Hello folks,
Well since my message from the weekend appears to have been
lost, I will summarise my experience. I had three things on my mind when
I returned to my parents house to retrieve my Midget; firstly getting
the Midget back to Loughborough in one piece, secondly to try and find
a new distributer to replace my cracked TR6 one and lastly to keep my
eyes open for a set of SUs to replace my ZSs. And at the end of the
weekend I had for all intents and purposes acheived all three.
I will start with the TR6 distributer problem (remember the
cracked, wobbly casing). Well I called a number of places up - all of
whom said "oooh - I don't know where your gonna find one of them".
Anyway, I finally called up place called Triumph Spares (Chelmsford,
Essex) and although he didn't have a TR6 distributer, he had a number
of Triumph 2000/2500 ones that would do temporarily. I decided to
visit the place, only to find a huge shed full of Triumph spares -
absolutely amazing selection. Anyway, he showed me the "distributer
shelf" and we inspected a number of possibilities.
Nothing really seemd to fit until I saw a couple of
distributers on the bonnet of a Herald which was in the process of
being broken. They were extremely similar to the TR6 distributer and
apparently from a Triumph Vitesse (the 2 litre engine). The main
difference is that the TR6 is fitted with vacuum retard and the
Vitesse one is fitted with vacuum advance. I decided to get it anyway
- mainly because it had the tacho drive connection which is difficult
to come by. Anyway, I have a number of questions w.r.t. the philosophy
behind vacuum retarding the ignition on the TR6 - can anybody tell me
why they did this? I've asked around at local specialists, and they
all put it down to general de-tuning for emissions. Nobody has been
able to give a more detailed explanation and even my expert
restoration friend is mystified.
Anyway, I tried the Vitesse distributer in the TR6 last night
- it seems fairly good - actually it seemed unbelieveably pokey with a
cold engine but I'm a little uncertain of its true performance over
the whole rev range (well it was pooring with rain outside). I also
tried it briefly with the vacuum advance unit with slightly less
successful results. I know the original TR6 distributer had quite a
lot more centrifugal advance than the Vitesse one, so I may be best
getting a new set of weights to insert in the distributer (if
possible). I have also consulted the workshop manuals and tried to
compare the rpm/advance profiles of the various distributers - I don't
have the true profile for the vitesse though - anybody know this
information?? I called up the local TR parts place who were keen on me
swapping my Vitesse distributer for a reconditioned original TR6 one,
but there was a small charge of over 100 pounds for this privilige -
not what I had in mind. Maybe I can get the separate centrifugal
weights and springs separately, since the distributer shaft and cam
are in excellent condition. Any advice about my situation would be
very much appreciated.
Well the other thing I managed to get from the Triumph Spares
supplier is a set of HS6 carbs and manifold from a Triumph 2500.
They're in excellent condition and I'm surprised how simple the
substitution appears to be. I'm hoping that I will be able to get the
correct needles and any additional linkages this weekend - I shall let
you know how the conversion works out.
That's it for now,
Paul.
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