While my '72 Midget has always been a good, strong runner, it had become a
somewhat reluctant starter. Not anything really major, but not jumping to
life every time I touched the key, like it always had. With my somewhat
chaotic work & life schedule, over the past several years, I've had to do my
maintenance and systems overhauls in a somewhat less methodical manner than I
used to. As a result, the time line, for the reluctant starting, became a bit
blurred. I seem to recall that I noticed the reluctant starting about the
same time I rebuilt the carbs, sometime in the summer of '07. Thinking it
might be more ignition related than carburetion (these things usually are,
after all), I had Jeff Schlemmer rebuild a dizzy for me, also in '07. No big
difference in starting, but, overall it ran so much stronger & got
significantly better gas mileage that I just ignored the starting issue and
kept driving it.
Over the past winter, I used the excuse of a head gasket leak to justify
putting a rebuilt head on it. However, I had gotten to the point where I just
HAD TO pin point the reluctant starting issue and put it right. But, as
usual, I had limited amounts of time to spend on it, so I just took a stab in
the dark (sort of), and installed some NOS needles, for a '67 Midget, that I
had in my parts stash. I noticed that the new needles were significantly
longer than the new ones, from Burlen, that came in the rebuild kit.
Well, after installing them and resetting the mixture and idle speed
adjustments, the engine is back to starting (hot) with just a touch of the
starter. Cold I'll find out about tomorrow. But, I was wondering, has anyone
else noticed any strange running or starting issues with then new Burlen
components? Or is it just me?
BTW, one of my Triumph buddies, has discovered that some-not-all of the new
Burlen .090" jets (which our Spridgets also use) are actually closer to .100",
which is causing an over-rich mixture problem. He's had to compensate for
this, on at least one "field repair" (on a VERY rich running TR4) by lowering
the needles out of the pistons until the set screw barely catches them. This
allowed him to set the mixture correctly, until the guy could get back to PGH
again (we were at Watkins Glen, last Sept.). Anyone ever heard of this
issue?
I suspect that my car's jets were the correct size, because, after installing
the new (NOS) needles, I had to drop the jets about 3 or 4 flats to get the
mixture right.
Bud Osbourne
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