403 replies to this topic

[Asphalt]

Soooo - bad news and good news.

Bad news first:
Tried to take a fast corner, as usual, - and the steering got very hard, almost locked up

But - Somehow I managed to take the corner. Car was pulling to the left. Strong. Rolled to a halt. Suspension, steering and brakes - nothing that looked or felt wrong. So continued to limp home (under 1 mile to go) - nothing hapend.

First suspicion: a brake line must have swolen and holding pressure. I was braking very hard into the corner.

Jacked the car up. But: nope. No blockage with resp. after etxtreme pedal pressure. So it's not the brakes. Calipers don't stick either. Would've been surprising if the brakes were faulty; nothing older than 4 years...

But: when I turned a wheel I had a odd clatter from the diff area. And both wheels turned the same direction. Ahaa! There's the error.

The diff is *melonsed*!

I'll see what's the exact problem tomorrow; my suspicion is a too soft diff pin.

The good news:
I took the chance to try some manifolds. Since the engine needs to come out anyway, I had a reason to remove the HIF6.

Result 1:
More than sufficient bulkhead clearance with the twin carb on a 5.5" JanSpeed manifold:




That's more space than I ever dreamt of This should allow for a quite good airbox/plenum design!

Result 2:
Good I bought the other Fish carb! Turned out the other manifold actually FITS over the LCB!!



With OVER 0.0395" CLEARANCE!!!

That's the GO! for a Fishy 998

Cheers,
Jan

[Asphalt]

I let the pictures tell the story...





I guess there's too little material left due to fitting of the bushes. Also the bushes are too weak, they opened up. You can clearly see how the bush got smashed on the left planetary gear (formed a 'crown' when it widened).

*man danglies*!! Why the *melon* to they sell stuff like this??? If I don't find the missing teeth I can strip the whole gearbox. AGAIN! Gosh I'm MAD! I'll NEVER buy anything 'uprated' again. It's all stupid nonsense! 50 quid for that piece of *melon*!!! Maybe it's OK for a granny's 850 but NOT for spritted driving... 3000 miles!! For *melon* sake!!

Sorry for swearing... Had to vent a bit.

Cheers,
Jan

[Asphalt]

So. Fiiiiiiinaaaaly my stuff arrived from Minispares Took only 8 days... And because I was so bored in that time, I installed a A+ gearset in a remote-gearbox. Just for fun. And not much complicated But since this gearbox suffered a major idler gear bearing failure, I had to drill some holes to pin the idler gear shims in place. I hope that works to save the case. I'll see...

The 1275's gearbox is reassembled too, this time with a central oil pickup pipe (from Minispares ). I hope that makes hard cornering possible this time. The diff is a std. diff this time. When the 998 is finished (that's what the remote gearbox is for ), the 1275 comes out one more time for revision & installation of a 1275GT helical close-ratio gearbox. The 1275's current gearbox will then rest as a spare.

Ah why make things easy if you can have them comlicated

And I think I'm going to reove the brake servo now. It's just too anoying...



Cheers,
Jan

[Asphalt]

Sooo, finaly I got to update this thread...

well - the central oil pick up pipe works as promissed - I'm finaly able to take corners as hard & fast as I wish without a bad feeling & loss of oil pressure... Well chuffed with that!! Though it probably needs good attention on oil & filter changes, since the mesh is smaler than the original one.

The gearbox works even better now, it was well worth replacing the 2nd gear for an even better one.

I fitted the engine on monday, fineshed monday night. Drove a few meters. On tuesday morning took a hired merc Sprinter, drove 800km to Berlin, put my sister's stuff in the back, drove home on wednesday, arrived on wednesday night, unloaded it, and on thursday I drove off to the IMM.

The only problem: I have a slipping clutch! I don't know yet if this is due to a leaking crank oil seal or just due to the reason that I swapped the original clutch assembly over from a old engine (the pressure piece had worn the springs quite badly on the old one, that's why I replaced it). Still I managed to get to the IMM and back and some 500 miles more with no major trouble; the clutch slipps only under hard acceleration so it's OK to drive. Still needs doing, though...

Some pictures from the IMM: http://picasaweb.goo...feat=directlink



Aaand: I had my second real break down! We were driving home from the IMM in a smal convoy and made a smal detour through Karlsruhe for refuelling & saying good bye to a fellow. When I went off the gas station, I pulled full throttle into the traffic line - depressed the clutch, slected 2nd, released the clutch - and the engine was dead...

After a few miutes it was clear that I lost the ignition. No spark.... Though everything looked fine. Our first suspect was the ignition module on the RSP dizzy. we tried to find a ign. module at a local Mini mechanic's, but no luck. So we took a 998 points dizzy & coil from the mechanic and returned to my Mini to fit it to be able to limp home.

By a random impulse my mate had the idea to swap the ignition coil from his SPI over.

Oh what a good idea! Engine ran on the first turn of the key

So back to the mechanic's place, return the dizzy and coil, get another low resistance coil, fitted it - and I was able to make the last 90km of the trip under my own steam No ADAC (RAC in germany). Hehe!

Why the old coil failed so sudden - I have no idea. But it was a no-name Unipart coil, and you could hear that it wasn't fully filled with oil. Maybe this lead to local overheating and high load & vibration was too much and it broke. I don't now...

Cheers,
Jan

[mini_mad69]

Absolutly love it.

Looks great, so what's in it now? the 1275 on single carb?





Ben

[Asphalt]

Yes, still the same 1275 w/ single HIF6

Cheers,
Jan

[Asphalt]

A little bit more:

On the IMM I found this rather interesting looking wheel. Though noone seems to know anything about it. All I know is, that it was marketed in the mid 80's for a very short period of time. The wheel I bought was a demo-wheel sent to a german Mini-parts-dealer. He got the one wheel - and never heared from the company again.

It looks like the casting is a 'Special' wheel, but with some extra fins & steel inserts...




So I'm looking for at least three more of them If anyone got a few - PM me please!

I think they will look rather sweet on the car... I made a little photo-session to see how they'll look:


And stitched together:


Classic, decent and subtle - very nice!

Cheers,
Jan

Edited by Asphalt, 03 June 2010 - 05:50 PM.

[AndrewJ530]

It's a shame the guy only had the 1. Hopefully someone will come up trumps with another 3.

[Asphalt]

It's a shame the guy only had the 1. Hopefully someone will come up trumps with another 3.

I wouldn't mind if it's only one As long as I have a full set one time There's one (a set) for sale in Italy right now - for 600€... Haha! 600€ my ass!! I payed only 20 for the one

Hmmm - changed the std. plastic indicators over for Mk1 glas ones today. They look so much better! Brilliant! Strong colors... And they will probably stay like this - forever



Cheers,
Jan

[AndrewJ530]

I'm liking this car more and more everytime i see it !

[liirge]

I'm liking this car more and more everytime i see it !

Agreed, and the wheels are really nice.

[Asphalt]

Thanks guys!

Since I raised the car a bit (2-3") because it was way too low and resting on the bump stops, I had to readjust the track. To do this, I tried 'Tracking device EvoII'.

Consisting of two(!) cords. One that goes around all 4 wheels, and one that goes around the front wheels only. On the rear wheels are some pieces of wood which accomodate for the difference in track width. The cord going around the car is then used to determine the difference of the track adjustment for left & right. So that you get a centered steering wheel and no misalignment which could happen if you use only the rope around the front wheels. You just don't know wheter your 'drifting' to the left or to the right. And since the track centres the steering wheel, you may end with a off-center steering.



The long rope around the front wheels is to set the track. Quite simple: measure the lenght, the distance as close to the wheels and as far away from the wheels as possible. Then it's a few mathematics and you have your track. I aimed for 0.35° total toe-out. The actuall toe-out after raising the suspension was 1.45° - a 'bit' too much.



First try I endet up with -0,36° - second try I got pretty close - 0.36° toe-out. I actually calculated how far I would need to spread the far away measuring point, set the cords accordingly and adjusted the track rods (of course with taking into consideration the change on the close measuring point! Took a few approaches to get it right!). If that makes sence. I hope it does

And since I'm no good with maths, I used a excellent Excell sheet a mate once programmed Haha - makes it a fully computerised tracking device



Next evos: camber & castor adjustments. Got a few good ideas for that! But it will require turn tables...

Cheers,
Jan

[Asphalt]

Someone reversed into my Mini yesterday......



Got his written admitance at least.

[AndrewJ530]

At least he admitted it. Are you going through the insurance or is he paying for it?

[Asphalt]

It's going through insurance.

Cheers,
Jan