altezzaclub

So... do you reckon the cage added 50% more weight? We looked over a gent's immaculate Stanza at yesterday's rally, and he said its done 61rallies in the umpteen years he been driving it! I couldn't believe it, everything was just so neat and clean and straight and tidy and ... like yours and the opposite to ours! Those extinguishers in? I moved one of ours to under the navigator's knees so we can always access at least one, front or rear.

Naturally they couldn't excape without some garden work, I needed a bean frame pipe welded. After the usual arguments about who was the best welder, it was shared! Then into the Slowdeo and a 550km drive up to Walcha. Meanwhile, I'm in for a quiet afternoon in the garden and an early night! ... then the plans for going faster start!

Well, that wasn't too bad.. Pete couldn't come as he was feeling crook, so he'd loaned us his Slowdeo and a mate of Steve's came to do service. Up at 5am Saturday to drive the 300Km to Tumut, arrived in time to catch half the driver's briefing, and straight into the hot seat. Seeing he hadn't driven it since rolling it in May he was taking it easy, a good idea as it was a high-speed blast around wide smooth roads in the mountain forests. Sadly not suited to The Big Girl, flatout in 5th is not her scene. Still, Steve ran around 16th for most of it, then the terratrip died halfway through a stage and there was still another stage to refuel. We couldn't find anything wrong with either probe and put it down to overheating, and sure enough it was working again for the next stage. It dropped him to 19th there but he finished at 14th overall, with not a mark on the car. Amazing really, all that wiring and rebuilding worked perfectly! We had a beer afterwards and grabbed the results, then I hauled the Slowdeo back up to Orange and we hit the pit at about 1am. Took a 'roo on the way back, they are Aussies greatest road danger, but luckily the Boss' ute didn't get marked. Yet another new navigator, but this time he is really good. Josh has driven in motorsport as well as navigated before, so maybe now we can really get organised!

He was even allowed to take it for a paddock-bash before it went on the trailer. No Mothership this time, so we're rolling with a borrowed trailer and a borrowed ute... They headed off to scrutiny while the Girl's KE70 headed off to gate-opening duty for the big truck. ..and I'd better post this and make a move to Orange. We will see how tomorrow goes!

Well, travel day has arrived! Amazingly its as good as what we can get it in the time... The Big Girl may be battle-scarred and pretty rough, but she's a goer! The inside is just what I wanted, plain and simple, and lightweight.

Then we got distracted because Nell ran out of water in the farmhouse. She takes water from the high tank on the woolshed, beside the workshop. That only fills from the high roof, so the two tanks that fill from the main roof don't get used. We took her pump off the windmill well and pumped the water from the low tanks up onto the high roof and let it fill her tank. Nothing like a couple of radiator hoses to make things work, although the pump did suck the intake one flat! So by the late afternoon we had one door and one guard on, and in a stroke of genius I donated The Girl's dash-mat for this rally to make the dash look more civilised... Inside I had managed to get all the wiring AND the lights working, so we have an oil pressure gauge, a water temp gauge, (both are capillary direct-readings) ) an ammeter, an oil pressure/ water overtemp combined light and a charge light... information overload for a rally driver, they can't handle complicated things.... Today we finished the assembly, and although there is more I'd like to do, it has to be in Tamworth for scrutiny in the morning and in Orange by tomorrow night! I'll get pics before we load it....

Well, back up here almost a week now! Fought my way through the piles of KE70s all waiting to become paddock bashers and spent more hours on the re-wire. We have to leave tomorrow for a rally on saturday 850km away in Tumut, and yesterday morning it looked like this... We had just got the motor and box in on Tuesday, and fitted the bumper and spots. I needed the motor in to chase the instruments and find out if the highly modified wiring actually worked. The usual indicators/horn/wipers were all easy, but the engine stuff had changed. The first problem was that out temp gauge woldn't screw into the head, the probe was too long. We found a spacer in an odd place... That was cut down to a few mm and fitted. The gauge is an adjustable warning type, so it earths out a light and a buzzer at whatever temperature you pick. Inside I was proceeding at snail's pace, it was taking forever to re-route the stock wiring and modify relays and stuff to do new functions.

Yep! Most interesting.... I would reckon a 33 would out-perform a 28 too, but there is always more to it than just the size. Seeing we've been pumping water around the farm I'm thinking of a home-made engine dyno... it doesn't matter what it says in absolute terms, its just for comparisons exactly as you did.

That'd damm good power! What is the compression ratio? ..and the air/fuel ratios? I assume he had it jetted correctly. Wade list that cam as 295deg, which to me is a large duration, so it should haul at the top end with the Weber. The only thing I can think of is what your mechanic said, the extra air volume is going in at decreased velocity and not filling the cylinders efficiently. It will be interesting to see if the smaller chokes give more power. Do DCOE make more power.. probably not, but they look sexy and sound great, so everyone uses them! Richard here is using a 40DCOE with 33mm chokes on his 4K, but he's got no comparison except for the stock Aisan.

..and look carefully for other damage caused at the same time when someone drifted it into a kerb....

Well, bro 'n I went to Bathurst for the V8Supercars, then I ran him up to Coolangatta. The 60series tyres were on the back going up, but we went to Armidale via the flat inland road with a tailwind, so the trip up was 1000km at 6.8L/100. It was a little squirmy in the rear, but I wasn't sure if it was lack of grip or bump steer from more sticky tyres, certainly I expected the 60series to be better than the 70series. We swapped the wheels to big ones on the back and small ones on the front up there, and I went back to Armidale to fetch The Girl from Uni. This was a climb up through the twisties from sea level to a few thousand feet, and then we had a headwind back to Orange. The big tyres on the back dropped the revs, but turned in 7.7L/100km, all on United 95octane. The worst thing was the tyres! The 60series have worse grip than the 70's, so Maxxis are just not as good as cheap Falkens. The increase in understeer was quite noticeable. Still, they'll do while I decide what diff to use, 13" or 14" rims, which tyres to buy.

Auto box in gear?? or in neutral? The charge light suggests the alternator is not charging so the battery will run flat. You might fix that first. However the handbrake shouldn't affect the idle at all.

Points start off with two nice flat round surfaces, and slowly one side gets eaten away and the other side gets metal spark-deposited on it. The rubbing block also wears away so the gap gets smaller, which retards the spark timing. If the points have a volcano on one side and a hollow on the other, buy new ones and get a condensor at the same time. Fit them carefully and set them to 0.45mm gap. Put a touch of grease on the rotating cam so it lubes the rubbing block. Set the timing to 8-10deg, although they will take more than that. Once the ignition is fine, tackle the carb. Changing the timing will change the idle speed, so that might need a re-set before playing with the mixture.

They would if CO2 was important Only crazies own old Rollas Hey! -its the Socialists that are pushing global warming, us crazies are all Capitalists.

Bah! ABC! "Now that global warming is causing these fires in the Blue Mountains, what are you going to do to stop it Mr O'farrell..." Always spouting the official globalist propaganda as fact. Reed, I'd rather talk to your crazy conspiracy lady!

Interesting... Can you get the extra flow without the pressure going up? If you pump at a high enough pressure you can take the white metal off the bearings, not that I've ever seen that happen. Would you drill out some oilways to get more oil up to the cam or head?? All you might do is pump more oil out the pressure relief valve. Chat to Phil there, he had a 4K doing 9000rpm!

White or body colour or ANY DAMM COLOUR EXCEPT BLACK! So hard to do work in a black engine bay, especially in reduced light such as on the roadside in the evening!

Check the points gap, and if you change it you will have to reset the ignition timing again. Then use the idle speed screw to get it idling at what speed is comfortable, and finally screw the mixture in and out a 1/4 turn at a time to get it running smoothly at the maximum idle speed. You might have to reduce the idle speed on the idle screw again.

Have you got a wiring diagram Brad? There are some up on here, and that will show you what joins to what.

Not quite so bad in a KE70, but there is no room in the KE30/55. Richard has one on his KE30 and the socks are jammed up against the strut turret. The sideie will outperform the downdraught if you are really keen on performance, but in everyday driving I expect the d/d will be more economical. I can get the jet sizes he is using for you, although Insanity on here will know. Note- these guys don't pay for their own fuel.......

One of t\he big stores still makes rubber bushes as well as polyurethane if you don't want them too hard. I can't remember which it was, came up while I was searching the same as you.

...or maybe a thermostat, maybe a water pump, maybe a radiator flush, maybe a cleanout even.... When was the 5K last running and how was it then? ..and how was the radiator with your last engine? What fan is on it at the moment?

Spark plugs will not be the problem. Spark timing needs the correct points gap to start with. Then it is either with a timing light with the motor running to set it at 10deg at idle, so let the revs die and watch the timing mark around 1000rpm. ..or, take off the dizzy cap, turn the motor so the crank pulley timing mark is at 10deg, turn the ignition on (not to 'start', just to ignition lights) and loosen the dizzy locking bolt. Turn the dizzy a few degrees one way then the other until you see a spark jump as the points open. Maybe repeat it until you have it just as the spark jumps, then do up the locking bolt and put the cap back on. Now your timing is 10deg. If the timing is retarded, (less than 10deg ) it will make the idle slower. How is the fuel level in the window?

The petrol should be half-way up the little window. If it is above that, then ajust the needle & seat where petrol comes in to lower the level. Otherwise it runs rich and chokes the motor, so it dies on idle.

We took ours off to paint. The gutter trim rolls off starting underneath at one end and working it off by rolling it around upwards to the gutter side. Its easy to damage and not that keen to stick back on properly as taking it off stretches the metal slightly and it is just clamped on. The screen is held on by plastic clips, which we prised up and off. I think they're a keyhole so the trim slides up and then lifts off, but it was a while ago now to remember. You can stick that back on with a bit of silicon. The door chrome lifts straight up, also prone to bend if you're unlucky. You can mask over them if you're painting the same colour, a careful masking job is not noticeable.