Early Triumph roadster - questions

[Mike]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

How goes this project, no posts for a while ????????

Should we move this thread into the "Builds" part of the website ?

DC

School holidays DC?

[dcunn]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Could be...but from May ?

Guess "exam time" may also be relevant

Thanks for the thought

Rgds DC

[mylittletony]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Hello!! back from the dead...

Apologies for the lapse. I went away for 2 weeks over May/June, then term finished and we spent a lot of time trying to to get it to run. I managed to get a few visits in during the holidays which allowed some focused work though. I had a picture lapse during the break too I'm afraid, mainly because we were head scratching.

In response to the above, the clutch is free and engages/disengages well, so has been left.

So, we ended up buying a new points distributor to assist in easy setup - may return to electronic at a later date. Spent countless hours timing it up, trying it and having no joy. We had spark, fuel (lots) compression, but pops and farts and no action

Then it was suggested that we were 180 out, turns out muggins had fitted the distributor the wrong way - . A quick flip of the leads and we had a roar of life!! Then nothing... for weeks, except for fuel literally pouring out of the carbs.

Time to strip them down, to find this stuff clogging the bowls and jets - nice:



Managed to get them back together and fitted at the end of last week's visit

Turned up today, hooked it up (with a filter) and it fired up straight away! Well chuffed!

In other news, the boys have been priming the panels, I've made a 'functional' exhaust and we've got a plan for the throttle pedal. Then it's test drive time

Here's a few pics I took today, fingers crossed for faster progress over the coming weeks.







Cheers!

[dcunn]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Many thanks for the update, delighted hear you've sorted the Gremilns - ornery little critters aren't they - and got it running. Was it Murphy who said that
if it is possible to put it together the wrong way then that is what would happen ? Been there, done it myself, so easy.

Looking forward to the continuing story

Rgds DC

[b_caswell]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Its looking good keep the pictures coming. Well done.

[b_caswell]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

This thread shows as moved but its still here but the list for last post is still blank? AH hide and seek a.

[mylittletony]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

hi all,

sorry again for the delay, last week was a driving day, making the most of the light evenings before the winter and also a lack of rain. The car was taken, along with 2 land rovers to some fields on the grounds for the boys to drive around. It was GREAT fun, the marlin has plenty of poke and the boys love it!



This week was the slightly more tedious job of sorting the wiring. We didn't really mark it up properly when dismantling and are now reaping the consequences... As with the rest of the car, there are some magnificent bodges, chocolate blocks everywhere and mystery wires...





I have managed to identify most of the connections:



with the help of the Haynes...


I plan to strip the loom, remove unused wires, shorten it where possible and replace any connections where necessary.

We have sorted a rudimentary exhaust, the panels have had a coat of black paint, awaiting a second coat and hopefully we'll tear into it over the coming weeks (well, in 2 weeks time after half term)

Thanks for your patience!

[b_caswell]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Hi Tony, well done with getting it running ........................Fortunately the Triumph loom uses some earth return wires but they are not included in the drawings. Be careful with wires that have a tracer colour as they fade and are difficult to recognise. Obviously the GRP mounted items need an earth return. Are you sticking with the dynamo? if not now is the time to redesign the wiring for an alternator.

[mylittletony]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Hi again,

sorry once more for a long delay! There has been quite a bit of beavering in the background, mainly painting panels. An exhaust has been fashioned, all remaining brackets removed and painted, the rad removed for recoring and the wiring has been roughly routed and today was a day of assembly!!

The panels are on and now we're ready to connect electrical items and finalise the routing. It's been tucked away so work can commence on the next project (peeking in the last pic!), so you'll have to make do with these pics:







Final straight now!

[dcunn]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Lookin' good

[mylittletony]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

I know the paint finish leaves a little to be desired, unfortunately the need to keep up momentum was greater to maintain enthusiasm. I'll be looking to remove the panels and even out the paint in the future.

Can anyone show how their headlights are mounted? We have holes in the wings, but they seem unstable already without extra weight being added. Is there a tie bar, or any bracing to the chassis?

Many thanks

Tony

p.s. dash is a template at the moment, will be aluminium once the layout is finalised.

[b_caswell]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

The easy way would be to get one of these from Mike Garner but I am sure you are on a budget so perhaps find a find a second hand bar or make one in your workshop..............Originally on your car there was two small GRP mouldings bolted to the inner wing these held the headlamp unit but then an alloy bar was introduced that mounted across the two small mouldings and the headlamps mounted on that. .............. Can't find a picture at the moment sorry

[dcunn]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

The green and red cars are as the earlier cars were built...a flat bar/tube section across f/glass moulded bits.
The black car shows the later method, probably the easiest way for you with bars as in Ben's pic.

[b_caswell]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

The other thing you could do to make the front wings more rigid is to do away with the bent bar bracket halfway back and make a hockey stick type bracket(like the MK2 cars) that mounts on the front of the Triumph suspension tower using the upper wishbone pivot bolt that will need a longer one and drilling a second bolt hole lower down. The top of the bracket bolts up to the top of the wing. You may need to bend it a little to avoid the side light unit.

[mylittletony]

Re: Early Triumph roadster - questions

Thanks for the pics, very helpful information as always. I've sourced a bar as per Ben's picture, this seems the best solution all round, especially considering the extra mouldings are missing! We are starting to wonder whether it's even been driven as the wings would have lasted all of 5 minutes...

... the bent bar bracket halfway back ...

errrrm, we don't have these!! No wonder they're wobbly!

...and make a hockey stick type bracket(like the MK2 cars) that mounts on the front of the Triumph suspension tower using the upper wishbone pivot bolt that will need a longer one and drilling a second bolt hole lower down. The top of the bracket bolts up to the top of the wing. You may need to bend it a little to avoid the side light unit.

I might have a crack at this too, I think my preferred option is to go to cycle wings, but the teacher is concerned about experimenting on the car.