It's not looking good...

[Chris71]

Waiting for my dad's (TVR) 1600M engine to vacate the engine stand before we can have a proper look at my Chimaera lump, but we've noticed a rather disturbing sign. There's a good half inch of play on the flywheel. Its solidly bolted to the (cracked) crank still, so I fear that degree of movement may indicate damage to the block itself rather than just the bearings.

That's obviously expensive news, but I had my eye on a short-stroke conversion anyway...

[taylormj4]

Not heard of that before, sounds bad but also intriguing. Let us know what you find.

[Simon says]

Broken crank .... hope not

[M@H]

Simon says said:

Broken crank .... hope not

Crank definately broken if I remember the other thread correctly...

[Chris71]

M@H said:

Simon says said:

Broken crank .... hope not

Crank definately broken if I remember the other thread correctly...

Very much so:



And the crank bearings are almost certainly broken too. The thing is, even under those circumstances I wouldn't expect a lot of movement on the crank - a little, yes, but not the amount we're seeing here. Apparently, when the cranks go it's not unknown for them to take out the area of the block that the main bearings sit on, so I fear that's what's happened here. If so, it's new block time.

[Jonny cobra]

How do your thrust washers look ???????


Jc

[Simon says]

Let me guess 500?

[Chris71]

Simon says said:

Let me guess 500?

Speaking to people it seems there are a couple of fairly fundamental issues relating to the way TVR acheived the very long stroke for the 500.

Jonny cobra said:

How do your thrust washers look ???????

Jc

No idea, I'm afraid. We're waiting to get the M-Series lump off the engine stand before we can have a proper look at this one. But it's the first thing we've noticed that suggests the damage might go beyond crank and bearings.

[Oggs]

Time to look at the twin turbo lump again....