Jim Swarthout wrote:
I can assure you that
> no amount of classroom education will prepare you for the automobile.
> It's all hands-on. An engine is a culmination of parts, all moving
> according to the momentary volatility of a given fuel. It will continue
> to stump the best math!!!
And when it comes to Triumph and fuel injection, never was a truer word
spoken.
I was lucky with my car, knowing an old colleague who used to set up the
Press cars. The metering unit on my 2.5PI was upgraded to TR5 spec as it had
a TR5 cam in it as well. This meant changing the spring in the metering unit
vacuum capsule, re-setting the fuel datum track on a flow bench to original
specs and fitting a TR5 dizzy. When the butterfly shaft was re-bushed and
all the b'flies synchronised, I was pleased with the results.
Then Bert saw it.
"Who the bloody hell's been working on that?"
An hour later - and after many expletives on his part it was a radically
different and far better car. Apart from minute fiddling with the pressure
relief valve setting, minute movements of the distributor, the majority of
the work was done with hardly any tools - except a screwdriver and a few
intriguing spanners - most of which he'd made himself. The majority of the
time was spent listening and periodic smelling of the palm of the hand
across the exhaust. What I've got is a TR5 engined car that does somethhing
few (if any) TR5's ever did. It idles happily at 800rpm, with full power
across the rpm spectrum.
Bert's comment? (expletives excepted) "Tuning these injected cars is just
like tuning a pianner. **** the workshop manuals and printed **** - use yer
***** ears!
All of which is fine if you know what you're listening for!
But contrary to someone's comment about the mechanical system needing weekly
adjustment, mine's remained as Bert set it over a year and 10,000 miles ago.
I'm not expectinng it to need adjustment or any kind of intervention for a
long time yet - and that's normal for a *properly* set up injected Triumph
with the full Lucas mechanical set-up and all its quirky 'isms' of a bygone
age.
Ain't no substitute for a lifetime's experience at the coalface.
Jonmac
|