Today as I was standing in the line at the DMV office waiting my turn to
have the title paperwork processed for my TR4 I happened to glance the date
we bought the TR4, April 24th 2010 We bought from the Mark Joslyn estate
auction. I got to thinking about all that I had been through trying to get
this car running again and titled and decided it was pretty appropriate
that the car was going to be on the road again just in time for Memorial
Day. I thought that was a fitting tribute to Mark who was a pretty avid
Triumph nut, much like a lot of people on this list.
Mark had put the TR4 had been put in the shop for an engine rebuild way
back in 2002 and it sat there until Mark's passing in 2008. After Mark's
passing his brother subsequently had the engine work completed and
installed in the car trying to ready it for the auction. Unfortunately
the original manifold and carburetors disappeared over
the intervening years and so the car had to be sold as non-running. Susan
and I bought the car and I rounded up the missing pieces to get the engine
running only to find that once I got it started it smoked really bad. The
harder you stepped on the pedal the more it smoked. At first I thought it
was steam so I replaced the head gasket. That didn't solve the problem so
I pulled the head and had it checked for cracks but found that it was OK.
I then realized that each piston was covered with a very large puddle of
oil which led me to think that the oil control rings were probably not
working. So I bit the bullet and pulled the pistons out. Yep I was right
the brand new pistons (and liners) had bad oil control rings. I ended up
buying new Total Seal rings, de-glazed the cylinders and put everything
back together. I'm happy to report there is no more smoking and now that
the paperwork has been processed I can finally drive the car, two years and
one month after buying the car.
I rather hope that Mark would be happy to know his old car is finally back
on the road.
Brad
1963 TR4 (among others!)
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