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Bad Karma

To: triumphs@Autox.Team.Net
Subject: Bad Karma
From: Bob Lang <LANG@ISIS.MIT.EDU>
Date: Mon, 05 May 1997 14:41:00 -0500 (EST)
Hey,

I went to work on my TR6 this weekend. I experienced some bad karma.

I then did the right thing.

While my engine is out of the car (again), I thought I'd take a few 
moments and change the steering rack bushings from stock rubber to 
Urethane seeing as I have a kit with all the bushings in it.

First, I wanted to see how "loose" things were. I grabbed the rack and 
tried moving fore/aft. No play there. However, the rack did rotate when 
twisted and it also moved side to side a wee bit.

So, I get under the car and look at the bolts. As I suspected, 23 years 
of time had bad effect on the U-bolts and nuts that hold this thing 
together. I applied liberal amounts of "liquid wrench" and let things set 
for about 20 minutes.

In short, I made about two turns with the wrench and the u-bolts broke 
off. Yep, those suckers were rusted! Good thing I have the parts cars for 
spares...

At that point my assistant showed up to help me re-establish my cam 
timing, as I had just replaced the crankshaft last weekend...

So, before putting the oil pan back on, I thought I'd rotate the cam and 
see how everything looked. All the lobes looked great. All except what 
was left of lobe #12! The lifter was hammered and the cam lobe was worn 
off about .025 or so.

#$*&. Now I have to replace the cam.

I determined that Sat. was not a good day to work on the car. So I turned 
my interests elsewhere for the rest of the day.

As for fixing these problems, good thing I have all those parts cars!

The cam with the bad lobe will be "getting the treatment" a little later 
this summer. I'll have 'em weld up the lobe and grind the cam to Z-19 or 
S2 specs. In the meantime, I have a good '69 cam with surprisingly little 
wear and a complete set of lifters from that car...

Sheesh. Good thing I wasn't doing anything too major!

It was bad karma.

later,
rml
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Quote: How many Triumphs do you own??? I'm losing count.
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