More Sparky's winter work

quattro

quattro

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After the Gas Board modified Sparky, I have managed to get him back in the correct shape. Thank You Clive, Mark and Chris.
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Now I can start the winter work, the weather has turned bitterly cold, thank you BG for holding up when the weather was better :evil: . Sparky is however taxed, MOTed and insured this winter and will not come off the road as normal.

I have been toying with the idea of using a cold air induction system. I have been told that if you restrict the air intake a little you will get better torque, and cold air being denser than the warm engine bay air, will give more power as well.

So I have modified a brake duct intake and fixed it to the side of the air filter (just temporarily to test it - it won't be staying like that :shock: ). Taped up the rest of the K&N and connected a large bore pipe to it and aimed it at the front of the car. It should pull air from under the water bottle/around the side of the rad, and from under the car. I have got a sheet of aluminium to make up the filter shroud if it all works.

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Initial tests were good, with a noticeable torque increase and even better, a much much quieter engine. That induction roar that was present with the 3" x 14" K&N sitting on top of the carb, has gone altogether. The engine also seems to be smoother, but that could be because of the lack of roar. The Induction roar was nice for the first few months but gets tiring after a while, gimme some quiet please LOL - oh, and I can hear the exhaust now :) so good news all round. Seems to be running a little rich though, so will run him for a while then sort the jetting out.

I do have a noticeable knock from the front end and have decided to take the front wings off and sort it out. It appears to be the shock mounts, those new ones aren't very good. I have taken the adjustables off and have driven it round our car park - no knock at all. So, back on with the old ones for now and see what they perform like.
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I will give it all a good clean under there when the wings are off, a good inspection and a liberal dosing of Dinitrol.

Richard
 
I like your modification Richard. At first I thought you had fitted one of the air boxes from a Jensen or something. The science of cold air induction does make sense, although I've tried both the K&N cone filter and the standard airbox in my SD1 and I haven't noticed any obvious difference other than a more refined, quieter induction with the standard airbox than the K&N. However, I would imagine that with your very big carburettor the induction would be a lot more noisier than twin SUs or Efi.

I have to say I actually prefer the K&N cone filter now, as on my car it dosen't intrude very much, if at all on my V8. But the silenced airbox does have a more factory look to it, as the K&N type do appear to look a bit on the chav side. I think perhaps the nylon filter silenced would be the way to go for a more factory look, and have all the benefits of cold air induction at the same time?
 
Hi Richard,

As you suspected, the carburettor will be running rich now as the volume of air that can be drawn will be less.

I investigated a similar arrangement when my 4.6 went in, running a cold air induction tube from the large snout on the air canister, but decided against it.

Ron.
 
DaveHerns said:
Won't that give you carburretor icing on these cold damp days ? Might be fine when hot but a pig when cold ?
Click to expand...
I too was thinking that icing might be a problem. Many years ago I did a similar thing on a little V/hall Nova. It had the effect of increasing power. It would run for maybe dozens of miles then I would get start to get icing. It was OK in summer but you had to be careful in winter.
 
Hi Richard

Glad to see Sparky all tucked up!

I'm very 50/50 about that mod. I concur with the icing concerns, although my guess is that you will get away with it. My big worry would be if you arrange the hose intake to get a "ram air" effect. Numbers ofpeople have done this with the hose going to a similar location. Ram air is great for racing, no good at all in road driving. The problem is thatyou can't predict how much ram air effect you're goinfg to get at a given throttle opening and engine revs - depends what gear you are in! Therefore you can't jet the carb correctly and finish up with a compromise that works for none of the options.

I have an alternative suggestion. RPi now make a very neat plenum chamber to go where your filter housing is now. Have you got enough space to relocate the filter to low down at the front of the engine bay? An EFi style very large K&N cone would be suitable or perhaps a canister filter from a n other modern saloon?

Unfortunately, whatever you do to the induction system, th carb set up will need rolling roading again after to get it spot on.

Chris
 
Hi Chris

I really don't see how I'm going to get a ram air effect with the intake where it is, or indeed how this set up (which to be honest is being tested with a view to possibly buying the RPI system)actually differs from the RPI system.

I am trying it to get 1/. Cold air into the engine, and 2/. to reduce the noise of the huge K&N on top of the engine.

I had not thought of the icing issue, thank you Dave, but I don't think this will cause me a problem. If it does I will have to warm the car up before driving it about.

When it's all done and finished, I intend to get it set up on a rolling road to optimise what is there. It is already a lot better and seems easier to drive.

We'll see what happens soon :)

Richard
 
You could fit a flap like the 2000TC air filter box to take a proportion of warmer air to help prevent carb icing. Also, will you be at risk from drawing in road debris and spray from having the intake lower down?

I fitted a plain K&N on my Land Rover 2.25 petrol carb with no cold air feed to it but that was awful for carb icing. Some cars just seem to suffer from it more than others.
 
I was thinking about a flap of some sort, maybe from an SD1 as I remember them having that sort of arrangement.

And it would be more suitable for a V8 than a 2000TC

The pick up isn't too close to the ground, I will have to take a pic of the lower bit. I am hoping to get most of the air from under the washer bottle area above the horn but will have to raise the bottle slightly. Also the intake funnel has some mesh over it to stop anything form going up there.

Pics to follow :)
 
Waiting for some 3/16 x 1" split pins and suitable washers to arrive to refit the original shocks, so not much going on at the moment. I have however had too much time on my hands recently and have made this.

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Tried to make it look period as possible, not sure whether to put it on yet, or not. :?

Will be needing some of the others as well, colour sticker, etc.

Richard
 
That engine bay bay servicing sticker looks brilliant, was it hard to replicate or find the original font?
 
It wasn't easy. I scanned a 3500S one in and change it as well as possible. I have put on there which oil the gearbox uses, redrawn a pic of the gearbox as there was an auto one to start with, put the correct name of the Dizzy on, the correct spark plugs, tyre sizes and pressures, redone the Lion and Unicorn icon as it was fuzzy (not easy), changed 3500S to 4000S, and changed Automatic to 5 speed. Couple of other things and cleaned up the print (that took a while).

Then printed it out on self adhesive paper and put a clear plastic label over it to make it look like a plastic sticker and to protect the print.

As I said, bit too much time on my hands :LOL:
 
:D Very good - the lube chart is a great idea. All you need now is a 4000S Owners Manual - place it on the dash at cars shows and that will really confuse folk.
 
Didn't really complete much last year as my back was playing up after the collision; I couldn't lie on my back on the floor without it going into spasm. Thank you so much to BG :evil:

Still had the windscreen to change, as the original has a crack in it. Still had some panels to fettle with, cold air intake to finish, and a few other things.

Sparky has just got his new MOT today :D but with one advisory :( he has a crack in the windscreen. Never mind though, he is MOTed and raring to go.

Richard

Starting the winter list already

Change Windscreen
Have a panel fettle
Replace furflex with set of black ones I got at Coughton
Repaint grill and replace N/S headlamp surround
Finish cold air intake and get set up on rolling road.
Refurb wheels
Work out a way to get the Vitesse alloy onto the boot mount
Try to get P6 gearstick onto gearbox
Tidy up throttle linkage

Ohh I do like a list :)
 
If yo want to have a look at how a factory did Ram air or a cold air induction, google "Oldsmobile Ram Air" or "Oldsmobile RAM ROD"

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=olds ... B587%3B402

they took air from down in the front bumper. If you wanted another idea, forget using air from the front, use air from the back a la GM Cowl Induction hoods - they use the pressure area in front of the windscreen - same theory applies to systems which draw air from the plenium area under the windscreen (usually the empty area where windscreen wiper motors live).

If you want to get really tricky, plumb in an A/F gauge and watch it under various driving conditions.
 
I do have an Lambda Gauge fitted which runs from 10:1 to 16:1 on the Air/fuel ratio.

I does dance a bit but happily sits around 14.7 (ideal) on cruise, goes off the clock on overrun, and will sometimes hit the 10 on hard acceleration. I will get the air intake sorted first, then get it all set-up on a rolling road. I have a set of jets and rods for fine tuning. The gauge sits under the dash alongside the fuel pressure gauge.



Richard
 
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