1984 Rover SD1 Vitesse
Discussion
I've been kinda bad, and lazy. I haven't washed Tess since before I put her in storage when I moved, in April, and she is FILTHY.
I'm a bit weird too, because I like seeing cars that are clearly used and dirty (not dirty from sitting neglected under a tree, but obvious signs of spirited use) so having mud all up the sides of Tess hasn't really been too much of an issue, but since working on her recently I ended up with clean patches and hand prints in places from brushing against the car. Not a great look
Because she is finally holding her oil, and running well.... oh and because she is booked in for a Warrant inspection this week, I felt I needed to clean her and get her looking presentable again.
I was going to polish and wax her but couldn't be bothered today, so I only gave her a good wash, and clay barred the bonnet. The reason for the clay bar there, was due to my stupidity when painting my calipers in my old garage, and not having enough room, so I ended up with a fine mist of red overspray on the bonnet. Most of it came off with a previous wash, but there has always been a slight pink haze to the bonnet when its clean, so I used a clay bar to remove it, which it did successfully. Unfortunately this has highlighted the fact that the rest of the car now needs another clay, as the paint isn't as smooth as it should be.
On the flip side though, I forgot how much gloss her paint has when clean!
After the photo I went over all the black trim with 303 Aerospace, which is a trim protectant (also happens to black and shine the trim too) and shined the tires. It's a shame there isn't a show, she looks amazing! At least with her own garage space I should be able to keep her cleaner easier, than living outside like she was.
So with that clean done, I needed to quickly address an issue that presented itself recently. The windscreen wash button isn't working, so I have no washer jets.
This is a Warrant of Fitness issue and would cause a failure. I know the motor is good, as is the jet, and since I was getting nothing from the system I knew it had to be the switch.
The Rover way of firing the washer jets is to turn the whole end of the wiper stalk into a button, so when it's pressed toward the column it activates the washers.
Lots of other British cars of the time use the same/similar stalks and have the same operation, including the Mini.
To delve into why mine didn't work, I removed the column shrouds. Just a screw top and bottom, and the bottom drops off. The top needs the dimmer removed, which is done via pulling the knob off and removing the large hex nut on the outside of the shroud.
A quick fiddle around and I found my culprit. I think this should be connected to something
But where? With limited space on the column to get my noggin in for a look, I dug into my spares and found an old Series 1 switch. It works the same but is upside down due to S1 cars having the indicator and wiper stalks swapped to S2 (S2 has indicators on left). Someone has previously chopped the loom for this switch, so no idea if it was any good. Either way, it wasnt good for my car, so destructive investigation it was
You can see the black wire on the left in the above photo. It disappears into the depths of the switch. With some uh, percussive persuasion (and a drill, since the housing is riveted together), I found where it goes. The wire is literally flattened out, and jammed between the stalk shaft and housing, to ground the switch when the button is pressed. Typical Lucas design.
Now I had three options. Replace the stalk with another; extend the "wash" wires and use a random dodgy button to trigger them; or fix the switch.
I checked my stocks, and the only switches I had were either wrong, or the one correct one I had actually had the same broken wire. So option 1 was out.
I could easily extend the wires and put a random button somewhere, but that just isn't my style. Option 2 was out before it was even really considered.
Option 3 was to fix what I had. Let's get 'er done.
So now I knew what I was looking for, I removed the switch from the car. two 1/4" hex head screws, and a round clip thing with metal prongs. I used a small pick to lever up the prongs and slip the clip off
The connector for the switch is buried way up under the dash on the RH side. You need the drivers glovebox out to get to it. Remove the switch from the column, and just jiggle the wires from it until you can feel where they go under the dash, and then unplug it.
With the switch out, I knew I needed to remove the stalk from the body. First I marked the stalk position to the body, so I could align it easily. I carefully placed the stalk into soft jaws in my vice, and using some small taps from a dead blow hammer, out it popped
This exposed the badly corroded remains of the wire. The wire on this is weird, it's a mesh instead of straight strands. Maybe Lucas knew it was going to move every time you moved the stalk, so thought it might last longer. I stripped the broken wire back
There was corrosion inside the insulation on it, so I cleaned it as well as I could, and then fed it through the housing, smeared some copper grease on the wire and stalk splines, and pulled the stalk into the housing, making sure it jammed the wire into the splines and was lined up correctly. Obviously I couldn't just assemble it by hand, so it went back into the soft jaws, upside down now, and a couple of light taps on the back of the housing slid the stalk back into place.
Next I plugged it back in under the dash, before reassembly, to make sure it worked. Sure enough, my freshly cleaned paint and windscreen got a blast of washer fluid
It was just a matter of routing the wires again, reinstalling the stalk onto the column, reinstalling the column shrouds and away we go. Now we should be 100% ready for Wednesday. Hopefully she passes the WOF; she should, since she is significantly better than the last inspection.
I'm a bit weird too, because I like seeing cars that are clearly used and dirty (not dirty from sitting neglected under a tree, but obvious signs of spirited use) so having mud all up the sides of Tess hasn't really been too much of an issue, but since working on her recently I ended up with clean patches and hand prints in places from brushing against the car. Not a great look
Because she is finally holding her oil, and running well.... oh and because she is booked in for a Warrant inspection this week, I felt I needed to clean her and get her looking presentable again.
I was going to polish and wax her but couldn't be bothered today, so I only gave her a good wash, and clay barred the bonnet. The reason for the clay bar there, was due to my stupidity when painting my calipers in my old garage, and not having enough room, so I ended up with a fine mist of red overspray on the bonnet. Most of it came off with a previous wash, but there has always been a slight pink haze to the bonnet when its clean, so I used a clay bar to remove it, which it did successfully. Unfortunately this has highlighted the fact that the rest of the car now needs another clay, as the paint isn't as smooth as it should be.
On the flip side though, I forgot how much gloss her paint has when clean!
After the photo I went over all the black trim with 303 Aerospace, which is a trim protectant (also happens to black and shine the trim too) and shined the tires. It's a shame there isn't a show, she looks amazing! At least with her own garage space I should be able to keep her cleaner easier, than living outside like she was.
So with that clean done, I needed to quickly address an issue that presented itself recently. The windscreen wash button isn't working, so I have no washer jets.
This is a Warrant of Fitness issue and would cause a failure. I know the motor is good, as is the jet, and since I was getting nothing from the system I knew it had to be the switch.
The Rover way of firing the washer jets is to turn the whole end of the wiper stalk into a button, so when it's pressed toward the column it activates the washers.
Lots of other British cars of the time use the same/similar stalks and have the same operation, including the Mini.
To delve into why mine didn't work, I removed the column shrouds. Just a screw top and bottom, and the bottom drops off. The top needs the dimmer removed, which is done via pulling the knob off and removing the large hex nut on the outside of the shroud.
A quick fiddle around and I found my culprit. I think this should be connected to something
But where? With limited space on the column to get my noggin in for a look, I dug into my spares and found an old Series 1 switch. It works the same but is upside down due to S1 cars having the indicator and wiper stalks swapped to S2 (S2 has indicators on left). Someone has previously chopped the loom for this switch, so no idea if it was any good. Either way, it wasnt good for my car, so destructive investigation it was
You can see the black wire on the left in the above photo. It disappears into the depths of the switch. With some uh, percussive persuasion (and a drill, since the housing is riveted together), I found where it goes. The wire is literally flattened out, and jammed between the stalk shaft and housing, to ground the switch when the button is pressed. Typical Lucas design.
Now I had three options. Replace the stalk with another; extend the "wash" wires and use a random dodgy button to trigger them; or fix the switch.
I checked my stocks, and the only switches I had were either wrong, or the one correct one I had actually had the same broken wire. So option 1 was out.
I could easily extend the wires and put a random button somewhere, but that just isn't my style. Option 2 was out before it was even really considered.
Option 3 was to fix what I had. Let's get 'er done.
So now I knew what I was looking for, I removed the switch from the car. two 1/4" hex head screws, and a round clip thing with metal prongs. I used a small pick to lever up the prongs and slip the clip off
The connector for the switch is buried way up under the dash on the RH side. You need the drivers glovebox out to get to it. Remove the switch from the column, and just jiggle the wires from it until you can feel where they go under the dash, and then unplug it.
With the switch out, I knew I needed to remove the stalk from the body. First I marked the stalk position to the body, so I could align it easily. I carefully placed the stalk into soft jaws in my vice, and using some small taps from a dead blow hammer, out it popped
This exposed the badly corroded remains of the wire. The wire on this is weird, it's a mesh instead of straight strands. Maybe Lucas knew it was going to move every time you moved the stalk, so thought it might last longer. I stripped the broken wire back
There was corrosion inside the insulation on it, so I cleaned it as well as I could, and then fed it through the housing, smeared some copper grease on the wire and stalk splines, and pulled the stalk into the housing, making sure it jammed the wire into the splines and was lined up correctly. Obviously I couldn't just assemble it by hand, so it went back into the soft jaws, upside down now, and a couple of light taps on the back of the housing slid the stalk back into place.
Next I plugged it back in under the dash, before reassembly, to make sure it worked. Sure enough, my freshly cleaned paint and windscreen got a blast of washer fluid
It was just a matter of routing the wires again, reinstalling the stalk onto the column, reinstalling the column shrouds and away we go. Now we should be 100% ready for Wednesday. Hopefully she passes the WOF; she should, since she is significantly better than the last inspection.
Tess has been a bit grumpy recently, and it was probably my own silly fault, but now I have to fix it.
I took Tess for a WOF inspection the other day, which she passed, of course. I did need to clean the reflector on one of the tail lights as it was completely obscured by dust, but that was as easy as blasting the inside of the light out with compressed air through the bulb holes.
It was pretty bad, I don't blame them for failing it
For comparison, the RH side with the nice clear reflector (I'd say the light was replaced at some point. it's too, clean.)
The result isn't perfect, but the reflector is actually visible now. Not sure how critical a LH side rear reflector is, but hey.
Moving along; I was a bit silly with the WOF. I didn't have the money for a tank of gas (not 60L of 98oct at these prices), so I chose to take it for the WOF with somewhere in the vicinity of 1/8 of a tank. Maybe 1/4 at the most. The fuel gauge is a bit of a joke, it consistently reads about 1/4 low so on the lower end of the dial it's anyone's guess what's in the tank.
The WOF was fine, but driving the car shortly after that (a celebratory WOF passed hoon) it developed an annoying stutter/hesitation when quickly pressing the throttle. If you rolled the throttle on it would rev out and drive fine, but if you jabbed the throttle too quick, like when rev matching or changing gear spiritedly, it would fall flat on its face for a bit, possibly pop out the exhaust and then come back to life and rev fine.
I tried adding some more gas to the tank, but obviously I had made her mad. This gave me a huge sinking feeling.... the car had been sitting for years before I got her, was the tank full of rust? Had rust blocked the filter?
The first step for me was to see if the fuel pump might have been mad. Its been making weird noises since I got the car. When you first turn the key and the pump primes, 1/4 of the time it would make a normal buzzing sound, but often it would just make a series of clicking noises. It still seemed to work, but you had to prime the system twice when cold or the car was hard to start. One prime, lots of cranking. Two primes, instant start.
The Rover SD1 EFI system runs a big resistor on the power feed for the fuel pump, which drops the voltage so the pump runs quieter with less output. These pumps are basically the same as the infamous Bosch "070" pump as used on fabulous machines such as the V12 Jaaag XJS, and the VL Commodore "tsutsutsu" turbo. Good for something like 300-400hp apparently, so obviously not stressed on the old 190hp RV8.
Because my car is running an aftermarket LinkECU, but has the standard loom adapted, I had no idea if it was still running the resistor or not. In Effie I bypassed it when the Speeduino was fitted.
The resistor lives up at the base of the LH A pillar, next to the glove box. Remove the glove box and it should be bolted into an oval cut out. I had already removed the bolt in this photo.
Some wiggling with the bolt out and it will come out
I made a quick bypass out of some genuine Lucas wire, and two spade terminals
Unplug the resistor, plug the bypass in
The good news was that the fuel pump made lovely buzzing noises all every time now, and you only needed the prime the system once and the car would fire into life without issue. The bad news, was that the hesitation was still there.
The next step here was to check the fuel filter. The SD1 has a particulate filter in the fuel tank, on the outlet pipe (more on that later), and a fine EFI filter in the engine bay. I replaced the EFI filter when I got Tess, so anything in it would have been since then. I removed the filter and drained it backwards, from the inlet, into a clean jar.
It looks like someone poured fine glitter in my fuel. It wasn't rusty, it was silver, and ferrous. I swirled a magnet around in the jar and this is what came out (looks kinda brown here, but in person it was shiny silver)
Well that's good and bad I guess. No rust means the it may not have sucked up rust, but metal filings mean the fuel pump is probably poked.
I cut the end off the filter and opened it up to check. Nothing else in it, just more fine glitter on the paper. Nice to see the Ryco filter has a plastic cage to stop the paper being crushed.
The clicking noise made me wonder, and the glitter confirmed it, the fuel pump wasn't a happy chappy.
Thankfully I have a spare, original fuel pump. I wasn't sure how good it was, but it did come alive when 12v was shoved into it.
Before replacing the pump there was one other quick check to do, remove the fuel level sender and check the inside of the tank.
There is an access hole in the bump behind the rear seats, on the LH side. It has a large rubber plug in it covering the sender and wiring
Mine was covered in crud, but that soon loosened when I got the hammer out to remove the retaining ring. The retaining ring has three tabs sticking up from it. I used a screwdriver and hammer to tap it around anti-clockwise with the tabs. There are three cutouts in the retainer, that will line up with three bumps on the tank housing, and when lined up you can remove the retainer
I gave the area a quick vacuum so that crud didn't end up in the tank.
With the retainer out, and the connections off, the sender can be lifted out, being careful of the float
So, with bated breath I shone a light into the tank and had a look. Well I'll be. Nothing but clean metal, even on the sides of the tank that I could see. There was some sediment at the bottom of the tank, but nothing major. Unfortunately the particulate filter was in the tank.... but no longer attached to the outlet, so useless. This is a common occurrence with SD1s.
Due to the design of the tank, the only access hole is the sender hole which is too small for an adult hand, and the tank is very deep in this area, so there is no way to reach the filter and reattach it.
Stoked, the tank is all good. I wasnt looking forward to paying the $600+freight+GST for one from Rimmers, which would still need to be cleaned and internally coated.
The terminals on the sender were all badly corroded, so they got a quick clean up, but I also found the reason for the sender reading 1/4 low.... the float had fuel in it! Not much, but enough it wouldn't be floating on the top anymore. Strangely, there are no signs of any holes or gaps in the seams, so no idea how it got in there.
I drilled a tiny hole with the smallest bit that would fit in my drill, and drained the fuel
The next day when I was sure it was empty and dry, I used my little soldering iron to melt plastic back over the hole and seal it
I did test the sender when it was out, and it seemed to read accurately based on where I positioned the arm, except no matter what, it wouldn't go over 3/4. I suspect an issue with the fuel gauge or maybe the sender itself, but as long as the rest of the scale is accurate now, I'm not bothered.
With the terminals cleaned, and the float emptied and sealed, I refit the sender with a new gasket ring. I used copious amounts of red rubber grease to lubricate the seal, so the retaining ring wouldn't catch it. Screwdriver and hammer once again employed to knock the retaining ring clockwise to lock it in place.
Back to the fuel pump, which is the main course in this buffet of goodness.
Replacing the fuel pump is a pretty straightforward process, I just wish I didn't add another 20L or so to the tank, as the fuel pump is inline under the car and gravity fed from the tank. It lives tucked up in front of the tank, covered by steel plates and in a little rubber/foam housing. It should be bolted to a crossmember that goes across the trans tunnel, but my crossmember was cut off so the stupid exhaust would fit.
I had previously noted that the high pressure hose on the outlet of the pump was looking a bit worse for wear, so wanted to do this job anyway, this just sped it up. I purchased some spare 8mm hose for the pressure side, and some new hose for the inlet side, which is low pressure, so doesn't need to be special EFI hose.
Since the in tank filter was no good, I wanted to fit an inline filter before the pump. This is also a common mod with SD1s, to try to trap rust before it kills the pump. It may not have been rust that went into my pump, but something chewed it up. This filter may have saved the pump, but oh well.
The standard hose from the tank to pump is 12mm ID. Finding a filter on the shelf with an inlet/outlet of 12mm or 1/2" is damn near impossible here (You can order them online, such as the WIX 33299, but I needed it quicker than that), so I had to look for an alternative. I ended up buying 7/16"/11.1mm fuel hose from Repco and picking up a Ryco Z153K filter. It has a 10mm inlet/outlet.
To remove the pump I found it easiest to remove the whole crossmember and bracket assembly first, and leave the pump hanging by the hoses. I don't have any photos of this because it's a pain taking photos under the car, and the next step got pretty messy.
Something had been living on the bracket I suspect
Being gravity fed, as soon as you remove the feed to the pump the fuel tank is going to drain, quickly. I removed the hose from the pump and directed the end into an empty fuel can. I drained the tank until the fuel started to sputter from the hose, as the little baffle sump in the tank filled and drained. This allowed me to remove the hose from tank and fit a piece of new hose that I had plugged with a wheel stud
I then removed the outlet hose of the pump from the hard line
Moving to the bench it was time to replace the pump and hoses. The outlet hose was worse than expected. It's a miracle it wasn't obviously leaking (although there has always been a strong fuel smell in the vicinity of the fuel pump, but no obvious wetness). Sorry for the average photos.
Here is the replacement standard pump, in the housing
The only place to fit the pre filter is just before the pump, as the rest of the hose is covered by the brackets with minimal free space
Pinched the connections from the old pump and swapped to replacement, with some modification as old pump wasnt original (it's actually a proper Bosch 070, or maybe a "copy") and uses screw terminals not spade terminals the standard one does. Nice new hose (and not the s
tty fake R9 hose)
I pre-assembled it on the brackets to see how it all fit, but you can't actually fit it to the car like this, you need to do the reverse of removal; hang the pump from its hoses and then fit the brackets
Then it was just a case of refitting it all. Once the pump was back in place, I directed the hose in the engine bay (inlet for EFI filter) into a bottle, reconnected the fuel pump connector and turned the key. It took a couple of primes to get all the air out, and fill the pre-filter, but then it shot a nice stream of fuel into the bottle. I did this twice to make sure there was no more glitter or dirt in the lines, and fit the new fuel filter.
A quick test to fill and prime the filter, and then proceed to spray pressurised fuel all over the engine..... oops. I replaced all the hose clamps on the fuel filter with proper EFI clamps, as the hoses were still good, but I hadn't got a good seal on one of the clamps. Repositioned and tightened, and she was all sealed up.
The replacement pump is nice and quiet, and makes a smoother whirring sound than the old 070, even with the resistor bypass in place.
I took Tess for a quick drive to see how she was. I was a little peeved off, the hesitation was still there.
I returned home, swapped back to the fuel pump relay, which quieted the pump down further, but it still makes a nice soft whirring sound, but the issue remained, even to the point where stabbing the throttle at idle caused the engine to stall. I tried to restart but it wouldn't immediately start, so I decided to have a quick look at the spark plugs.
I removed a plug and sure enough it was as black as night. Very rich and fouled.
I whipped out all 8 of the plugs, and they were all the same. I cleaned then all with a wire brush and brake clean, and regapped them from the 0.9 they were (I lowered the gap when fitted at recommendation of others), to 1.1. I figure a bigger gap might help have a bigger spark to blast through the carbon on the plugs.
Unfortunately I had a whoopsy removing one, and broke it >_< Thankfully I have spares, so I popped a replacement in
I had to shoot out and pick the wife up from the train, so took Tess to see if tweaking the plugs had changed anything. The car started fine with the clean plugs, but still hesitated. I picked her up and just as we got home she asked if I had given it a good blow out. No, not really, so we went the really long way home... with a decent italian tuneup. The car now revs happily and freely, no matter how quick you jab the throttle. Despite taking care in the wet conditions, because traction, I still put the hammer down and blew them cobwebs out.
I can't be sure what fixed it exactly, but the fuel pump was not in a happy place, and the spark gap may have been too small. I also suspect one or more injector is weeping/leaking, so that wont be helping. The fuel gauge does read much more accurately now too, which is awesome.
The lesson here? If you don't have a pre-pump filter, and your fuel pump is already sad, don't run your 30+ year old car low on fuel. It might just be the straw that breaks everything.
As a side note, don't worry, Le Mini Snicket is still here. I moved it outside the other day and then it proceeded to rain. This was a good test of the new window seals i fitted, as the interior was dry, with no signs of leaks. Success. I'm just getting the money together to take it for the registration inspection, and then we will see where we are.
I took Tess for a WOF inspection the other day, which she passed, of course. I did need to clean the reflector on one of the tail lights as it was completely obscured by dust, but that was as easy as blasting the inside of the light out with compressed air through the bulb holes.
It was pretty bad, I don't blame them for failing it
For comparison, the RH side with the nice clear reflector (I'd say the light was replaced at some point. it's too, clean.)
The result isn't perfect, but the reflector is actually visible now. Not sure how critical a LH side rear reflector is, but hey.
Moving along; I was a bit silly with the WOF. I didn't have the money for a tank of gas (not 60L of 98oct at these prices), so I chose to take it for the WOF with somewhere in the vicinity of 1/8 of a tank. Maybe 1/4 at the most. The fuel gauge is a bit of a joke, it consistently reads about 1/4 low so on the lower end of the dial it's anyone's guess what's in the tank.
The WOF was fine, but driving the car shortly after that (a celebratory WOF passed hoon) it developed an annoying stutter/hesitation when quickly pressing the throttle. If you rolled the throttle on it would rev out and drive fine, but if you jabbed the throttle too quick, like when rev matching or changing gear spiritedly, it would fall flat on its face for a bit, possibly pop out the exhaust and then come back to life and rev fine.
I tried adding some more gas to the tank, but obviously I had made her mad. This gave me a huge sinking feeling.... the car had been sitting for years before I got her, was the tank full of rust? Had rust blocked the filter?
The first step for me was to see if the fuel pump might have been mad. Its been making weird noises since I got the car. When you first turn the key and the pump primes, 1/4 of the time it would make a normal buzzing sound, but often it would just make a series of clicking noises. It still seemed to work, but you had to prime the system twice when cold or the car was hard to start. One prime, lots of cranking. Two primes, instant start.
The Rover SD1 EFI system runs a big resistor on the power feed for the fuel pump, which drops the voltage so the pump runs quieter with less output. These pumps are basically the same as the infamous Bosch "070" pump as used on fabulous machines such as the V12 Jaaag XJS, and the VL Commodore "tsutsutsu" turbo. Good for something like 300-400hp apparently, so obviously not stressed on the old 190hp RV8.
Because my car is running an aftermarket LinkECU, but has the standard loom adapted, I had no idea if it was still running the resistor or not. In Effie I bypassed it when the Speeduino was fitted.
The resistor lives up at the base of the LH A pillar, next to the glove box. Remove the glove box and it should be bolted into an oval cut out. I had already removed the bolt in this photo.
Some wiggling with the bolt out and it will come out
I made a quick bypass out of some genuine Lucas wire, and two spade terminals
Unplug the resistor, plug the bypass in
The good news was that the fuel pump made lovely buzzing noises all every time now, and you only needed the prime the system once and the car would fire into life without issue. The bad news, was that the hesitation was still there.
The next step here was to check the fuel filter. The SD1 has a particulate filter in the fuel tank, on the outlet pipe (more on that later), and a fine EFI filter in the engine bay. I replaced the EFI filter when I got Tess, so anything in it would have been since then. I removed the filter and drained it backwards, from the inlet, into a clean jar.
It looks like someone poured fine glitter in my fuel. It wasn't rusty, it was silver, and ferrous. I swirled a magnet around in the jar and this is what came out (looks kinda brown here, but in person it was shiny silver)
Well that's good and bad I guess. No rust means the it may not have sucked up rust, but metal filings mean the fuel pump is probably poked.
I cut the end off the filter and opened it up to check. Nothing else in it, just more fine glitter on the paper. Nice to see the Ryco filter has a plastic cage to stop the paper being crushed.
The clicking noise made me wonder, and the glitter confirmed it, the fuel pump wasn't a happy chappy.
Thankfully I have a spare, original fuel pump. I wasn't sure how good it was, but it did come alive when 12v was shoved into it.
Before replacing the pump there was one other quick check to do, remove the fuel level sender and check the inside of the tank.
There is an access hole in the bump behind the rear seats, on the LH side. It has a large rubber plug in it covering the sender and wiring
Mine was covered in crud, but that soon loosened when I got the hammer out to remove the retaining ring. The retaining ring has three tabs sticking up from it. I used a screwdriver and hammer to tap it around anti-clockwise with the tabs. There are three cutouts in the retainer, that will line up with three bumps on the tank housing, and when lined up you can remove the retainer
I gave the area a quick vacuum so that crud didn't end up in the tank.
With the retainer out, and the connections off, the sender can be lifted out, being careful of the float
So, with bated breath I shone a light into the tank and had a look. Well I'll be. Nothing but clean metal, even on the sides of the tank that I could see. There was some sediment at the bottom of the tank, but nothing major. Unfortunately the particulate filter was in the tank.... but no longer attached to the outlet, so useless. This is a common occurrence with SD1s.
Due to the design of the tank, the only access hole is the sender hole which is too small for an adult hand, and the tank is very deep in this area, so there is no way to reach the filter and reattach it.
Stoked, the tank is all good. I wasnt looking forward to paying the $600+freight+GST for one from Rimmers, which would still need to be cleaned and internally coated.
The terminals on the sender were all badly corroded, so they got a quick clean up, but I also found the reason for the sender reading 1/4 low.... the float had fuel in it! Not much, but enough it wouldn't be floating on the top anymore. Strangely, there are no signs of any holes or gaps in the seams, so no idea how it got in there.
I drilled a tiny hole with the smallest bit that would fit in my drill, and drained the fuel
The next day when I was sure it was empty and dry, I used my little soldering iron to melt plastic back over the hole and seal it
I did test the sender when it was out, and it seemed to read accurately based on where I positioned the arm, except no matter what, it wouldn't go over 3/4. I suspect an issue with the fuel gauge or maybe the sender itself, but as long as the rest of the scale is accurate now, I'm not bothered.
With the terminals cleaned, and the float emptied and sealed, I refit the sender with a new gasket ring. I used copious amounts of red rubber grease to lubricate the seal, so the retaining ring wouldn't catch it. Screwdriver and hammer once again employed to knock the retaining ring clockwise to lock it in place.
Back to the fuel pump, which is the main course in this buffet of goodness.
Replacing the fuel pump is a pretty straightforward process, I just wish I didn't add another 20L or so to the tank, as the fuel pump is inline under the car and gravity fed from the tank. It lives tucked up in front of the tank, covered by steel plates and in a little rubber/foam housing. It should be bolted to a crossmember that goes across the trans tunnel, but my crossmember was cut off so the stupid exhaust would fit.
I had previously noted that the high pressure hose on the outlet of the pump was looking a bit worse for wear, so wanted to do this job anyway, this just sped it up. I purchased some spare 8mm hose for the pressure side, and some new hose for the inlet side, which is low pressure, so doesn't need to be special EFI hose.
Since the in tank filter was no good, I wanted to fit an inline filter before the pump. This is also a common mod with SD1s, to try to trap rust before it kills the pump. It may not have been rust that went into my pump, but something chewed it up. This filter may have saved the pump, but oh well.
The standard hose from the tank to pump is 12mm ID. Finding a filter on the shelf with an inlet/outlet of 12mm or 1/2" is damn near impossible here (You can order them online, such as the WIX 33299, but I needed it quicker than that), so I had to look for an alternative. I ended up buying 7/16"/11.1mm fuel hose from Repco and picking up a Ryco Z153K filter. It has a 10mm inlet/outlet.
To remove the pump I found it easiest to remove the whole crossmember and bracket assembly first, and leave the pump hanging by the hoses. I don't have any photos of this because it's a pain taking photos under the car, and the next step got pretty messy.
Something had been living on the bracket I suspect
Being gravity fed, as soon as you remove the feed to the pump the fuel tank is going to drain, quickly. I removed the hose from the pump and directed the end into an empty fuel can. I drained the tank until the fuel started to sputter from the hose, as the little baffle sump in the tank filled and drained. This allowed me to remove the hose from tank and fit a piece of new hose that I had plugged with a wheel stud
I then removed the outlet hose of the pump from the hard line
Moving to the bench it was time to replace the pump and hoses. The outlet hose was worse than expected. It's a miracle it wasn't obviously leaking (although there has always been a strong fuel smell in the vicinity of the fuel pump, but no obvious wetness). Sorry for the average photos.
Here is the replacement standard pump, in the housing
The only place to fit the pre filter is just before the pump, as the rest of the hose is covered by the brackets with minimal free space
Pinched the connections from the old pump and swapped to replacement, with some modification as old pump wasnt original (it's actually a proper Bosch 070, or maybe a "copy") and uses screw terminals not spade terminals the standard one does. Nice new hose (and not the s
tty fake R9 hose)I pre-assembled it on the brackets to see how it all fit, but you can't actually fit it to the car like this, you need to do the reverse of removal; hang the pump from its hoses and then fit the brackets
Then it was just a case of refitting it all. Once the pump was back in place, I directed the hose in the engine bay (inlet for EFI filter) into a bottle, reconnected the fuel pump connector and turned the key. It took a couple of primes to get all the air out, and fill the pre-filter, but then it shot a nice stream of fuel into the bottle. I did this twice to make sure there was no more glitter or dirt in the lines, and fit the new fuel filter.
A quick test to fill and prime the filter, and then proceed to spray pressurised fuel all over the engine..... oops. I replaced all the hose clamps on the fuel filter with proper EFI clamps, as the hoses were still good, but I hadn't got a good seal on one of the clamps. Repositioned and tightened, and she was all sealed up.
The replacement pump is nice and quiet, and makes a smoother whirring sound than the old 070, even with the resistor bypass in place.
I took Tess for a quick drive to see how she was. I was a little peeved off, the hesitation was still there.
I returned home, swapped back to the fuel pump relay, which quieted the pump down further, but it still makes a nice soft whirring sound, but the issue remained, even to the point where stabbing the throttle at idle caused the engine to stall. I tried to restart but it wouldn't immediately start, so I decided to have a quick look at the spark plugs.
I removed a plug and sure enough it was as black as night. Very rich and fouled.
I whipped out all 8 of the plugs, and they were all the same. I cleaned then all with a wire brush and brake clean, and regapped them from the 0.9 they were (I lowered the gap when fitted at recommendation of others), to 1.1. I figure a bigger gap might help have a bigger spark to blast through the carbon on the plugs.
Unfortunately I had a whoopsy removing one, and broke it >_< Thankfully I have spares, so I popped a replacement in
I had to shoot out and pick the wife up from the train, so took Tess to see if tweaking the plugs had changed anything. The car started fine with the clean plugs, but still hesitated. I picked her up and just as we got home she asked if I had given it a good blow out. No, not really, so we went the really long way home... with a decent italian tuneup. The car now revs happily and freely, no matter how quick you jab the throttle. Despite taking care in the wet conditions, because traction, I still put the hammer down and blew them cobwebs out.
I can't be sure what fixed it exactly, but the fuel pump was not in a happy place, and the spark gap may have been too small. I also suspect one or more injector is weeping/leaking, so that wont be helping. The fuel gauge does read much more accurately now too, which is awesome.
The lesson here? If you don't have a pre-pump filter, and your fuel pump is already sad, don't run your 30+ year old car low on fuel. It might just be the straw that breaks everything.
As a side note, don't worry, Le Mini Snicket is still here. I moved it outside the other day and then it proceeded to rain. This was a good test of the new window seals i fitted, as the interior was dry, with no signs of leaks. Success. I'm just getting the money together to take it for the registration inspection, and then we will see where we are.
Dave Bright said:
This was my car!
I was the last owner in the UK and sold it on in 1995. It's survived well and looks pretty much the same. All the chrome and stainless trim was etched and painted black, mirrors, door handles, bumper and bonnet trims were black as well. The front bumper had the overriders and the wheels were highly polished. There was no badge on the bonnet too. It had standard exhaust manifolds with a very loud Rovertec system that finished with a 3" tailpipe. The car was running a factory ECU with the cold start injector and a K&N filter. I used to swap the rear end for a 3.9:1 axle from a 2.0 SD1, it would run 13s with no drama!
The box section trailing arms were one of the many upgrades you could buy.
The brakes were all police spec parts, the four pot calipers have the one connection instead of two as standard on the EFI cars and the rear cylinders are bigger too.
Shame you didn't get to look at the heads, It was running the biggest valves that would fit and it was very well ported so it went quite well.
Before it moved from the UK, the registration was B268 KPA.
I bought most of my parts from MRA in Nottingham as I didn't live too far away.
Great work on getting back on the road, really made my day seeing this.
Dave
I'll tell you what, this isn't what I expected to see when I noticed someone had bumped this thread back up from the dead, but thank you for getting in touch!I was the last owner in the UK and sold it on in 1995. It's survived well and looks pretty much the same. All the chrome and stainless trim was etched and painted black, mirrors, door handles, bumper and bonnet trims were black as well. The front bumper had the overriders and the wheels were highly polished. There was no badge on the bonnet too. It had standard exhaust manifolds with a very loud Rovertec system that finished with a 3" tailpipe. The car was running a factory ECU with the cold start injector and a K&N filter. I used to swap the rear end for a 3.9:1 axle from a 2.0 SD1, it would run 13s with no drama!
The box section trailing arms were one of the many upgrades you could buy.
The brakes were all police spec parts, the four pot calipers have the one connection instead of two as standard on the EFI cars and the rear cylinders are bigger too.
Shame you didn't get to look at the heads, It was running the biggest valves that would fit and it was very well ported so it went quite well.
Before it moved from the UK, the registration was B268 KPA.
I bought most of my parts from MRA in Nottingham as I didn't live too far away.
Great work on getting back on the road, really made my day seeing this.
Dave
Fascinating to hear the history of the car, I always wondered what its story was. Sounds like it changed a bit over the years, but still the same car. The wheels were indeed showing signs of having been polished, but were a bit tatty now.
Unfortunately, I had to sell Tess a couple of years back. Its a hell of a car. I still miss that sound.
Speaking of which, there is a post missing from this thread regarding fixing the issues I thought I had fixed in the previous post. Here it is.
Today I share with you, a lesson in the KISS principle.
I know, I've been a bit absent on here recently, but some things in life have come up and I havent really felt like or been able doing much on the cars. The other issue was that I wasn't even sure if I would turn this "experience" into a full post, but I feel I need to share, both the highs and the lows as it may help someone in the future.
So last post I changed the fuel pump and filter out because the car decided to have an intermittent hesitation when coming on the throttle. I found some metal flakes in the filter, so the pump wasn't happy anyway, but as it turns out I may not have NEEDED to change the pump at this point.
I thought the hesitation was finally sorted with that, but no, it wasn't. The issue had been randomly popping back, until it finally progressed to the point where the car would try to stall when taking off from an intersection. It would just fall flat on its face when you opened the throttle. It would stutter, backfire, and then off you would go. Even the transition from off to on throttle was terrible, with lots of lag and hesitation.
I tried driving over a local hill road and almost didn't make it over, as you couldn't feed any more throttle into it or it would start to die out.
I checked all the plugs, all very black (I only cleaned them the other day) and a couple of them wet with fuel. I replaced them with new ones, the issue remained. I checked all injectors were working (using the "mechanics stethoscope"), they were all firing OK. I reinstalled the air intake back in front of the radiator, no change. I removed and cleaned the cap and rotor, no change. Checked for vacuum leaks around inlet manifold, none. Cleaned idle control valve, no change. Removed idle control valve and bypassed, no change. Re-wired idle control valve as plug was damaged, no change. Resistance tested all leads, all OK. Resistance tested coil, OK.
I thought it might've been an ignition issue, so wanted to swap out the ignition amplifier and coil. So I stripped down the coil and amplifier unit, and swapped parts from another unit I had, after thoroughly cleaning all parts.
As you can see there is an aftermarket coil fitted, so I swapped that to a spare genuine Lucas coil (date stamped 1983) that tested OK for resistance
Curiously in the first photo you can also see an external condenser. This isn't standard, as there is already a condenser inside the box the coil is mounted to, so someone had added this at some point. It was held on with a zip tie and grounded via a wire wrapped around a screw. I removed it.
This is what's inside the box of magic tricks. Thanks to Ramon for this image.
I have heard the actual amplifier unit (the rectangular black thing in the top of the box) is a regular cause of failures, so I swapped to another from a spare unit. The standard thermal interface compound that is between the amp and housing its bolted to was almost gone, so I used some computer heatsink compound.
With it all back in the car, did it help? No, the issue remained. Argh.
I then stood back and thought, "damn, it's almost like when Effie didn't have enough acceleration enrichment in the tune, I wonder what the ECU is seeing on the MAP sensor". A quick check on the hand controller, and BAM, the MAP reading was all over the show when the throttle was blipped and wasn't responding as quickly as it should've been.
I removed the vacuum line to the MAP sensor, which also Tees off the FPR (Fuel Pressure Regulator), and inspected it. No cracks, no holes, nothing. I tested it for holding a vacuum with a hand pump, held well. I was about to reinstall it again and admit defeat for the day when suddenly a small dribble of oil came out of the end of the vacuum hose. Well damn, WTF?
I squirted some brake clean down the hose and it took a fair bit to come out the end of the hose. Eventually it came through as solid black, slimey and with some lumps. It took a lot of brake clean to clear the hose and run clear again; lots of oil in the hose.
The hose was refitted, and I fired the car up again. It fired straight up, and the MAP reading on the hand controller was much more stable and quick to respond. A couple of blips of the throttle and there was a little stutter, but once the plugs cleared it showed no signs at all of hesitating when giving it throttle. I took it for a drive, and no matter how hard I came on the throttle, even taking it up a steep hill, she just pulled hard.
So, I probably didn't need to replace the fuel pump, it obviously wasn't too bad and was just a coincidence that the car started to run badly when i was low on fuel. The MAP sensor vacuum line, which is the main "load" feed for the ECU was full of blow-by oil. So a tip to anyone that is running a remote map sensor, make sure you keep your vacuum hose clean.
The other interesting fact, is that there is no oil in the hose from either the plenum to the tee, or the hose from the tee to the FPR, or for that matter, in the Tee itself. Only oil in the MAP line. I had a think about this, and suspect the oil has been in there for longer than I have had the car, as when I first got it, the MAP vacuum hose was on its own nipple in the plenum (someone had drilled it out to add a new nipple); when I swapped plenums when I first got the car, the replacement only had the standard single outlet, for the FPR, so I teed off and connected the MAP line to that Tee (the same as I did when I converted http://www.tasteslikepetrol.net/cars/rover-sd1-two... Speeduino). Thus, I can conclude, that the oil had been in the hose for ages and it isn't new. Its only either gotten thicker and started causing issues now, or had congregated somewhere in the hose and blocked it.
So with that great success I was finally sorted!
Or not.
The issue was still there. It was small, just a lag coming back on the throttle and an occasional hiccup when taking off from a stop, but it was there. Did the oil get into the MAP sensor?
The next logical step was to remove the ECU and inspect the MAP sensor, and see if there was oil in it. Sure enough, upon inspection, there was indeed oil in the MAP sensor. Lame.
The MAP sensor lives on the ECU main board and cannot be disassembled or flushed through. It's the weird shaped black doodad on the LH side under the big white connector.
I tried soaking it out with brake clean, and sucking it out with a syringe, but still couldn't clear it. The trick was to turn the ECU upside down, and gently heat the MAP sensor up so the oil would thin out, and then gravity just drained it out drip by drip.
I cleaned up some surface rust on the ECU bracket, gave it a quick shot of paint and reinstalled.
Testing confirms the issue appears sorted, with no hesitation coming off and on throttle. The throttle response is now snappy and the slight rich mixture it had when coming on throttle is much lessened.
Excellent. Now when I can afford the fuel, I can drive her again.
KISS. Keep It Simple, Stupid.
Today I share with you, a lesson in the KISS principle.
I know, I've been a bit absent on here recently, but some things in life have come up and I havent really felt like or been able doing much on the cars. The other issue was that I wasn't even sure if I would turn this "experience" into a full post, but I feel I need to share, both the highs and the lows as it may help someone in the future.
So last post I changed the fuel pump and filter out because the car decided to have an intermittent hesitation when coming on the throttle. I found some metal flakes in the filter, so the pump wasn't happy anyway, but as it turns out I may not have NEEDED to change the pump at this point.
I thought the hesitation was finally sorted with that, but no, it wasn't. The issue had been randomly popping back, until it finally progressed to the point where the car would try to stall when taking off from an intersection. It would just fall flat on its face when you opened the throttle. It would stutter, backfire, and then off you would go. Even the transition from off to on throttle was terrible, with lots of lag and hesitation.
I tried driving over a local hill road and almost didn't make it over, as you couldn't feed any more throttle into it or it would start to die out.
I checked all the plugs, all very black (I only cleaned them the other day) and a couple of them wet with fuel. I replaced them with new ones, the issue remained. I checked all injectors were working (using the "mechanics stethoscope"), they were all firing OK. I reinstalled the air intake back in front of the radiator, no change. I removed and cleaned the cap and rotor, no change. Checked for vacuum leaks around inlet manifold, none. Cleaned idle control valve, no change. Removed idle control valve and bypassed, no change. Re-wired idle control valve as plug was damaged, no change. Resistance tested all leads, all OK. Resistance tested coil, OK.
I thought it might've been an ignition issue, so wanted to swap out the ignition amplifier and coil. So I stripped down the coil and amplifier unit, and swapped parts from another unit I had, after thoroughly cleaning all parts.
As you can see there is an aftermarket coil fitted, so I swapped that to a spare genuine Lucas coil (date stamped 1983) that tested OK for resistance
Curiously in the first photo you can also see an external condenser. This isn't standard, as there is already a condenser inside the box the coil is mounted to, so someone had added this at some point. It was held on with a zip tie and grounded via a wire wrapped around a screw. I removed it.
This is what's inside the box of magic tricks. Thanks to Ramon for this image.
I have heard the actual amplifier unit (the rectangular black thing in the top of the box) is a regular cause of failures, so I swapped to another from a spare unit. The standard thermal interface compound that is between the amp and housing its bolted to was almost gone, so I used some computer heatsink compound.
With it all back in the car, did it help? No, the issue remained. Argh.
I then stood back and thought, "damn, it's almost like when Effie didn't have enough acceleration enrichment in the tune, I wonder what the ECU is seeing on the MAP sensor". A quick check on the hand controller, and BAM, the MAP reading was all over the show when the throttle was blipped and wasn't responding as quickly as it should've been.
I removed the vacuum line to the MAP sensor, which also Tees off the FPR (Fuel Pressure Regulator), and inspected it. No cracks, no holes, nothing. I tested it for holding a vacuum with a hand pump, held well. I was about to reinstall it again and admit defeat for the day when suddenly a small dribble of oil came out of the end of the vacuum hose. Well damn, WTF?
I squirted some brake clean down the hose and it took a fair bit to come out the end of the hose. Eventually it came through as solid black, slimey and with some lumps. It took a lot of brake clean to clear the hose and run clear again; lots of oil in the hose.
The hose was refitted, and I fired the car up again. It fired straight up, and the MAP reading on the hand controller was much more stable and quick to respond. A couple of blips of the throttle and there was a little stutter, but once the plugs cleared it showed no signs at all of hesitating when giving it throttle. I took it for a drive, and no matter how hard I came on the throttle, even taking it up a steep hill, she just pulled hard.
So, I probably didn't need to replace the fuel pump, it obviously wasn't too bad and was just a coincidence that the car started to run badly when i was low on fuel. The MAP sensor vacuum line, which is the main "load" feed for the ECU was full of blow-by oil. So a tip to anyone that is running a remote map sensor, make sure you keep your vacuum hose clean.
The other interesting fact, is that there is no oil in the hose from either the plenum to the tee, or the hose from the tee to the FPR, or for that matter, in the Tee itself. Only oil in the MAP line. I had a think about this, and suspect the oil has been in there for longer than I have had the car, as when I first got it, the MAP vacuum hose was on its own nipple in the plenum (someone had drilled it out to add a new nipple); when I swapped plenums when I first got the car, the replacement only had the standard single outlet, for the FPR, so I teed off and connected the MAP line to that Tee (the same as I did when I converted http://www.tasteslikepetrol.net/cars/rover-sd1-two... Speeduino). Thus, I can conclude, that the oil had been in the hose for ages and it isn't new. Its only either gotten thicker and started causing issues now, or had congregated somewhere in the hose and blocked it.
So with that great success I was finally sorted!
Or not.
The issue was still there. It was small, just a lag coming back on the throttle and an occasional hiccup when taking off from a stop, but it was there. Did the oil get into the MAP sensor?
The next logical step was to remove the ECU and inspect the MAP sensor, and see if there was oil in it. Sure enough, upon inspection, there was indeed oil in the MAP sensor. Lame.
The MAP sensor lives on the ECU main board and cannot be disassembled or flushed through. It's the weird shaped black doodad on the LH side under the big white connector.
I tried soaking it out with brake clean, and sucking it out with a syringe, but still couldn't clear it. The trick was to turn the ECU upside down, and gently heat the MAP sensor up so the oil would thin out, and then gravity just drained it out drip by drip.
I cleaned up some surface rust on the ECU bracket, gave it a quick shot of paint and reinstalled.
Testing confirms the issue appears sorted, with no hesitation coming off and on throttle. The throttle response is now snappy and the slight rich mixture it had when coming on throttle is much lessened.
Excellent. Now when I can afford the fuel, I can drive her again.
KISS. Keep It Simple, Stupid.
Edited by KelvinatorNZ on Tuesday 10th March 06:42
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