TBL restoration

[vernon240]

well, all ready to come home. I got these photo's from Stu that confirmed she's rolling on her wheels again!





front suspension all painted and polybushed..


Rear shocks painted and on...



the sight that greeted me on Sunday morning...




all safely tucked into the workshop garage...



Both cars safely tucked away now.

[rscapriman]

Bloody Hell Darin will be relieved to see one sitting higher than his he will probably pay you to keep the engine out Vernon

Looking good

[darinmds]

len you never fail to put a smile on my face

[rscapriman]

Darin I knew you would take it the right way lol

[boz]

Looking great Vernon, what colour are you going to paint it? ;D

[vernon240]

Don't worry Darin, in your honour, it will be up that high for at least until next year! ;D

Yes Phil, when viewed on a colour screen, you'll see it looks white, but I'm guessing on your monochrome monitor it's not immediately obvious! Good job it didn't snow otherwise I'd be looking for a set of sills and a light panel to find it.

I am tempted to print this off onto high gloss paper and sell it with a set of felt tips at next years Combe show though!

Pretty sure Darin would buy one! ;D ;D ;D ;D

By the way, 'Gareth Special' stripes will go on once it's rebuilt...The boot will probably go on earlier though.

[garethb]

Hope you've found someone that can provide them for the right hand side ;D

[vernon240]

No problems Gareth, if not, I'll park next to a wall at shows!

Right, thought I would start on that big lump that keeps wanting attention every time I go into the garage...



Let the strip down commence. There looked to be some leaking of the inlet manifold at one point, plus some 'interesting' plastic chips in the sump...hmm could have been from a past cam wheel, as this one looks fairly new, but it won't be going back on the engine...I've sorted out a steel item.



heads off...lots of coking up in there, probably indicative of lots of short journeys.



Definately +60 thou pistons in there, so a 3098cc capacity...and not much room for reboring, should this be required. I know that +90 pistons were available and Burton do some slightly bigger than 60 thou pistons as well.



I have a growing mountain of 'bits' Some will be reused, others will be binned.




Big end shell where you can just about read 'STD' so good to see, should a regrind be required.



Just the cam and crank in the block. The jounals look good, but will be checked to see how round they really are, but they all look good on first inspection. The crank spins very easily in the block which is a good sign as well. No tight spots etc, but we'll look at the mains and see what they look like, as well as the thrust bearing.





no lip/wear ridge and still honing visible, indicating a fairly recent hone.



I need to check these bores for size and ovality and take it from there.



The cam retaining screws were a bit magled, but cam outok. I'll see if I have better ones in a spare engine.



so I'll take the cam and crank out and decide where I go from there after some measuring. I may well get the head faces machined to clean, just to make sure they are straight.

More as it happens!

[johnmc67]

cars looking mighty fine vernon , just a quick question should our inlet manifold be silver or black ? as when i had engine built ric wood painted silver and looks very nice ! but if it should be black i will have to get it sorted out , and are you using new bolts to rebuild vernon ? if so ,,,,stainless or standard as mine look a bit tatty even under the paint ,glad someone posted something on forum as ive been looking daily wondering where you have all gone LOL;) regards john

[rscapriman]

Inlet manifold black John.

[vernon240]

Hi John, there you have it, from the font. Black. I'm not sure that is politically correct though! Gareth will know!

On the bolts, I'm not sure. Head bolts for sure will be standard and more than likely originsl if they clean up ok. If I can get stainless to match, then possibly for others. The problem with stainless is that the standard A2 grade aren't as strong as grade 8.8 steel. Probably close enough, but anything needing a higher grade will more than likely have to be original steel, head bolts being the obvious one. The other thing is that if a bolt snaps, stainless is a bugger to get out due to bring so hard and not being easy to drill out. Having said that, water pump, front cover and inlet manifold would probably be ok, but I'll let you know. Anyone have other thoughts?

[rscapriman]

Originally engines would have been bulit up to include water pump etc then sprayed black using covers to protect the rockers covers no primer just a quick blow over.
Even though many like to use passivated bolts etc for the timing cover, inlet manifold, water pump etc etc this is not correct they would all have been painted.
RScapriman

[johnmc67]

thanks guys , best wishes john

[aussiecapri]

I glad to hear about stainless bolts, I get sick of telling people not to use them on bits like crossmembers...most I might do is to kad plate the bolts, like the inlet and timing cover, but heads bolts black. Vernon whats with the green paint?. Car looks good buy the way....O

[vernon240]

Hey Owen, I got a mate to change from stainless on his steering joint connections! That could have been interesting!

The green paint was something that people had said they had seen on the engine waaaay before I had it. 'Didn't it used to have a green block?' was a common comment.

From the various bits of paperwork, a previous owner was charged for a 'new' block. Maybe that was for new paint on the old block! ;D

Oh yes, the rattle can reconditioned engine was very popular over here!