8th May 2016, Glavon Vale of Evesham Run

After hopefully fixing the carburettors, I was interested to find out how the car actually drove so our Glavon TR Register group day out on 8th May was ideal.  Turns out it was the hottest day of the year so far and a proper test. We had a mixed group of 14 cars with TR3,4,5&6 but mine was the only TR7. During the day three of the TR5/6 broke down due to the heat but the TR7 didn't miss a beat.

It was raining at the start!

Driving to the start we had some light rain but the forecast was good so the roof stayed down. This turned out to be the right decision because by 10:00am it was a glorious sunny day.

The route took us from the start at Coombe Hill near Cheltenham across the River Severn at Tirley, to a coffee stop at Clive's Fruit Farm near Upton on Severn. They specialise in pick-your-own fruit, juices and cider, and I can highly recommend their home made cakes.

Coffee stop at Clive's Fruit Farm

Leaving the farm we met quite a lot of traffic at Upton on Severn which seemed to be heading for a Spring show at nearby Malvern. Several of us have CB radios so we were able to keep our small convoy together in the traffic and they came in useful when a couple of the TR5/6 broke down apparently due to the heat. It was now about 25 degrees and I actually decided to put a little sunscreen on my face whilst the cars were restarted.

Lunch was at the Fleece Inn at Bretforton. This is a lovely old 15th century pub owned by the National Trust where they do really nice food.  It is in the middle of a small village but we had arranged to park our cars in their gardens which provided a perfect location for a couple of pictures as well.

Lunch stop at the Fleece Inn, Bretforton

The afternoon run took us up onto the hills and a stop at Broadway Tower before dropping down via Snowshill, Temple Guiting and Kineton to Naunton where we all separated to make our way home.

The TR7 ran perfectly and drove better than it ever has. The engine was smooth with a good spread of power from low revs all through the range.
All in all, a grand day out.

May, 2016. Carburettors

Since I fitted the alloy carb mounts last year I have never been happy with the idling speed.  It never wanted to go much below about 1000 or even 1100 rpm and because there has been stuff going on I have not bothered about it.  The engine runs perfectly, apart from the idle, with good power and reasonable economy so I decided it was time to investigate properly.

All the linkages etc were free and lubricated with no signs of sticking. There was no signs of any air leaks and all the breather hoses are connected and in good condition. Next thing was to put a flow meter on the carbs, and sure enough the front carb was drawing much more air than the rear one. The next thing was to loosen all the links between the carbs and set the idle on each one but even with the throttle stop completely undone the front carb was still drawing way too much air.

Synchrometer, air flow meter I use.

Something was obviously going on with the front carb so I decided the only thing to do was take them both off and have a proper look. First thing I noticed was that the fuel level in the jet of the front carb seemed much higher than the rear one, not an answer to the main problem but something else to sort out as well.  With the carbs off I found that the throttle butterfly on the front one was not closing fully. Holding it up to the light I could see the butterfly was clearly not centered properly in the spindle because light was still visible with it "closed". I was able to slacken off the two screws holding it and get it adjusted so no daylight showed. The butterfly must have been like since the engine went in the car and I think the old suspect rubber mounts had masked the problem.

Next thing to look at was the float levels. The newer types of SU carbs have a one piece plastic float which is non adjustable. Some folks put washers under the needle valve to alter it but I decided I might as well fit the best new ones from Burlen Fuel Systems. These are called StayUp Floats and come complete with a new needle valve and gaskets as well so should be an answer to the fuel level problem. They also have a metal lever so are adjustable as well if needed.

Burlen SU StayUp float kit

Well the new float kits came and are fitted in the car. It was a really easy job to fit them and adjust the floats to the correct setting.

The engine now runs much smoother and I can actually adjust the tickover to a nice 750/800rpm. It also drives nicer and pulls strongly from low revs. I popped into my local garage and checked it on their emissions tester.  CO2 levels were a little high so I set them down to a comfortable 4.5% .

We are out on a little Sunday tour with our GLAVON TR Register group tomorrow so it will be interesting to see how it goes in normal driving.

17th April 2016, Clutch master cylinder

Checking the lights before our journey home after the Corinium Run we noticed that the brake lights had stopped working.  A brief investigation showed it was the switch which was faulty so that needed doing as a priority. Its not a difficult job, just a bit awkward working up under the dash, but when I was replacing the faulty brake light switch I spotted signs of something dripping on the mat

That wet spot means trouble

 

and this is where the drips come from

The clutch master cylinder needed to be replaced soon before it let me down and I already happened to have a new one "in stock" so that was good.

I had been considering fitting one of those nice shiny Aeroquip type stainless hoses instead of the standard plastic one so now was my chance and I ordered one from Robsport. It arrived next day so that was great service.   Swapping the master cylinder and hose was pretty straightforward and only took an hour or so, but like the brake switch involved mostly working upside down under the dash. Why is that so much more difficult than it used to be when I was 20 years younger?

New master cylinder and hose

New hose at the slave cylinder end

After bleeding I now have a really smooth clutch pedal which feels better than it has ever been.

14th April 2016, Corinium Run

I asked my old mate Chris Riley to come along again on the Corinium Run again this year. I have know Chris since the 1970's and we have competed and serviced on rallies together ever since. He also helps me with the two man jobs on the TR7 so a very useful bloke to have around.

The Corinium Run is a classic tour of about 125 miles using "Tulip" navigation. For those who don't know this is a system named after the Tulip Rally in Holland who developed it in the 1950's. It uses a series of diagrams of the road junctions and features found along the route and the distances between them. Most serious crews have a special trip meter fitted in their cars to give a very accurate distances but we used an app on a mobile phone which worked pretty well. I will have to invest in a trip meter if we do many more runs.

Tulip navigation explained

2016 Roadbook, our actual route

 It was a nice day, but cold and even a slight frost early on. Leaving home we soon discovered that the heater blower was not working, not a disaster, but we had to rely on the air coming through the heater as we went along which turned out to be OK. It was my own fault because I had been working on the centre console and had not tested that everything was OK afterwards, beginners mistake.

This year they had allocated us the same start number as last year - 42 - how neat is that.

Start was at the Cirencester Town Football Club premises where they gave a us a nice bacon roll and a hot drink before the first car left at 9:30am.  The route then took us through Daglingworth, the Duntisbournes, North Cerney and Rendcombe before our first stop at Chedworth Farm Shop for a tea and one of their excellent cakes.

Duntisbourne Leer.   Sorry, but I can't resist a watersplash.

After refreshments our route took us further north along the lanes via Yanworth, Compton Abdale, Hawling, Hailes and Greet before the lunch halt at the Gloucestershire & Warwickshire Steam Railway in Toddington.   This suited us fine because both Chris and myself are steam enthusiasts. Turns out he has bought himself a day out there soon and will be actually driving one of the engines so I am very envious.

Wonderful stuff

The afternoon run then took us though Stanway and another ford to Guiting Power, Bourton on the Water and Turkdean before our tea stop at the Cotswold Lion Cafe. This is actually the old Northleach Prison and again they do very good cakes. Do you detect a pattern here - lots of stops for tea and cakes!

I tried to get the photographer wet

The tea and cakes are excellent here!

 We got back to the finish in Cirencester to be greeted with a choice of curries, chili or sweet & sour whilst the organisers worked out our fuel consumption.  This turned out to be 25.99mpg so not bad for a lot of twisty and hilly lanes.

Another great day out in the TR7, which is exactly what I bought it for in the first place. The car had behaved itself perfectly and we had really enjoyed ourselves.

6th April 2016, Indicator buzzers changed

I originally fitted indicator buzzers in the old red car because I found it was too easy to leave the indicators on by mistake, especially with the top down.  I moved them with all the other good stuff over to the blue car but they have started to sound a bit poorly so I decided it was time they were replaced. Very easy job to do and they are cheap to buy, so I sourced a couple of different types off Ebay to see which sounded best.

Choice of different buzzer types

Testing them I found the round ones were a bit too strident and decided the rectangular ones would be better and more gentle on the ear. Only took a few minutes to make them up with some connectors ready to plug into the wiring adapter in the indicator stalk tail (see picture March 2015).

Buzzers ready to plug in

 Most difficult part of the job was reaching up under the dash to plug them in!

30th March 2016, Radio fix and console change.

The radio has been playing up a bit, working sometimes and not others so I needed to find out why. I had only stuffed an old Panasonic stereo/cassette in there as a temporary one anyway so it was time to do something more permanent.  The radio location in a TR7 does not have enough depth behind it to take most standard head units without sticking out but I had a modern Radiomobile unit which is much smaller that I kept from the old red car. There is no cassette player but it has facility for an SD card, a USB stick and an Aux input instead.

Tracing the intermittent fault was the first priority and with the console removed I soon found that moving the wiring about caused the fault to come and go. The problem was to narrow it down to which wires. Trial and error revealed it was in the two standard connectors just below the heater that supply live and earth to the radio. Attempts at cleaning the connectors didn't work so I ended up replacing them with modern crimp connections. Not as neat but the fault was fixed. Looking at the old connectors I took off revealed some corrosion in the wires so they obviously got wet at sometime in the past - maybe from a heater leak judging by the location.

New crimps connectors fixed the radio fault

Whilst the console was out I took the chance to replace the old cigarette lighter with a modern 12v socket and add a USB output socket as well. This will be useful for a phone charger or sat nav later.

Console with USB, 12v and driving lamps switch

  

1st March 2016, Slow Headlight Motor & DRL's

The drivers side headlight has always been a bit slower to rise than the other one, and sometimes needed a tweak of the manual knob to get it started, so I thought it was time I fixed it.  I knew all the wiring and connections were good from when I fitted the auxiliary relays back in May 2014 so the problem was obviously with the headlight motor or the lift mechanism.  I had also noticed a little bit of "flutter" from that headlight on bumpy road surfaces so that needed investigation as well.

First thing was to take the whole assembly out of the car, but before doing that I tried shaking the headlight and could feel some definite movement even though it was locked in the up position.  With the assembly out of the car you could actually see some movement in the mechanism where the turnbuckle link joins the crank.When I took it apart there is a bronze bush which had developed a small amount of wear allowing the light pod to vibrate slightly when raised.

Worn bronze bush here.

Luckily I have a small collection of headlight assemblies that I have acquired during several years of TR7 ownership - just in case - as they say,  so I was able to find a much better bush in my stock. I was also able to find a better motor as well. Some of them felt a bit stiff or rough to turn but again I found a better one so that went on as well.

The whole lot was then put back into the car and I now have a pair of headlights that rise and fall in unison!

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Next little job was to fit some Daytime Running Lights.  This has been on my list of jobs for a while and I consider it a good idea in modern traffic. The TR7 has a low profile front end and as mine is dark blue I think it might be hard to see coming in shady places - hence the DRL's.

I bought a set of Ring Ursa LED lights which come complete with all the wiring and a neat little relay switch to turn them off when your main lights are switched on which is a legal requirement in the UK apparently. They are normally about £40 but I found a new set someone had bought and not used on Ebay for £19.95.  There are lots of very cheap LED lights for sale but I wanted something that didn't look like temporary fix and one of the guys on the Triumph TR7 Owners Page recommended them. 

They mounted neatly in the "hockey stick" trim just below the headlights and the little relay switch fitted on the hidden side of the radiator side filler panel so nothing is visible in the engine bay.

Spot the DRL's

Top view