The loom of my car is nearly 50 years old. It has been cut into several major chunks, which I imagine allowed the previous owner to quickly dismantle the car, perhaps planning to re assemble the loom later using quick connectors. Not a bad idea, which I will probably revisit later, but for now, I decided to make up a skeleton loom to allow me to start the car. This is partly because after working on it on and off for six and a half years, I want to get the engine going, but partly because I wanted to understand how the wiring works.
At this point, I should say that the plan is to rebuild the car with dynamo and control box, as original, but later I will convert it to alternator power. Yes, mad I know, but I want to do it that way to learn how the system works, before changing it.
I'll post a diagram of the skeleton loom below once I have got it to work.
For the skeleton, I have extracted the basic ignition and charging system from the diagram below. Its from a Series 2 Vixen manual that I bought early on to help me understand what bits went where. This one has the interesting addition, by a previous owner of the book, who was clearly fitting an air horn.
This diagram doesn't tell you that the wires are of differing thicknesses to cope with the current going through them. That bit, I had to get from the old loom. Also, some of the colours on the S2 diagram are not the same as the original loom on my car, so it may not be 100% helpful to S1 owners. If you are relying on the above loom diagram, be aware that the over drawn section obscures part of the ballast ignition circuit. You need to check it closely.
Just as you can't get the engine running without electrics, you can't have an electrical system without a battery, and in my case, you can't have a battery without a battery clamp, and you can't have a battery clamp if it has returned to nature:
so that has to be fixed. But not before I got distracted and cleaned off the rest of the old paint from the engine bay, and theres another reason why this all takes so painfully long.
There thats better. Don't worry, I vacuumed out the slot then ground it back.
Quick point: I cut out the rusted section from the top, because I mistakenly believed that TVR had let the steel section in and then glassed over it. However, the bulge that went over the section, was actually the result of the completely rusted steel expanding and pushing the mat upwards! In fact the factory appear to have cut two small slots for the protrusions pushed the steel up from below, then glassed it over underneath. I added two additional small bolts through the bracket to stop it being pulled through by the weight of the battery on braking or cornering.
5th July: Update.
I've installed the skeleton loom and wired it up to the dash. I've bought a new battery and I've made a reproduction battery retainer; and following a short interlude with no power due to a missing wire between the battery and the control box, the car very briefly, turned over on her own key for the first time in at least 17 years and probably since 1986.
WOO HOO!!!
A few things to do before I try and start it:
Petrol pump needs sorting out, I need some petrol pipe and I need to find some suitable fittings for connecting the pump to the pipe.
Points need doing
Connect up plug leads etc
Connect up oil pressure pipe, so I don't lose all the oil
Water in
Fit temperature sender, which currently doesn't fit, probably because the threads are full of paint.
I hope.
Watch this space.
22nd July update
After a lot of Googling and thread measuring, I identified the temperature sender thread in the crossflow head as 1/8 27 NPT and ordered a suitable tap, which arrived the morning I was due to go off on holiday, so I sneaked out to the garage and cleaned out the threads and quickly fitted the temperature sender, which now screws in fine.
29th July
Well, she runs!
I would add "Yeee Haaa!" but I can't get her to run for more than a few seconds at a time.
Initial problems with a slow turn-over were traced to loose earth connections, but she wouldn't start. I checked I had a spark and I did. Then I remembered I had intended to gap the points and had never got round to it, so I did that...no luck. I rechecked the ignition timing, which was a bit out and at this point the engine began to "catch", but not hold. It popped and spat back through the carbs. At one point a blue flame leaped out , which was novel! At this point, I noticed some smoke issuing from the side of the engine and traced it to the hole in the inlet manifold where the crank-case breather was supposed to be plugged in...remember I said I would get around to that later.... Of course the missing pipe means there is a huge air leak weakening the mixture, so I plugged that back in and the engine then caught, ran very rapidly for about 5 seconds and then died. So, I have a spark, it occurs at the right time and so the issue seems to be fuelling; and so began an infuriating cycle of me adjusting the choke, throttle or starting jet and retrying until the battery began to show signs of weakening. So I put it on charge and shut the garage up for the day.
I think it might be over fuelling. I am going to check the float levels and go through it again tomorrow if I can sneak out to the garage.
No comments:
Post a Comment