GTSixing

Overdrive Modification

2012-01-13T17:45:00.013Z

As one or two of you may know I was having overdrive problems just before the last 10CR and tried (unsuccessfully) to fix it at the time.

After the run when it gave up completely I started to look around for a replacement unit and found this info on wikipedia,

"The first production vehicle to feature the Laycock system was the 1948 Standard Vanguard Saloon. The first unit to be created was the A-type overdrive, this was fitted to many sports cars during the 1950s. Several famous marques used A-type overdrives, including Jaguar, Aston Martin, Ferrari, Austin-Healey, Jensen, Bristol, AC and Armstrong Siddeley. Later the A-type overdrive was to be fitted to the entire range of TR cars.

In 1959, the Laycock Engineering Company introduced the D-type overdrive, which was fitted to a variety of motor cars including Volvo 120 and 1800s, Sunbeam Alpines and Rapiers, Triumph Spitfires, and also 1962-1967 MGBs (those with 3-synchro transmissions).

From 1967 the LH-type overdrive was introduced, and this featured in a variety of models, including 1968-1980 MGBs, the MGC, the Ford Zephyr, early Reliant Scimitars, TVRs, and Gilberns.

The J-type overdrive was introduced in the early 1970s, and was adapted to fit Volvo, Triumph, Vauxhall/Opel, American Motors and Chrysler motorcars, and Ford Transit vans.

The P-type overdrive marked the last updates and included both a Gear Vendors U.S. version and a Volvo version. The Volvo version kept the same package size as the J-type but with the updated 18 element freewheel and stronger splines through the planet carrier. The Gear Vendors U.S. version uses a larger 1.375 outer diameter output shaft for higher capacity and a longer rear case."

Suggesting that the last and possibly the best unit made was a P/Type overdrive for the Volvo fitted to the 740 turbo of around 160bhp and 175 ft/lb torque.

Looking through ebay I spotted this unit and thought it looked very similar to the J/Type fitted to my GT6.

It was described as a new old stock unit that had been in storage for some time and possibly kicked around the garage floor a bit too!!!

OK as you can see there is no provision for a speedo drive output, (the volvo speedo is driven via a propshaft sensor) I would cross that one when I had too.

I hoped that it would all just bolt onto my existing GT6 gearbox and with a change over of the rear propshaft flange be a straight forward fit. (Arn't I the optimistic type :) )

Once the overdrive arrived I took off the rear housing and had a look to see if there was a speedo worm drive under the spot where the casing was not machined for the speedo drive spigot, no such luck only a spacer between the bearings, however on the bright side of things the inside of the unit looked brand new and still had traces of some sort of red test fluid (possibly ATF).

All I had to do now was take out the GT6 gearbox and get cracking................................................

That was the beginning of October,

Ok I'm a lazy Git I admit it !!!

It only took me 3 months to get around too it................................................. (Thanks Gaz)

Here are a few pics of the gearbox and the new overdrive side by side for comparison.

Thankfully the swap over was just as straight forward as I had hoped, I took off the rear housing and propshaft flange from the new P/J Type overdrive.

Then removed the old unit from my gearbox and removed the propshaft output flange, speedo worm drive and speedo drive spigot.

Still follow me :-/

Then it was just a case of fitting the old rear cover and associated speedo bits to the back of the new unit and fitting it back to my gearbox.........................

eerrrrrrrrrr not quite but only a small problem of the studs in the volvo nit being to long to be able to get everything bolted up.

A quick swap over of the studs and all was well, even the rear propshaft output flange is a perfect fit.

Here are some pics of it all swapped over,

Next I ran it up on my test rig to see if it was working.........

Don't Laugh too hard it works.

I used ATF to run the pressure test thinking that it is relatively thin when cold and would simulate gear oil when warm (and clean out my gearbox too).

Result of the pressure test was that it was running at 380 psi, I then shimmed the relief valve and it upped it to 490 psi.

I believe the Stag J/Type runs at around 550 psi and will set it to that eventually if that is correct as I have also modified the gear linkage to allow me to use overdrive in second gear and the extra pressure should help the overdrive not to slip in second gear. ( I hope )

Here are some pics of how you get to the relief valve and what it looks like.

Sump removed showing primary filter.

Primary filter removed showing access to, Top main filter, middle is the pump/piston assy and removing the bottom plug reveals the relief valve.

Pressure relief valve

I have tried to show the relief valve parts laid out in sequence. The little washers in the middle are in fact the adjusting shims to increase the pressure.

Simply add shims to up the pressure or remove them to decrease pressure if you go to far. it only takes a thin shim to up the pressure considerably, I put one in that at a guess was about 12 - 15 thou and that upped it by around 100 psi.

Here is a close up of the part number/ID Tag showing it to be ( I believe ) a 27% overdrive.

In the end not a bad result for a new overdrive unit (providing it all works as expected on the car) for a punt on Ebay of 81 beer tokens.

Now I just have to strip the box and sort out a possibly bearing related grumbly first gear ;D

About time for an update!!!

2010-04-03T12:51:00.005+01:00

It's been quite a while since my last update but for the moment I have put my engine upgrades on hold until I get the chassis/running gear sorted out to my liking.

On that note I have recently fitted vented discs to the front end and as they are only the same diameter as standard they won't improve the braking but they should run cooler and stop any brake fade when they are used in real anger like when we were on the Club Triumph 10 Countries Run, we did get brake fade once or twice coming down the long descents from the mountains.

Also yesterday afternoon before going up to my local CT meeting at the Old Stone Trough in Kelbrook I fitted some uprated front springs. I thought I may have gone too far at a rating of 650lbs but they are a revalation they have transformed the front end of the car and it just seems to go where you put it with very little body roll. It is certainly much better on wet greasy roads. I still need to try it on dry tarmac. I was amazed at the difference because the springs I took off were already stronger than standard at a rating of 480lb. I can only put this down to the fact that the rear of my car is very stiffly sprung (really a bit too hard for my liking) and that fitting even stiffer springs at the front has balanced the car up instead of the front of the car trying to do most of the work.

Also I have ordered a full retrim kit in leather for my seats and headrests from Park Lane Classics as my seats don't hold me in place when pushing on around the twisties anymore.
I could of gone for the cheaper option of MX5 seats or bucket seats but I still think reupholstered originals are best. Rob Southerns newly upholstered Spitfire seats were used in my car on the last RBRR and were superb, allowing the passenger to recline full length and get some sleep. I don't think I will get my seats done in time for the HCR as it is going to take at least 3 weeks for my seat covers to be made and delivered. So Rob and I may be using his seats again in my car.

The next thing for my GT6

2009-08-11T20:21:00.002+01:00

I now have almost all the stuff required to change my tired old 2 litre sixpot sometime after the Club Triumph 10 Countries run in September (more on that later)

I have been following Stephen Attenborough's GT6 blog http://triumphulation.blogspot.com/
with much interest as I am going down the PI route. (may or may not convert to efi later)

I know that I'm pushing it with the transmission but I'll cross that bridge when/if I break it but I'm sure Nick Jones CV drive shafts are up to the job at the rear.

What I'm after at the moment is any pics of GT6/Spitfire engine bays fitted with the Lucas setup just for Ideas of what to look for and to be a little more prepared for possible problems like bulkhead and bonnet clearance issues and how best to deal with it.
I'm after fitting the engine and PI setup in a fairly short time and then sorting out any running issues, fuel pressure/surge etc once it is in place.

The manifolds are the later type, maybe not as much outright power but easier to setup?

The metering unit has been reconditioned to run unleaded and the rest of the stuff is a bit secondhand but mostly all there from what I can see.

Here's hoping it's a fairly straightforward learning curve and fitment but something tells me there will be one or two things to work out.

I intend to update this as I go along so as to help out anyone contemplating a similar conversion.

A few pics of the parts

Nice clean manifolds

Ready for unleaded metering unit

The rest of the bits are a bit tatty but I reckon usable, the Lucas fuel pump makes a noise but how well will it work!!!

Northern Area Camping Weekend

2009-07-20T18:15:00.013+01:00

I just want to say THANKYOU Rob Southern (bobbyspit) for a wonderful weekend Louise Anna and I enjoyed ourselves immensely, the wigwams and the campsite were fandabbydozy as was the company.

It was nice to meet Ed (notfinishedyet on the Club Triumph forum) and his wife Jill and their son George. They had a beatiful blue herald that has only done 320 miles since being rebuilt.

Ed admitted to a few teething troubles or as I call it "character". I'm sure you'll sort out the little niggles soon Ed.

I'm ashamed to say that we went up in the modern.................not enough room for all the weekends crap in a GT6 and/or three people. We didn't go on the run around the Lake District on the Saturday for a couple of reasons,

1. My wife Louise had a very fuzzy head after a boozy friday night.

2. I was also meeting my mate Gary (Gaz) Seddon who arrived early on Saturday afternoon with his two kids and another in tow. (Brave, brave man!!!)

I'm still aching all over from playing football and volleyball with Rhys my mate Gaz's football daft son who has enough energy to power a large city. Gary will be my co pilot on the 10CR and came along for the fun and to meet some of the people going on that trip.

Mr Acclaim himself was there (Barry McGrath) with his sons James and Alex in one of his many Honda's............................erm TRIUMPH Acclaims, sorry Barry it was "Ginger" I think.

The other Triumph to turn up apart from Rob's was a nice white Spitfire Belonging to Neil who will be Rob's co pilot on the 10CR. It used to belong to Craig Gingell's wife, If your reading this Craig it has gone to a good home.

As for the weather we only had a couple of showers here and there, I even got a little sunburn on the Saturday. Of course once the barbecues came out on Saturday evening we had a rather heavy shower that almost put out the barbecues untill Gaz's daughter Natasha and her friend came to the rescue with their umberellas.

Matt was also there from the P&P keeping us all topped up with lots of goodies and was the only Gentleman there to offer my wife Louise a proper wine glass.Louise says thanks Matt .

Last but most certainly not least it was good to see Marcus again who met up with the cars on the run around the Lake District and came to the campsite for the evening and had us all in stitches with some of his stories, especially the one about the goat and his neighbour.

The campsite comes highly recommended and is in a great place to visit the Lake District, The North Pennines and Hadrians Wall. http://www.woodclosepark.com/index.htm

Again Rob thanks for a great weekend and a fantastic location and I think you should be unopposed for the next Pendle and Pennine bonus point.

Steve Thompson (tiggrr1)

A couple of more little jobs done

2009-07-13T20:35:00.001+01:00

I thought it was about time I got round to fixing a small water leak that my GT6 has had since the 2008 Round Britain Reliability Run.
It has needed topping up every 200 miles or so but has been getting steadily worse and almost not getting me home from the last Pendle and Pennine Club Triumph meeting.

I changed the water pump about a month ago thinking that the leak was from the water pump seal, as it happens I was close it was actually coming from the water pump to cylinder head joint. The repair was as simple as popping off the water pump and fitting a new gasket.

While I was at it I also fitted a new powder coated aluminum radiator shroud sourced from ebay and well worth the £28 + postage as it must be forcing more air through the radiator as the water temperature has dropped on the gauge to sit between 1/3 and 1/2 of the needle sweep even during the recent hot weather!

I also managed to break my front number plate which was mounted far too low on the front spoiler so as not to restrict the airflow through the grille to the radiator. Belive it or not on the step up and ramp into the garage in the background. I usually put a couple of thin planks down to help lift the front of the car over the lip into the garage. That will teach me not to be so lazy next time................................................

So now it looks like this, I do think it is very difficult to get the front number plate looking right on the spitfire & GT6 but that seems to be the best I have had it so far

Driveshafts

2009-07-11T14:23:00.004+01:00

First off I would like to say a big thank you to Nick Jones for supplying me with this excellent driveshaft conversion for my rotoflex GT6.

The inner joint is brand new and the driveshaft and outer CV joint are refurbished items but as you can see from the picture they look brand new!

Also the hub has been machined to take the more modern MGF wheel bearing which should be stronger. Fitting of the driveshafts was pretty straightforward as it is literally a case of taking the old ones off and bolting in the new ones, also it is much easier to get the upright mounted to the spring as the rotoflex rubber is not holding the driveshaft under tension.

While I was at it I also completely stripped the back end including the diff to polybush everything. Some of the old bushes were knackered.Now the rear of the car is much more firmly planted through the twisties and the transmission feels much more direct without the rotoflex rubbers in place, however the tradeoff is a little more diff/roadnoise transmitted into the car particularly at 2200-2300rpm there is a slight diff whine but at all other speeds it is fine . It does gives me the excuse to add a little soundproofing as there is only carpet fitted to the car at the moment.

Got there in the end

2009-05-30T20:19:00.000+01:00

On my last blog update I had the misfortune of my nearside front upright snapping just before I was going to visit Marcus in Maryport, Cumbria.
Any way I went to visit him last Sunday to pick up a set of Alloy wheels he had agreed to sell me.

Apart from picking up the wheels I had to have a closer look at his fantastic GT6.

It may upset the purists (but I like it).

I'm sure some people would probably say the setup was all wrong,
wide tyres 205/50 x 15 and two front antiroll bars & 600lb springs at the front.
It should understeer and clash and bang over the potholes but it doesn't. It is very well sorted.
Omex engine management system combining with a 268 degree cam and electric engine management and EFI combine to give an Impressive rolling road printout!

Marcus was daft enough..........................err sorry Marcus, kind enough to ask me if I wanted too drive it.

Does a bear poo in the woods, is the Pope a Catholic!

Was I impressed. You bet I was It goes like stink as the rolling road printout would suggest and sticks to the tamac like brown smelly stuff to a blanket.

Needless to say I'm now being a bit of a pest and asking lots of questions.

Here is a link to more pics and a better quality rolling road print out that you can make out more clearly. http://s44.photobucket.com/albums/f36/tiggr_r1/Marcus%20GT6/

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK

2009-05-19T19:44:00.001+01:00

Some of you will no doubt know what this is and what happens when it breaks!

This is the result

Just after this........EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKKKKK

I'm not sure if I made that noise or if it was the car!

The skidmark showing my ace control, NOT!!! The car took me where it wanted to go, but it has good manners and decided to park safely out of the way of other road users.

And this was the only way to get it home as at the time I did not have the bits to repair it at the roadside.

I had just taken my GT6 out for a road test to check/bed in my brakes after polybushing the front end of the car.Whilst giving the brake pedal some welly, thankfully at not to high a speed. (25-30mph left foot braking and throttle applied)Must have stressed the nearside upright too much and it snapped resulting in a crunchy grinding slide towards a the kerb.

The following day (Monday 18th May). I went to see Max at TotallyTriumph in Cheshire to get the parts to repair the car. I got both front uprights and trunnions + bushes.

I got the broken nearside assembly changed straight away and have now also changed the offside upright and trunnion too as a precaution. Both trunnion bush/bolts were very stiff, the bolts were siezed in the bush sleeves which may also have contributed to the failure of the n\s upright.

Looking at the first picture again it does seem as if the upright has had some old damage, it looks to me as if it was already fractured half way through. This was why I decided to also change the other upright. It looked okay but at least I now know it is not (hopefully) about to let go in the same way as the the other.

Our Tip:

SCDB.info - the most up-to-date speed camera database in Europe for your GPS!

The RBRR (Team Shorts)

2008-10-12T13:01:00.001+01:00

After having just over a week collect my thoughts and recover from the rigours of long distance driving and sleep deprivation.

I must say that the RBRR is an absolutely fantastic experience and should feature in those lists of top ten things “to do before you die”.

Was it fun.....Oh Yes

Would I do it again.....Definitely

Was it difficult.....I did not find it hard to do the event but then I did take a couple of days off work before hand to relax and get some good sleep, I also ate well to build up some energy reserves.
I did however find the week after completing the RBRR very tough, I kept falling asleep as soon as I got home from work!

It was great for me to meet up with people at the start of the event at the Plough and put faces to names from the CT forum as I suspected you all turned out to be great fun and also slightly mad but I suppose that goes with wanting to drive old Triumph's 2000 miles in 48 hours!

Here's a few of my favourite photo's from the run. (some are not mine and are from CT forum members I hope you do not mind me using them)

Team Shorts ready to go

2008-09-29T10:21:00.000+01:00

Team Shorts is ready for the RBRR (we hope)

I went over to Rob's place yesterday (Sunday 28th) to fit his superb leather seats + headrests into the GT6, It only took a few minutes and totally transformed the car! It really does show just how knackerd (technical term) my seat foams really are, we hoovered half of my seat foam out of the footwell for sure!

We also had a play with a power inverter and my laptop with a broadband usb internet adapter.

A few niggles with the cigarette lighter power source means that I will hardwire it to the battery via an inline fuse. We are hoping to use this setup when we are not too tired from driving or just trying to keep up.

We hope to post back onto the Club Triumph website with our progress and thoughts on the RBRR. It is just an experiment as the broadband coverage is patchy at best outside of built up areas, so the updates may be few and far between but we'll do our best to try to share the RBRR with those who are unable to take part this year.

Oh by the way Rob's the good looking guy on the left hand side of the picture.

Looking Forward To The Round Britain Reliability Run Car No.141 (Team Shorts)

2008-09-27T15:28:00.000+01:00

Here's a couple of pics of my Spotlights as fitted for the RBRR.They are fitted to the bonnet hinge mounting point behind the chassis end cap.The end cap has a slot cut in it to alow the angle iron to protrude through it, the light bar is then held very firmly on a pivot by two 1/2 inch bolts (you can actually jump up and down on the bar it will not move!!!)To tip the bonnet however I do have to loosen the bolts to tip the lamps down out of the way and then tighten them back up afterwards. I do have plans to fit another small bolt/bracket so they return to the same spot each time
They have had a good test over some very bumpy roads this weekend and light up the way ahead superbly with no trace of any annoying wobble which can be very tireing on your eyes
Also for the purists among you I can remove them in about 10 minutes and now just need to find some new chassis end caps to replace the ones I've butcherd to make the lights fit

The RBRR, personaly I need to thank (blame) Tim Bancroft for my taking part in this event. I mentioned to him that it was a shame that the running list was full (at the CT National) and he said it would be a good idea to get on the reserve list as he expected a few to drop out!!!

To get the car ready for the RBRR the main thing was to change the driveshaft U/J's the nearside was in a very poor condition, I've also fitted an oil cooler and some very powerful driving/spotlamps (150w each) with a high capacity alternator (65amp) to power them.

My First Blog Posting (and first attempt at a blog)

2008-09-27T10:41:00.000+01:00

This is a picture of my Triumph GT6 at the Club Triumph National Meet 2008.

I'm new to blogging so I hope this goes well in the future!

(Sorry it's so short, this one was a test to see if it worked)