cook1e

Just found some Valvoline VR1 on ebay buy it now for £24.55 with free delivery from a BMW place in Swindon., ebay user bmwmotormec.  Just ordered some for a service I'm doing on the Dolomite, the listing says "More than 10" available so worth placing an order if you want some.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/271249905266?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649#ht_3322wt_1399

Sure Bill, I'll sound out Carl when I next see him. Also it may be worth you putting a post up on the Triumph Dolomite Forum, ( http://forum.triumphdolomite.co.uk )you don't have to be a Triumph Dolomite Club member to join and post on the forum. It may be that someone on there has a pair of front seats or knows of a car being broken for spares that has a set. I've started using it myself but haven't joined the club as yet although I may do at some point in the future as they have some good spares that are only available to club members (eg stainless exhausts much cheaper than anyone else, body panels that are only available through the club etc).

I am expecting to use the Dolomite for the IOW this year with the Kids so yes would be good to get a picture of it with Dolly Roo....

Mock up of roughly what it would look like with a vynil leathercloth top to match the door cards/seat backs etc...

Bill this is my back seat. What I'm thinking of doing is getting a trimmer the strip of cloth with some vinyl leatherclotch to match the seat backs/door cards, if possible with some brown plastic piping along the lower edge.

Bill,


It will be interesting to see if they can replicate the original, Carl who as you know is a Dolly Club official reckoned that the original nylon material is not available so the best a trimmer can do is find something vaguely similar. I've certainly seen a few Dolly's that have been re-trimmed with a different nylon facing, just depends if you are a stickler for originality or not.

Bill,


Dolomite seat covers are a bit of an issue, I don't think anyone makes any so you either have to have the seats re-trimmed by a car trimmer in a similar but not identical cloth or look for a good 2nd hand set.

One Dolly I looked at before I bought mine had wear and splits on the seats and although it was a good car mechanically it was one of the things that put me off buying because I already knew that availability of covers was an issue.....

My new Dolly has nice seats apart from some deterioration at the top of the rear seat back, apparently this is a common issue caused by sunlight. The previous owner has stitched a bit of cloth over the top which I'm not totally happy with. I think I'm going to get a trimmer to put a vinyl section in a brown to match the door cards along the top 4 inches of so  of the rear seat back, although it won't fool any Dolomite Anoraks it will provide a fix that will look like it was supposed to be there to the untrained eye.

Another important bit of prep work for the RBRR completed, I've agreed with the ex Missus that she'll have the Kids for the weekend.....

Without this I'd have to take an 11 and 13 year old along on the run!

I replaced mine with moulded a few years back, really good fit. Bought it from Paddocks as they had the best price by far at the time for a GT6 moulded set but Im pretty sure it was a Newton set, I think all the moulded sets come from there.....

yeah but they work better that way around as they can be seen from the side. Not that I fitted them, that was the previous owner. Had an exhaust flange gasket to change on it this evening and found that the manifold thread had stripped for one of the studs, and it had already been tapped out larger. As per my blog, I bit the bullet and ordered a nice reconditioned unit from Chic Doig tonight. Last thing I want to be doing is changing a manifold flange gasket in the rain at the roadside in the Scottish wilderness on the RBRR so needed a proper repair rather than a bodge...So some proper RBRR prep work going on already :-)

Tim,

With the Dolly it will allow the option of a 3 man RBRR team, plus it will use less petrol than the GT6 as well. Plus the GT6 is in the bodyshop next week having the bits that were damaged back in the 2010 RBRR repaired, (plus some rot on and below the tailgate)  don't want to tempt fate and use it again quite so soon after getting it back to tip top condition.

My Blog Article from earlier this year goes through how I tune the carbs on the GT6 in detail with lots of picture so may be of use.

http://www.cook1e.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/tuning-carbs.html

Items to use a gunsons colour tune for the mixture and a webber synchrometer (snail type) for balancing.

Car purchased that will probably be my RBRR car next year. Russet Brown 1500HL Dolomite with overdrive AKA "The flying log" . It's only done 49,000 miles and is an RBRR veteran as it used to be owned by Darren Sharp who completed the 2008 RBRR in it.

Main reason for purchse was to have a 4 seater Triumph to be able to go to Triumph events with the kids but as a useful coincidence it also makes a great RBRR car, two birds with one stone etc :-)

Up until about 5 years ago I used Duckhams 20-50 on the GT6 but it's now no longer available. Nowadays I tend to use Halfords Classic 20-50, for the last oil change though I used Morris Golden Film classic 20-50 which seemed pretty good. I change my oil in the GT6 annually though with an additional change if I'm doing the RBRR which means there's only about 2,000 to 3,000 miles between oil changes. I always change the filter at the same time as well and use a quality filter with a non return valve as I have a spin on adaptor. I managed to get a job lot of Unipart filters a couple of years ago from ebay which was helpful but I think I'm down to my last one now...

Up until about 5 years ago I used Duckhams 20-50 on the GT6 but it's now no longer available. Nowadays I tend to use Halfords Classic 20-50, for the last oil change though I used Morris Golden Film classic 20-50 which seemed pretty good. I change my oil in the GT6 annually though with an additional change if I'm doing the RBRR which means there's only about 2,000 to 3,000 miles between oil changes. I always change the filter at the same time as well and use a quality filter with a non return valve as I have a spin on adaptor. I managed to get a job lot of Unipart filters a couple of years ago from ebay which was helpful but I think I'm down to my last one now...

Not a brilliant picture but this is a Spitfire owned by a local area member in the TSSC West Berks Area called Nick. It has a 2.5L injected 6 pot moved back by about 6 inches. The Engine is moved back so far that it all fits under a standard Spitfire MKIV/1500 bonnet without any bonnet bulge...

Unless someone has drilled your diff they don't have a drain plug as standard and the standard maintenance schedule just requires topping up rather than draining and refilling. A few people have however drilled the diff casing though and fitted a drain plug. Triumph were good enough to put a suitable point on the casting to drill even if they were cheapskates and didn't supply a drain plug tapping.

EP90 is the correct oil to GL4 spec, Gearbox uses the same oil so worth having some for topping up anyway. EP80/90 is OK but make sure it's GL4, later grades have additives which can damage the internal bronze components. Capacity if you do have a drain plug is listed as 1 pint according to the manual for the diff.

I know Bill, they are good aren't they, I only stumbled upon them by chance when I was trying to find out how to set the cam timing on my car earlier this year.

I've had Triumphs for over 30 years but had never had to set up the valve timing from scratch before this year. The Mini wheel bolt as a TDC piston stop is a really good tip ;-)

You shouldn't need a manual to time the cam, just follow the MOSS videos that I linked to earlier. I replaced both camshaft sprockets on my GT6 and the new sprockets had no marks so I had to set it up from scratch and using the videos as a guide it was a breeze....

I used the standard Triumph 2 part bushes on my rear Koni's (part number 102987) , fitted with no issues and I find it easier to fit the rear shocks into place with just one side of the bush at the bottom, then add the other side afterwards if that makes sense. That's the reason I didn't go for polybushes as I didn't like the one piece design...


My Front Konis still have the original bushes fitted.

And this is the Lockheed version.


Yes I've had both types fitted to my car over the years!

The Original Girling one was going to cost more to fix than a replacement Lockheed one and the Lockheed one is superior as it's a higher boost ratio so it was a no brainer for me to swap over to the more modern Lockheed servo.

Powerstop is the Girling version.

Looks like this, I'll post a picture of the Lockhead version in a sec

My GT6 used to suffer with a seized clutch pretty regularly back along when I lived in a previous house which had a less than watertight garage that tended to be a bit damp.

The method I used to use is not for the faint hearted as it's rather dangerous but it works every time...  You will need to get the brakes working first though. The good thing is that you won't have to take the car out on the road which is useful if it is without MOT or sorned.

Jack up the rear end and ensure it is secured extremely well on axle stands. Ensure that the front wheels are very securely chocked so the car can't possibly move forwards or backwards. Start up the car and get the engine nice and hot. Stop the engine, wedge the clutch pedal down with a sturdy piece of wood the right length so it holds the clutch pedal fully down wedged against the cross member just in front of the seat.  Put the car in 2nd or 3rd gear and start it again so the rear wheels spin away. Give it some revs to increase the efefctive rod speed and stamp hard on the brake pedal like you were doing an emergency stop. The clutch will either free up with a big bang or the engine will stall. If it stalls repeat the excercise until it the clutch frees up. Even when my clutch was very siezed up it would never take more than 4 or 5 attempts.

no doubt there will be some comments about how dangerous this method is but I come from an age before health and safety regulations made everyone a big wuss!