The continuing saga of my Lancia Beta Spider

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

Not too much of an issue, we used to have 4800 pair cables at BT, that's 9600 wires in a cable.

How did that translate to fibre?

I'd left by the time of fibre street cabinets, but it's going to be 2 cores to feed a cabinet, telephone calls are tiny amounts of data, I don't know what codex BT use, probably G711, look up how much data a G711 voice call makes.

[mangocrazy]

After wingeing about delivery times to France yesterday, when I went out to the boulangerie this morning, there was a packet from VWP sitting by the front door. So the saga will continue after breakfast.

Perhaps.

[mangocrazy]

Well, no-one ever said it was going to be easy or simple.

And it isn't/wasn't...

I fitted the plumptious new earth battery cable to a new -ve terminal post and everything went together nicely. Battery positive connection went on first and it was with some trepidation that I then fitted the earth cable. But this time there was no drama, no sparks, no smoke and no burning smell, so all good. I'd removed the plugs and disconnected the electronic ignition box from the loom and then spun it over on the starter to ensure no nasty mechanical noises were apparent (they weren't, which was a relief). So then it was a case of pop the plugs back in, reconnect the ignition pack and fire up the fuel pump.

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And that was where it all went a bit south...

Out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw a slight movement down by the front crossmember on the RH side. On looking closer there was movement, fuel was dripping from the outlet port of the Huco electric fuel pump. At first I thought it was the fuel hose leaking from the spigot, but that wasn't the case. It was leaking from the body of the pump. Huco fuel pumps have a clever and simple method of allowing you to set the inlet and outlet spigots at any angle you like, to cater for all installation types, and it was from this junction on the outlet side that the leak was coming from.

Back on the bench all became clear when I stripped the inlet port down, to discover an o-ring in two pieces. The o-ring provides the seal and mine had cried enough and bifurcated itself. They're a 60p part and I didn't have a spare. So I guess progress has been made, but (as usual) not as much as I'd like.

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In the dim distant recesses of my mind I think I might have a spare pump of the same type, so time to start creating havoc and searching through cardboard boxes. If not, it's more time wasted getting inexpensive parts sent out from the UK. What joy.

[DefTrap]

I don't have much luck with French HighStreet (or even BackStreet) motor factors - I give them the benefit of the doubt as they have to cope with my Franglish accent, and I don't think they're really any worse than your average UK Halfords. You can't seem to order anything without having a carte grise first, and even then they're super reluctant to help you with anything like o-rings, seals, nuts, washers etc - the stuff that oddjobbers are always after.

[mangocrazy]

Yes, it's for that reason that I take as much stuff with me from the UK as I can. The idea of swanning into my local Roady and tring to get them to match up an o-ring is laughable, Unless it's on the shelf, they don't sell it and they won't try looking. That o-ring looks to be a very non-standard size as well, the cord is much slimmer than any I have in my o-ring variety box. If I can't find the mythical 'spare' then I'll wait till I'm back in the UK before ordering. Then it's either order ten off from Eurocarb, or order one, find out the exact size and order ten but in FKM (Viton) to resist the E10 muck that's everywhere these days.

[Newey]

I'm trying to understand the logic in that, but failing...

On an aircraft there are probably hundreds if not thousands of wires. You'd run out of colours!

"Connect the teal wire to the teal port, not the dark turqiose one!"

Not too much of an issue, we used to have 4800 pair cables at BT, that's 9600 wires in a cable.

The colour coding was repetitive, ( blue, orange, green brown, slate) with different binder colours ( white, red, black, yellow, violet) on different layers of wires , trying to identify a certain pair of wires in among the 4800 pairs would be impossible if the end was cut back and all the wires were just spread out like a huge fan as you wouldn't know what binder or layer it came from, unless you "toned" it out from the other end of the cable.

[mangocrazy]

For once I've been able to find what I was looking for in the assortment of cardboard boxes I have in the garage (and the house, for that matter). I found the spare pump with a viable o-ring. which was then fitted to the pump on the car, I energised the pump and all fluids were held inside and none made their way to the floor. So I'm calling that a result.

If the weather is decent tomorrow I'll try to fire it up. If it runs, the first task will be to get it outside in the road and give it a damn good wash. It's covered in dust and cat footprints and the windscreen is opaque.

[mangocrazy]

One step forward, two steps back...

With a pretty much fully charged battery (only used to turn the engine over with plugs removed), the engine spun, but I was shortly greeted with a couple of bangs in the exhaust. There might have been some flame from the exhaust as well...

So I guess I've mis-timed the ignition and it's firing on the wrong stroke...?

And just to add to the sense of jollity I noticed that the washer bottle was leaking, probably from the rubber seal where the pump goes into the bottle.

Not one of my better days.

[mangocrazy]

As I've provided an update on one tale of mechanical woe, I guess I'd better provide the same for this particular saga.

After taking advice, it was clear that my guess that I'd mis-timed the ignition and it was firing on the wrong stroke was correct. To correct this first I had to line up the mark on the crank pulley with the mark signifying 10 degrees BTDC on the cam pulley cover and verify that the exhaust cam on cylinder #1 was on the closing stroke. This meant that cyl #4 was on the firing stroke. So with some trepidation I loosened the nut holding the distributor clamp and pulled it out of the spline. I needed to get the rotor arm positioned such that it was just about to meet the HT lead contact for cyl #4.

After much vacillating and dithering I decided on a final position, pushed the distributor into its spline, tightened up the nut and called it done. After reconnecting the cap and pushing the HT leads onto their respective plugs it was time to see if I'd made any improvement.

As it turned out, I had.

It fired up on about the third turn on the starter, so I'd got something half right. But the engine sounded more than a bit rough (hardly surprising with guess-work ignition timing) and more worryingly there sounded like there was a significant exhaust blow. This was a concern as I'd spent a lot of time and effort making sure the exhaust was properly fastened.

So I peered under the car to see if I could spot any reason for the exhaust blow, and that was when I saw the drip - drip - drip of oil onto the garage floor.

And that, dear reader, was when I said 'fuck this for a game of soldiers' and turned my back on the whole sorry mess.

It's a problem for future Mango.

[MrLongbeard]

Have you thought about buying a bicycle

[mangocrazy]

Have you thought about buying a bicycle

I do have one, and it's in France. But it's not very good for the big weekly shop...

[Sadlonelygit]

I have a large selection of o rings that I could check for you and post over, if you know what size you need!

[mangocrazy]

I have a large selection of o rings that I could check for you and post over, if you know what size you need!

Spare o-rings for the fuel pump are currently on order, but in Viton so they're ethanol-resistant. But the engine oil leak is another issue altogether. I don't know exactly where the problem is, but I don't think a new o-ring will fix it...

[Taipan]

Have you thought about buying a bicycle

I do have one, and it's in France. But it's not very good for the big weekly shop...

[mangocrazy]

Three bottles of wine and a baguette - that's only one meal by my reckoning...

[Rockburner]

Have you thought about buying a bicycle

I do have one, and it's in France. But it's not very good for the big weekly shop...

Looks more like a daily shop to me....

[Taipan]

I do have one, and it's in France. But it's not very good for the big weekly shop...

Looks more like a daily shop to me....

Pedantry spoiling me clipart!

[Big Red]

The main 2 things I would be checking for an oil leak is the oil filter(possibly rusted through to a pinhole) if its been lying around for years and the oil pressure switch.
May be something really simple and would be my first checks

[mangocrazy]

The main 2 things I would be checking for an oil leak is the oil filter(possibly rusted through to a pinhole) if its been lying around for years and the oil pressure switch.
May be something really simple and would be my first checks

Thanks for the suggestions; the oil filter was changed less than 12 months (and zero miles) ago and the oil pressure switch (and filter) are on the front of the engine and the oil leak is at the back.

I was so pissed off when I saw the oil leak that I just threw my hands up and walked away. When I return in April I should be able to take a more reasoned and philosphical approach. Maybe... But it wasn't a tiny weep, it was a proper drip,drip, drip so I doubt it will be anything trivial.

I actually have a fully rebuilt, rebored and reconditioned engine and gearbox sitting in the UK waiting to be swapped out for the scrapyard special that's currently in place, so I'm seriously thinking of taking the 'good' engine down in the van next April (along with an engine hoist) and switching them. This is the currently unemployed engine that's twiddling its thumbs in the UK...

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No contest really, is it?

[ChrisW]

I actually have a fully rebuilt, rebored and reconditioned engine and gearbox sitting in the UK

Well that's a proper deus ex machina solution right there