that.
Is 8 degrees generally a better setting to start the engine than the 14 degrees we've been advised to use?
As you say though, need to get it sorted with minimal cranking, if at all - increasingly aware of all the fuel going through...
We WILL get this damn thing going!!
Cheers all,
Tony
YYYYYYEEEEEEEESSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!! Absolutely bloody fantastic! Friday afternoon, we decided to start again, and re-set up all the timing. We knew what it would do if it was 180 out, and the first time we turned the key, it did just that, so we just swapped it over, and hey presto, it fired first time!!!
Quite why we couldn't get it to go on Monday or Wednesday, i'm not sure, but it ran for about an hour and a half in total, and it was fine!! The oil pressure was good, and temperature stable - the only thing that wasn't so useful is the tacho, which refused to budge. I think it's a wiring issue which we tried to resolve but to no avail. It's a smiths unit with two connecters on the back, one male bullet and one male spade. Any ideas?
One minor mishap while running was that one of the hoses came off, nice green fountain as the coolant gushed everywhere, but we just stopped the engine, and with gloves on, popped it back on. It WON'T be coming off again in a hurry!!
We started it up in gear too, just to confirm that drive was ok, and it went with no problems at all. The newly refurbed wolfies look fantastic!
So, from here on in, it's back to bodywork, then probably put the body on before the respray - the missus wants the temporary workshop out of the garden!
Thanks once again to all for your advice and support, and for Adrian for his time on the phone on Friday afternoon.
Chris has sorted out some digital video of the start up, which can be found at www.tvr-3000m.co.uk/running.htm - I'm hoping to add the full article to the site tonight.
Cheers all
Tony www.tvr-3000m.co.uk
>> Edited by bigtone on Monday 23 September 13:11
quote:
Absolutely bloody fantastic! Friday afternoon, we decided to start again, and re-set up all the timing. We knew what it would do if it was 180 out, and the first time we turned the key, it did just that, so we just swapped it over, and hey presto, it fired first time!!!
Quite why we couldn't get it to go on Monday or Wednesday, i'm not sure, but it ran for about an hour and a half in total, and it was fine!! The oil pressure was good, and temperature stable - the only thing that wasn't so useful is the tacho, which refused to budge. I think it's a wiring issue which we tried to resolve but to no avail. It's a smiths unit with two connecters on the back, one male bullet and one male spade. Any ideas?
One minor mishap while running was that one of the hoses came off, nice green fountain as the coolant gushed everywhere, but we just stopped the engine, and with gloves on, popped it back on. It WON'T be coming off again in a hurry!!
We started it up in gear too, just to confirm that drive was ok, and it went with no problems at all. The newly refurbed wolfies look fantastic!
So, from here on in, it's back to bodywork, then probably put the body on before the respray - the missus wants the temporary workshop out of the garden!
Thanks once again to all for your advice and support, and for Adrian for his time on the phone on Friday afternoon.
Chris has sorted out some digital video of the start up, which can be found at www.tvr-3000m.co.uk/running.htm - I'm hoping to add the full article to the site tonight.
Cheers all
www.tvr-3000m.co.uk
>> Edited by bigtone on Monday 23 September 13:11
I would have tried signal and earth (either way round) first but obviously you already tried that.
The fact the connectors are different makes me wonder if one of them is supposed to be a power supply, and the other a signal? I seem to remember having one like this (earthed through the casing) although that was a nasty cheap one not Smiths. Just an idea.
If I am reading this wiring diagram correctly. You should have an ignition +ve feed. You should have a signal from the distributor side of the coil and it should be earthed normally via the casing.
Biggest problem normally with electrics is the earthing. Anything from - not starting or cutting out (I know of a wedge that wasn't properly earthed and cut out. The AA couldn't fix it, just added an extra earth brading from the battery to the chassis and it started) Other things like wipers/blowers running really slowly or side lights lighting slightly when the indicators are on.
Russell
Biggest problem normally with electrics is the earthing. Anything from - not starting or cutting out (I know of a wedge that wasn't properly earthed and cut out. The AA couldn't fix it, just added an extra earth brading from the battery to the chassis and it started) Other things like wipers/blowers running really slowly or side lights lighting slightly when the indicators are on.
Russell
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