legerra bites dust

[Dave Adams]

On my way home.....danny driving got as far as cambridge and head gasket went loads of white smoke......
up to then danny said it was a pleasure to drive.....up to then.

[Dave Adams]

Anyone got a spare mk2 escort ignition lock and key? mine is FUBAR.

[Adrian Southgate]

Aaaaand another thing... Check the plastic insulator is present between the manifold and the carb base. Its whole reason for being is to stop the carb body heating to a point where the fuel evaporates. Check also you don't have a pipe draining fuel from the carb bowl. Different versions have different pipes and internal plumbing, Yours should be a single inlet unless its fitted with an over pressure return valve thingy which bleeds fuel back to the tank if the float bowl overfills. Mine has this arrangement and I made a join out of copper/nickel pipe which allows the overflow to feed back into the non pressurised part before the filter so it gets pulled back up through the fuel pump. Another one of those little documented tweaks that get done and then forgotten or just assumed that everybody would have one. If that overflow pipe is blocked off then the bowl level will vary and may even airlock.

[Adrian Southgate]

This would also fit cars with the holes already cut in the bumper as they would also open into the void space / collector area.

[Adrian Southgate]

I've thought about it from time to time but still think the answer lies in internal ducting, something i'm currently working on. If I take a mould of the ducting once finished we could pass it round and replicate our own. It will have to be in two or three parts so the completed unit can be trimmed to fit each cars internal bumper / radiator arrangements. I'm not into commercial productiion so you would each have to make your own. I use the nearside upper opening to force air into the heater system via a pipe up the underside of the inner wing, round the outside of the shock and then down to the factory moulded heater opening. The new internal mouldings would use the lower three apetures to duct air in a void in front of the radiator. This could in turn have a moulded collector fitted so you would then just have to trim and join up the bits on the inside of the existing bumper, eventually moulding them in.

[James Doulton]

Ade, do you think that we need some extra air holes in the front of our cars, like Richard's and Daryl's have? Mine was difficult to start this morning and I think it was just that the fuel had evaporated out of the carb after I parked it in the garage on Friday night when the engine was hot. It just took lots of turning over and then it was fine.

Maybe something like this...

[Adrian Southgate]

Its not just freshly bought ones, mine had a boiling paddy on the way to work this morning, made me late for work.

Needle was just over halfway up the dial when the civic pressure cap started spitting. Guess I need a new pressure cap, (lets hope its that simple)

[James Doulton]

You might just check that the inlet manifold is on properly and tight because that was what was wrong with mine when I had clouds of white smoke and very bad running. I heard that it is quite common for them to work loose.

It seems that I was rather lucky with mine, in that I drove it back 120 miles with only electrical failures ... until the next day.

Presumably Danny was getting quite hot in the car with the hood on, oh no, I remember - it has a sun roof too!

[Dave Adams]

Yup

[Adrian Southgate]

So Dave, AA to the rescue?