jaybee

Your clutch driven plate and pressure plate appear to be incompatible. I also agree that the driven plate may have been fitted the wrong way round (i.e. flywheel side is facing the gearbox), but I have never seen a gap between the pressure plate and the flywheel when the driven plate is fitted the wrong way round. Still don't understand you 'concentricity' problem. Where are you placing the finger of the DTI? Is it on the rim of the flywheel? If so, you may have the wrong flywheel for the vehicle. Check how close a fit the flywheel fixing bolts are in the fixing holes of the flywheel. If they are a sloppy fit, this could be your problem. If there are dowels to locate the flywheel, how good a fit are they in their respective holes?

Can you use a multi-meter? Check which switch contacts are closed circuit when the switch in in both the first and the second position. These will be normal and high speed respectively. Then look at your wiper motor. Two of the brushes in the motor are diametrically opposite each other. A third brush is offset, close to one of the opposite pair. The brush on its own is common to both speeds of the motor, and is connected to ground. The common brush and the opposite brush are used for normal speed. The common brush and the offset brush are used for high speed. I can't remember the wire colours or swich connections off the top of my head, but if you need wire colours, look on a wiring diagram. If you don't have one, give me a shout and I can find one somewhere.

Beg, steal or borrow a pipe flaring tool that can be hand-held if required. Flare one end of your pipe and put on the fitting. Temporarily connect the pipe, bend and route it, and leave enough free length at the other end to make the flare. Remove the pipe if necessary, or make the flare in-situ with the hand-held tool (don't forget to put the fitting on the pipe before forming the flare). Hey presto, made-to-measure pipe! Use kunifer or copper pipe in preference to steel (it's difficult to bend and flare, and it goes rusty).

It's common for replacement top rings to be 'barrel' shaped, i.e. not square, but with a convex outer contact surface. The reason is to prevent the ring 'hanging up' or catching on the cylinder wall when fitting new rings to a worn cylinder (i.e. not rebored, but still within usable limits). In this case the top rings will be clearly marked, even though they are easily distinguishable from the 2nd ring. Ring gap isn't critical, so long as the gap isn't smaller than the recommended minimum. You must square up the ring in the bore when measuring end-gap, or the measurement won't be accurate. To ensure the ring is square, fit the ring to the top of the bore and use a piston with no rings fitted to push the ring down the bore. Also check the ring side clearance in the groove of the piston - it's equally important that this is correct. When fitting the rings to the piston, position them on the piston so that the gaps are 120 degrees apart. Don't fit them with the gaps all in a line on one side of the piston. Finally, use a glaze-buster on the bores before rebuilding. This slightly roughens the surface (removes the worn glazed finish) and allows the new rings to bed in correctly. Failure to do this usually results in poor compression and high oil usage. As a footnote, when your engine is up and running, don't mollycuddle it! Driving at very low RPM and light throttle is not good for running in a new engine. Use it reasonably freely, but not at excessive RPM. This will allow new components to bed in reasonably quickly and give a longer engine life. Change oil AND filter at around 300 miles, reset carbs and ignition, and you can use it more-or-less as normal, but resist prolonged full-throttle and high-RPM use for around a thousand miles.

Thanks for the comments piman. I must admit I have never checked the fuel level physically, although the float level has been set and subsequently checked, and is spot-on. The needle valves are the viton-tipped  variety - I have found that they seal better and are less prone to leaking/flooding. The engine runs extremely well, and the carbs normally behave themselves perfectly. It's just this one (extreme) situation where I have problems. I like to make use of the car's good handling, but the fuel thing does tend to limit the possibilities. I suppose I should rig up some way of checking if it's just one carb or both that floods - it might help to arrive at a fix.

I fitted adjustable Gaz shocks to a scimitar GTE SE6 i owned many moons ago.  I had them set to full soft to cope with the roads over here in Ireland (you think the roads are bad in the UK eh?) They were just the ticket, and the car drove and handled really well.

You can use windscreen washer tubing, because its only a temporary fitment. You can also use a jar at each wheel with a smidge of brake fluid in the bottom of it, and put the ends of the clear tubes into the fluid. You can then see very easily when the fluid is free of bubbles. You will, of course, need 4 jars, and you will have to put spacers (wood blocks?) under them to get the height correct for the ends of the tubes. A bit of messing around to set the job up, but well worth the effort usually. If you use a pressure bleeder like the Gunsons, it has its own reservoir. If you empty the reservoir by bleeding any remaining fluid in it through the vehicle brake system, it won't cause any fluid spillage when you disconnect everything. I think Halfords used to sell these at one time, and they are still popular, so I'm sure they are available on the internet.

Many thanks guys for the replies. Nilfisken - your pics seem to be a fairly straightforward mod which is within the realms of DIY. JohnD - if you could post your pics (again!) please, I would really appreciate it. And Rotoflex - the link you posted was very interesting, but just a tad expensive for my taste. Has anyone come across the second problem (carbs flooding on hard left-handers)? I have owned and run Heralds and Vitesses previously, but never had this problem before. Having said that, I didn't drive them as hard as I do the Spit. I think the problem is due to either the fuel surging to the outside of the float chambers, or the floats sticking to the side of the float bowl when subjected to hard cornering forces. A possible fix might be to turn the float bowl tops so that the float hinge is in a different place. Anyone have any comments?

Our friends over the pond do exactly that for various types of racing (e.g.nascar). Sounds a bit complicated for me. I'd be happy just cutting some sheet metal baffles and tacking them into the sump, so long as I knew how big to make them and where to put them!

The whole point of the factory setting is twofold, firstly to comply with legal emissions requirements regarding crankcase fumes, and secondly to get rid of the smell. The factory setup works fine if all the bits are there as they should be. There is a small cylindrical plastic fitting which locates in the carb, and onto which the rubber hose is connected. This plastic bit has a restriction in it so that only a relatively small amount of air is drawn into the carb. If the hole is too large, it will upset idle mixture. Have you checked your dipstick to see if the felt seal which fits against the top of the dipstick tube is missing? This will allow too much air to be drawn through the engine and pipework, also making the mixture lean.

I assume your 3-wire alternator will have connections as follows: 1 - main output wire (charging) 2 - to ignition warning lamp 3 - voltage sensing wire, going to battery positive terminal Your main output wire is the fat brown (connected to '+' in your photo) Check your remaining wiring to see which colour wire goes to your ignition warning lamp, and which goes to the battery. Wire them accordingly. Insulate the remaining wires, and you are finished!

Why are you pulling the engine to replace the clutch? You can do most of the stripping from inside the car! Remove front seats, carpet and gearbox tunnel. Support the rear of the engine (use a flat, wide board to spread the load along the sump). Disconnect battery, remove starter and clutch slave cylinder. You can access the gearbox mounts, prop bolts and all except the bottom 2 bell housing bolts from inside the car. Support the 'box. Bottom 2 bolts are undone from outside the car, with you on the floor (that's the most difficult bit!). Get an assistant to help you lift the box out of the car. Hey presto, it's the easiest clutch you will ever do! PS - your chirpy rattly noise is the release bearing, so get a clutch kit (friction plate, pressure plate and release bearing).

Please don't think I'm asking the obvious, but your problem might be straightforward and you're not seeing it. For example, a friend of mine had a similar problem, and finally he noticed he fitted the calipers wrong way round (left caliper on right hub, and vice-versa). The bleed nipples were at the bottom of the caliper instead of the top! Firstly, you don't say if your brakes are single line, or dual circuit (tandem master cylinder). I assume because you have a servo, theyr'e single line, and so they should bleed easily. Here are 2 strategies you can try. 1. Gravity bleeding - fill the master cylinder, and have someone keeping an eye on it and top it up. Open all 4 bleed nipples and allow gravity to do the rest. When clear fluid (no bubbles) comes from any bleed nipple, close it. When all 4 are done, try the pedal. You can fit short sections of clear plastic tube to the bleed nipples whilst bleeding if you don't want fluid running down your calipers or brake backplates. 2. Pressure bleeding - buy a kit (I have a Gunsons, it's good!). Make sure the kit has a lid that fits your master cylinder. if not, order one from the manufacturer. Fill the reservoir of the kit as well as you master cylinder reservoir. Follow the instructions to pressurise the bleeder, and off you go! I have found that brakes can be very successfully bled at VERY low pressure (I have used a spare tyre at only a few PSI as the pressure source, and I once used an inflated car inner tube - and it worked perfectly. No need to run your engine, or to pump the pedal in either of the above methods. Good luck!

Rimmer bros and Canley classics do engine fasteners. You can also try www.burtonpower.com

Hi Guys Anyone have any info on baffling a spit 1500 sump? My car suffers from severe oil starvation/total lack of oil pressure on uphill left-handers during 'spirited' driving. I have searched the internet for solutiions, but I can't find any specifics on how to baffle the sump. I'm aware that there are 2 types of oil pump, but I don't know which is the better, or if either will cure the problem. I have also noticed a srong smell of petrol on left-handers when the car is under high cornering forces. I can only assume that the carbs are flooding, possibly due to the float(s) jamming.This concerns me because the exhaust is on the same side as the carbs, and there's an obvious risk of fire. And no, I don't want to slow down, because I enjoy driving my car too much! If anyone has any possible solutions, I would be most grateful if you would reply to this post.  Many thanks.