>Well, the concensus is that I need a full rebuild on my Spitfire motor. I
>thought that this might be the opportunity to drop something less
>troublesome in. What would be the easiest non-Spitfire motor to fit into an
>'80 Spit? I know that the purists on the list may flinch at this, and I
>will definitely keep my old motor in case I should choose to retrofit it
>one day.
First off, I have noproblem with cutting out the 1500 motor and putting in
somthing more potant than you can tune the 1500 to. I have looked into this
myself.
I would say that fitting any other motor for an easyer life would be
missguided, more power mabe, but you can cheaply get all the work done on
you 1500 motor, and not have to wory about it for 70 thousand mile, more
with an oil cooler. I would hate to think of the work involved in swapping
the engin, and your not ganteed to get any better relyability. After all
you will need to completly rebuild the engin your going to put in to give
you any advantage.
In my book your better off taking steps to increese the 1500s relyability
rather than swapping the engin. Heres a list of what you would need. You
will notice these are chainges to the ancillerys.
1. Oil cooler to cure its over heating problem.
2. A taller UK or even the tallest Swiss Diff (recalibrate spedo) so that
you dont spin it as much.
3. An Overdrive, enings run constantly at 2000 rpm can expect to last 2
years, where as engins running at 1000 rpm can expect to last 6 years.
4. A tubular extractor manifols (SS, and wrapped in insulation) to stop its
blowing down feeder.
5. Extra wide radiator, from any of the supplers so you'll never over heat.
Some fit a rocker oil feed, I am not convinced at the moment, but we'll see.
I want to know what happens at the rear cam bearing before I fit one.
All of the things above can be mail ordered, for a reasonable price from any
of the big supplyers. In the UK your lost for choice, theres hundreds to
choose from.
Get yourself the Moss TriumphTune Performace Manual, it describes the
strengths and weaknesses of most of the triumph engins. 4cylinders in
Spits, Herolds etc. 6cylinders in TR6's and GT6's, Slant 4's in TR7's and
Doly Sprints, even the V8. This book does go into engin swaps and mods as
well as all the suspension, brake etc mods you will need to make.
Given that they can sell you stuff to tune the 1500 to 115BHP, and that
dosn't envolve any mods to the bottom end except mabe balanceing you it must
be strong.
One note on the 1500 engin. In Midgets the life expectancy is 40,000 miles
in the Spitfire it's 70,000 miles, standard. Why the difference, the engin
bay is so crampt the Midget has a hard job keeping the oil cool. So if you
fit an oil cooler and the above sugestions I recon you could get 100,000
miles on the 1500 engin easy. And the thrust washer thing, I think thats a
bit of a mine is worse than yours type thing. As with all cars you have to
keep an eye out for the warning sines, mabe every 24,000 miles you should
check the play. Like the timing belt on modern cars, that snaps and kills
you pistons and valves.
Now, I have looked at swapping the engin for somthing different in my car.
Toyotat 'T' serise is an option, as is the Triumph slant for, or Triumph
'6'. Small sized, small capacity RWD motors are now getting like hens
teath. Quite simply they dont make them, the bigger V8's and the like need
Major body work brake drive chaine, chassis and suspension work. Any small
RWD engin sutable for fitting in the spit will not be a very modern design,
mabe early 80's at the latest. Even thoes engins can be considered
unrelyable compaired to modern standards. Even these will have there own
pit falls, some of which you will be the first to discover becaus they will
never have been run in the same environment before. The relation of the
1500 was first fitted to a car in the early 50's, it's had all its problems
ironed out. The ancilerys is mabe another mater.
Last August I was looking into the same choice you were, and quite honestly
the easyest rould by far was rebuilding the 1500, then tuning it to get
somthing like 95BHP from it. Which I think is reasonable for a car
weighting .8 of a tone. I'm now 3000 miles in on that engin, and its
started to run like a dream, apart from problems with ancilerys, and things
I could not aford to touch.
Mabe not what you wanted to hear, but you did say what would be the easiest
engin, in the long run I believe it will still be the 1500 motor.
James
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