Triumph Spitfire Engine Rebuild #20 - Auxiliaries

Sorry for the long delay again. That time of the year for baseball, bike rides and the rest. Just wish I could enjoy the weather with the top down!

Not a whole lot to this post as most of everything was just bolting stuff up with the proper torque. The one somewhat complicated installation was the distributor. The distributor drive gear end float is important to get right to allow the distributor some "wiggle room" so that is it not hard down on the camshaft gear that drives it. The end float is set with one or more gaskets that go between the block mounting point and the pedestal for the distributor. The workshop manual is clear and spells out how to do this.

Essentially, you obtain a plain washer of a size that will fit in the distributor mounting hole and with an internal diameter that will accept the distributor drive gear. A measurement of the washer's thickness is then made and recorded.

Left over washer from my differential bushing installation. 1.75mm (metric was easier for the math).

With this value know, the washer is set in the distributor mounting hole on the bush.

Washer down in the hole. Again, the distributor bush is installed (I never removed it).

Then, the distributor drive gear and the distributor pedestal (the distributor itself is removed) are installed. Now, using one or more feeler gauges (I had to use three), the gap between the block and the distributor pedestal is measured.

The gap with the washer installed was 1.86 mm. With the washer's thickness at 1.75 mm, the math results in a gap of -0.11 mm (1.75 mm - 1.86 mm). The end float specification is 0.076 mm to 0.178 mm. Since my gap was a negative result, I needed some gasket material to make up the negative and then provide up the the required specification. Therefore, shooting for the middle, I needed gasket material of 0.23 mm (0.l20 mm required plus the 0.11 mm to make up for) to provide the required end float.

My gasket kit came with two gaskets for the distributor that were both too thick. Since this area isn't exposed to any significant oil or oil pressure, the gasket acts more as packing than it acts as gasket. So, I traced and cut a regular grocery paper bag to get my required thickness.

I verified that the motor was still with #1 piston at TDC and installed the distributor drive gear. The motor needs to be rotated a bit to get the drive gear to mesh with both the camshaft and the oil pump, but when it does the gear drops into place. I then dropped in the distributor, ensuring that the rotor lined up with #1 piston per the workshop manual.

Proper orientation of the drive gear for #1 piston at TDC. This pic was take a while after I did this the first time, hence the oil filter.

Orientation of the distributor drive gear from the workshop manual.

With that, I set the distributor into place. I didn't apply Gasgacinch at this point, however, since I need to pull the distributor back out at a future date to allow me to prime the oil pump (more on that in a future post!).

Distributor installed.

Next up was the fuel pump. I had already rebuilt this so it was as simple matter of bolting it up. Not too complicated.

Fuel pump installed. The top is in the wrong orientation as was adjusted for installing the fuel pipes.

After that is was the water pump and water return pipe from the back of the block to the back of the water pump housing.

Water pump, housing and thermostat all installed.

Water return pipe using a compression fitting (a brass olive is used) where it attaches to the water pump housing.

Then the generator was bolted up. Again, just a straight-forward bolt up and belt tension adjustment.

Generator installed.

Other side, showing water return pipe.

That was about as much as I could get bolted up with the motor still on the stand, so it was time to put it on the hoist and get it on the chassis.

I pulled the valve cover to prevent scratching it, tightened down the generator bracket since it provides an engine lifting eye, and transferred the motor to the hoist. Once it was hanging in the air, I bolted up the rear engine plate.

Suspended, rear engine plate installed.

With that, I landed the motor.

Touchdown!

Other side. The rear of the motor is supported by a jack stand and the mounts are snug, but not tight.

I next installed the "new" flywheel that accepts the diaphragm clutch and bolted it down and bent over the lock tabs. I put a breaker bar on the crankshaft pully nut and rotate the motor until the breaker bar contacted the frame, preventing further motor rotation. I could then tighten down the flywheel bolts to the proper torque.

Locking tabs bent over. They've seen better days, so I put a bit of Loctite Blue on each bolt as well.

Finally, it was the starter's turn. There are shims that are installed between the starter and the rear engine plate to better align the starter pinion gear with the flywheel. There were no shims when I removed the starter originally so I wanted to see how it lined up. Looking at it, I felt one shim was required, so I fabricated one out of some welding steel and fitted it.

Trace of large aluminum spacer from the starter.

Ugly fabrication.

Mostly cleaned up and primed.

After fitting the starter, I got the gearbox installed, which was a simple bolt up after installing and aligning the clutch. Seriously deficient in pictures there.

Starting to look like a real car!

Next up will be another hodge-podge: radiator, prop shaft and probably a few other things!