1972 Triumph TR6 looking for a purpose

JoeTR6 said:

OK, back to work.  Something was bugging me while I should have been sleeping last night.  Something about two 65F days in a row starting today.  Oh yeah, I've been putting off painting the rear valance for years now.  It's about time.

While it's out, I also disassembled the trunk latch to figure out how hard the lock barrel is to replace.  Not very, it turns out.  I need to order a new lock barrel or figure out how to make this one work with a key that I own.

 

That color looks Brilliant in the sun light.  Very good choice.

Will you be driving it soon?

Indy "Nub" Guy said:

Will you be driving it soon?

I hope so.  I may do the VIN verification for Colorado today or tomorrow, then it can be registered and legal.  It's also leaking motor oil like a 80k mile Triumph, so I need to check on the source.  So far I've eliminated the oil filter, valve cover, oil pressure sensor, and front oil seal.  It's collecting on the bottom rear of the oil pan, so I'm hoping that eliminates the rear main seal (oil would be collecting on the bell housing).  If it's simply the oil pan, I can spread some sealant around the seam and hope that fixes it.  But it's OK for short drives.

In reply to JoeTR6 :

And you are sure its not crankcase pressure buildup?

NOHOME said:

In reply to JoeTR6 :

And you are sure its not crankcase pressure buildup?

I'm pretty certain it's not.  I have Richard Good's oil catch can that gets vacuum from the manifold.  The oil cap is under suction while running and you can hear it returning to atmospheric pressure for several seconds after shutdown.

Today is the last day for a while that's forecast to be in the 60s, so I planned on taking the car to a nearby dealer to have the VIN verified.  They do this in Colorado for out-of-state titles, so this was a necessary next step for me to make this car legal to drive.  I warmed it up and took it on a lap of the neighborhood, and all was well.  Everything was in the car with the tuning laptop running and logging, but I didn't make it out of the driveway.  It just died.  Playing around showed that it could be restarted, but would just cut off occasionally.  The log showed the same thing with no obvious issues, so I started testing ignition.  Steady power at the coil, but all plugs were intermittent.  Timing signal steady with no drops.  WTF, says I.  The problem seemed to be on the ground side of the coils or the coil pack itself.

Getting desperate, I dug the QuadSpark coil control out from under the dash and started checking connectors.  Everything was secure.  Then I thought about the ground wire.  Maybe the bolt through the firewall that I used wasn't making clean contact.  Swapping to another ground location seemed to solve the problem.  So yeah, check your grounds continues to be good advice.  BTW, doing this made no difference in the noisy baro sensor behind the MegaSquirt.

With that fixed (hopefully), I drove the 5 miles there and back to get my VIN form signed.  I even did some tuning under load along to way.  Everything appears good.  So on to locating my oil leak.

Joe, I just finished up a 6 engine build and it reminds me of a couple places that might leak at the rear of the engine. 

First is the top most bolt holding the rear engine seal plate on. That one goes into an oil gallery and is sealed with a copper washer and thread sealant. I also seal all the other bolts with thread sealant though I'm pretty sure they are blind holes. 

The block on my 6 tends to leak on the upper left hand edge right over the SN stamping. I put some sealant on the gasket per a discussion with Richard Good on this engine build. (I've built this motor 3 times in 30 years). Finally, also wondering if maybe there is a gap at the rear on the bottom edge of the rear engine seal plate and the block where the pan gasket goes across?

BTW, have read this entire thread. Enjoyed every word!

oppositelocksmith said:

Joe, I just finished up a 6 engine build and it reminds me of a couple places that might leak at the rear of the engine. 

First is the top most bolt holding the rear engine seal plate on. That one goes into an oil gallery and is sealed with a copper washer and thread sealant. I also seal all the other bolts with thread sealant though I'm pretty sure they are blind holes. 

The block on my 6 tends to leak on the upper left hand edge right over the SN stamping. I put some sealant on the gasket per a discussion with Richard Good on this engine build. (I've built this motor 3 times in 30 years). Finally, also wondering if maybe there is a gap at the rear on the bottom edge of the rear engine seal plate and the block where the pan gasket goes across?

BTW, have read this entire thread. Enjoyed every word!

Thanks for the suggestions.  My best guess is the latter.  Oil appears to be running down the back of the oil pan only, but I can't really see the exhaust side without putting it up on jack stands.  I thought about the rear seal plate as well, but that means the gearbox has to come out so I'll eliminate the others first.

Going back through old photos, I dug up this one from 2016 when the rear seal plate was installed.

It looks like the copper washer is on the top bolt, but I can't remember whether I used thread sealer.  There's plenty of copper RTV around the seal plate, so that should have extruded around the bolt.  I also have a photo of the gasket before I dropped the oil pan on.

For this I used Blue Hylomar on both sides of the gasket.  I also smeared some over the front and rear seals on the block.  From this it looks like I could have used a little more sealant along the sides.  No use speculating further until the car is on stands.

Here's a question.  If you have a closed PCV system that isn't connected to the fuel tank via a charcoal canister, what happens after you shut off the engine?  I'm thinking the engine is no longer creating a vacuum, so it's possible that the air in the block somehow expands and pushes oil through a seal.  My guess is that this is unlikely as the air will only cool off once the engine is shutdown, but maybe heat soak comes into play from lack of coolant circulation.  One test is to disconnect/block the vacuum source and leave the oil catch can open to atmosphere.

So much for being legal.  Titling requires a trip to the local DMV, and that is by appointment.  There are no appointments available through December.  So that explains the several cars I've seen running around without even expired temporary tags.

Wow!!! That stinks!

I got mine on the road today. First time today after a 6 month engine rebuild. Because of Covid, there are no machine shops with any availability. I ended up driving 1 state over and waiting a couple months to get my machine work done. And now I've finished the build and re-install. 

60 miles on the car today. Triple DCOE's. I need to bolt in my AFR and start tuning- it smells rich at idle. 

oppositelocksmith said:

Wow!!! That stinks!

I got mine on the road today. First time today after a 6 month engine rebuild. Because of Covid, there are no machine shops with any availability. I ended up driving 1 state over and waiting a couple months to get my machine work done. And now I've finished the build and re-install. 

60 miles on the car today. Triple DCOE's. I need to bolt in my AFR and start tuning- it smells rich at idle. 

Yeah, get those things dialed in and they are wonderful.  When we had them on an autocross car, they worked well, especially after using a wideband sensor for fine tuning.  Before that, they dumped gas into the oil, so we did frequent oil changes.

Just saying, I still have valid tags and registration from the other TR6.  What are the odds of me getting pulled over?  The car has insurance through Hagerty.

In reply to JoeTR6 :

Tour odds of getting pulled over for unregistered are about nil. Your odds for getting pulled over for exuberant behavior are more variable Around me the official word is "no prosecution for late registration" and we have had open walk in since August.

I can foresee this scenario:  "But officer, I was tuning acceleration enrichment". 

This week is for small accomplishments with Thanksgiving and family taking priority.  The latest parts order included new wiper blades to fit the new wiper arms.  I gave up on the original arms that I powder coated years ago, mainly because they where loose but also because I do not like the silver powder that I used (too light gray).  The new ones are stainless steel and should last a while.  I didn't realize until recently that early TR6s used silver wiper arms, and that the bayonet end was a narrower size.

Another small thing was finishing the trunk latch.  I ordered a new lock barrel and can now lock the trunk lid.  The latch assembly was painted silver because I still don't have a silver powder coat that I like.

The DMV opened up more appointments, so this thing becomes legal next Monday.

Congrats on getting the car to that stage! Something to be thankful for in this crazy year!

JoeTR6 said:

Just saying, I still have valid tags and registration from the other TR6.  What are the odds of me getting pulled over?  The car has insurance through Hagerty.

Just don't drive like an idiot and you'll be fine. Last year I was driving a green, unregistered URS6 to a rallycross with the license plate from a green registered URS6. We were late so I had been driving about 90 for like 2 hours straight. Got pulled over 5 minutes from the venue. Damn good thing they didn't check the VIN. 

In some ways this is a big step;  the car is finally legal to drive.  I still haven't slid under it to look for the source of oil leaks.

Huge step, congrats!

I finally slid under the car to take a look at oil leaks.  There is no oil on the driver's side of the engine or pan, at least not on the side.  Towards the back, oil appears to be accumulating at the back corner of the pan and on the clutch slave cylinder mount.  It's also all along the back edge.  There is oil in the seam between the oil pan and the rear engine plate.  There's nothing coming out of the weep hole under the bell housing, so the clutch doesn't appear to be wet.

Looking at the passenger/exhaust side, there is some staining but only one drip on the rear corner.  There is some oil in the seam between the engine and oil pan, and some oil tracks on the exhaust header.  The sides of the block are dry everywhere.

The next step worries me.  I could try to fix this by spreading sealant around the rear oil pan to block seam, or just drop the pan and see how it goes.  The windage tray and extended oil pump pickup may make that impossible, leading to the engine coming out.  But dropping the pan would allow me to see the rear engine seal, and if that's dry, resealing the oil pan may be all that's needed.

Bummer, had a similar problem on my turbo Spitfire where the turbo oil drain bung in the oil pan was not properly installed and I basically had to lift the engine to get the oil pan out so I could fix it. Shame we get this close to being done and something like this rears it's ugly head. Hopefully it is not the rear main and can be fixed by just resealing the oil pan. Fingers crossed for you!

That looks like a feature to me.

It is not a leak...your baby is masrking its' territory!

I had a somewhat similar hard to locate leak on my TR6.  In my case it turned out to be the cap 
( for lack of a better term ) on the rear of the block that covers the cam.  Moss part number 328-375.

I should have said this was from just a 5 mile drive.  But yeah, nothing like the autocross car where the front sealing block was worn out.  It would leave a puddle at the start line, which was no bueno.

I'm not finding myself in a hurry to tackle this.

Joe, let me know if you want a hand some weekend.