This is the second in a series of installments of the saga of my
TR-8 and my attempts to restore it to showroom condition....
Now that I had gotten the battery drain fixed and could count on
having a vehicle that would crank reliably, my attention turned to the
ignition system. I had experienced some problems getting the engine
to fire when cranking. It seemed like there wasn't quite enough spark
to get it started even though there was plenty of battery power to
turn it over. In addition, the tachometer didn't work at all. As I
had just gotten the car and wasn't that familiar with the electrics
yet, I decided to try and find out what was wrong with the tachometer.
Digging around under the hood, I discovered that the previous owner
had replaced the Lucas electronic ignition system and distributor with
a Mallory dual-point distributor. In the process, they had installed
a Mallory ballast resistor in series with the existing Lucas coil
(probably because the instructions said to). Normally you would
install the ballast resistor between the +12VDC ignition supply and
the ignition coil, and connect the other coil terminal to the points.
The resistance of the ballast resistor is chosen to be
approximately equal to the resistance of the ignition coil, in order
to drop the ignition coil voltage to approximately half the battery
voltage. This lengthens the life of the points due to the reduced arc
voltage developed across them as they open. In addition, there is
usually a starter solenoid contact that closes and provides full
battery voltage to the ignition coil when the starter is engaged.
This is to counteract the effect of the heavy starting current
lowering the battery voltage--it provides a hotter spark when
starting.
In this case, the previous owner had installed the new ballast
resistor between the existing Lucas ballast resistor/tachometer
resistor and the coil. The tachometer lead was disconnected and taped
up. The addition of the second ballast resistor reduced the voltage
at the coil from 6 VDC to 4 VDC when running and from 12 VDC to 6 VDC
when starting (no wonder I was having trouble getting it started!) I
removed the ballast resistor from the circuit (but left it in
position, should I ever need it for an emergency repair on the road
during the dead of night) and connected the tachometer lead to the
ignition coil negative terminal. What a difference! Starting was
considerably easier, and I could now put my foot into the accelerator
with more confidence now that I knew how fast I was spinning the
engine.
The next project is the one that put the car away for the winter.
When I picked up the car in Utah, the clutch was inoperable. A
serious hydraulic leak had drained the clutch master cylinder, so we
filled and bled and filled and bled and so on until the clutch was
operable once again. We had no clutch problems at all until the
middle of September, when I noticed fluid leaking onto the driver's
floor mat. The fluid was dripping from the clutch pedal, and seemed
to be coming from the clutch master cylinder. I decided to rebuild
the master cylinder as well as the slave cylinder as long as I had the
system taken apart. By the time that the parts arrived, the leak was
so bad that I barely got the car up onto the ramps due to the spongy
clutch.
The rebuild went well, but when it came time to reinstall the slave
cylinder, I made the fatal error. I noticed a big glob of grease on
the slave cylinder push rod, so I thought I'd grab a rag and wipe it
clean. BIG MISTAKE!!! As I grabbed the push rod and wiped, the push
rod and clutch release lever fell off of the pivot bolt on inside of
the bell housing. If this happens to you, don't even waste your time
trying to make the easy fix, --due to the geometry of the clutch
assembly and bell housing, it is not possible to reassemble the clutch
release lever/throwout bearing/pivot bolt assembly without removing
the gearbox. Since I didn't have my TR-8 Repair Operations Manual at
the time (which sternly warns you not to do what I had just done), I
wasn't aware of this, and I repeatedly tried to put everything back
together through the small hole for the slave cylinder pushrod.
Anyway, it soon became apparent that the _only_ way to reinstall the
clutch release lever is to remove the gearbox from the car. Words
cannot describe how I felt at that moment, but I'm sure you loyal
SOLers all know the feeling...
This job lasted from the middle of September through the end of
March since I had to remove the exhaust system and drive shaft in
order to remove the gearbox, and cold winter days aren't too conducive
to getting much work done in an unheated garage! One benefit of doing
all of this work is that I became better acquainted with what was
involved with repairing a TR-8 (Lots of patience and lots of spare
time, as well as a good set of ramps and jack stands!). Seriously, I
know quite a bit more on how it is put together, and which parts need
to be treated with care upon disassembly since you can't get them
anymore. The only thing that I really need is to find someone else
who has one so that I can see how certain things are put together--the
line drawings in the Repair Operations Manual leave much to be
desired, especially since many of them don't show many of the things
that were supposed to be installed on my car (front spoiler, for
instance). Hopefully these postings will lead to something.....
Well, that's enough for tonight--this saga will continue....
Tim Buja Cherry Valley, IL
(email via ccm0b@vm.cc.purdue.edu)
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