The Girl's Ke70

[altezzaclub]

.and here is how to swap the rear shoes when one wears faster than the other. The 3.9 is definately taller around town, I cruise in third too much! I think I'll keep my eye out for a 4.1 and try that too, maybe have a diff for around town and another for trips away! I can't say I've noticed any difference from a wider rear track, but that will only show up on the next trip North I expect, through the mountain passes around Kandos.

 

http://www.rollaclub.com/board/topic/65762-how-to-replace-rear-drum-brake-shoes/

[altezzaclub]

Well, its been a few years with many experiments, and now I can see what has worked and what hasn't.

 

With the drama on the orange rally last weekend (How not to build a rally car) the exhaust started sounding like a tractor.. I thought the special stage work with a loaded car had torn the pipe off the extractors, or the extractors had been cracked at the head. But no, something I've never seen, they were acturally melted out of shape and when cool one pipe had cracked.

 

I don't knowe how long they have been mis-shapen, with the fibreglass wrap on you can't tell, but I do remember they got red-hot coming up out of Bathurst way back in the early days when we bought the rich needles. The Girl was flat-out going up the hills when I said to pull over to swap needles, and as I opend the bonnet at dusk the pipes were glowing pnk.

 

So I assume my lean running up to Walcha and back has had them red-hot much of the time, the metal is heat-spalled over quite an area.

 

Anyway, a 6km walk downtown and back carrying a set of extractors, and a $20 donation to the welder's beer fund means they should work.

 

Other problems-

Two of the diamond-shaped insulators I cut out of a sheet of plastic have broken, I assume they got brittle and the gasket paper half-stuck to the inlet manifold and half to the carb. I'll need new paper gaskets too.

 

The throttle cable is frayed where it comes out of the outer cable- I folded the carbs back over on themselves when I took them off, which certainly didn't help.

 

The rack boot on the passenger's side is split on top, not something you can see without taking off the exhaust.

and I already knew the Corona LCA balljoints were worn so Id better get them done too.

 

I'll toss up a separate topic on heat-wrapping extractors-

 

http://www.rollaclub...ors-or-headers/

[altezzaclub]

I thought about replacing the little diamond-shape insulators with thiicker plastic, but they were Lexan and my replacement piece was a lower melting point Perspex so I did away with them altogether.

 

The new version starter motor heatshield took the form of a polished stainless steel sheet bolted to Hardiplank and hung on the extractors with stainless wire.

 

This sits hard against the bellhousing at one end and will reflect the heat away from the motor. I re-wrapped the extractors at the top where they were still painted blue, that will stop some of the heat going up through my alloy heatshield and into the carbs.

[altezzaclub]

.....aaaannd.... bloody thing was no different!

 

A week without wheels, cracked knuckles and bleeding hands in a freezing garage, and it still sounds like a tractor. Had a cup of tea and dragged myself back in there to strip it again. This time I got a floodlight and checked everything vert carefully.

 

Well, the shadow is not a shadow, its a bit of pipe missing! I thought it was a bit too noisy for a cracked piece. Anyway, they are beyond even Woolshed-Spec repairs!

 

So, $215 for extractors they said, a new pair will be ordered on Monday. Then the big question about the oxy sensors, a difficult mod without a car to run around town while I buy and drill and have welded... Maybe I'll just run the SUs as they are for a while, I know they behave the same.

[carbonboy]

After discovering something like that, I'd be having a cup of something a little stronger than tea, but each to their own. :)

 

Could that be a fault from when the headers were manufactured, a dodgy weld falling apart over time from heat cycling?

[luk3333]

I have the same headers as you.. :/ that doesn't bode well. Do you think having the heat wrap on there accelerated the headers failing?

[altezzaclub]

Yep-

 

They looked fine earlier on, and when I bought them they were 2nd-hand but not very used. I think where the four pipes all run paralell the heat-wrap goes right around all of them, so it trapped the heat and they heated each other up. Where the pipes are wrapped singly up at the head they can get the heat down the pipe and away, so they were still painted up there.

 

I run the car leaner than most people do, and a lean burn is a hot burn, so I don't think anyone else will have this problem. I suppose it might be a lesson for people who fit a carb and never get it jetted correctly, or fit a 4AGE and don't get the injection right. The car ran fine at those mixtures, it would climb hills at 19:1 until I go the boot down a bit when it dropped back to 14.7.

 

I'll put a webcam in there with the next ones, see how red-hot they get! The new ones are ordered, I hope to be fitting them on Thursday and be back on the road.

[altezzaclub]

Done! New headers, holes drilled, 18mm nuts bought & welded on, and we have them fitted with the oxy sensors. Final job was to take the resonator down to the exhaust shop and have them cut 'n weld the end 50mm on, as it had rubbed thin when it rode on the overlap on the extractors.

 

So then I was back to where I should've been two weeks before! I pulled the LCAs out and fitted new LCA ball joints, and the 'how to do it' is here-

 

http://www.rollaclub...lca-balljoints/

 

I saw a couple of other jobs that need doing under there too, but this week I want to just run it and check it before Uni holidays start and The Girl wants it. I expect to be up in Armidale to give it to her and I'll stay on at Walcha building the rally car. With a bit of luck I'll have the webcam on my ancient laptop and can watch the extractors under the bonnet!

Edited August 26, 2013 by altezzaclub

[It's_AUDM_Yo]

Man I love the detail and thought you put in to all your stuff.

 

Especially the two oxy sensor's I always wondered why more people haven't thought of/ can't be bothered to do it.

[altezzaclub]

Well, nothing on the car really, except another couple of thousand Km up to work on the rally car and visit my bro in Coolies. That's 5 full tanks and it went like this.

 

Black dots, Orange- Tamworth on United's 95octane E10 7.5L/100

Red dots Tamworth- Casino on Caltex 95 7.5L/100

Yellow dots Casino-Coolangatta and back on Matilda 95 E10 7.1L/100

Green dots Casino down to Walcha on United's 95E10 8.6L/100

Black dots Walcha- Orange on caltex 98 7.2L/100

 

So there's not much in it, I reckon the bad run from Casino down was the massive headwind that day and I was going more the 110kph than the 100. They're all about 500km, so a good day's drive.

 

I took the air inlet off and the flap while watching the mixture going up, so a few tanks have gone through without it and it seems to make no difference. The reason for it really lies in hot summer days at low speeds.

 

I'll put a new pinion oil seal in the 4.1 T-series I now have and try that next. I'm only home for two days then back up to Queensland, Kingaroy for some work on a rental house, over to Coolangatta and down to Armidale to drop the girl at UNE, then home again.

[altezzaclub]

Well, that went fine, another couple of thousand Km added at 100kph in the boring bits and lots of fun in the Great Dividing Range.

 

Again the fuel was similar, under 7L/100 for the straight bits and around 7.0 to 7.5 for more fun. Both boring bits were on non-ethanol 95 or 98, and maybe it helps a little. I did notice that when we changed from Caltex 95 to United's 95+ethanol it immediately picked up a lean hunt that I had to richen a fraction to get rid of. The oxy sensors went from just showing "L" at cruise to 18-20, but its not a good comparison when one is a road full of 25-65kph corners in winding mountain forests!

 

Orange-Armidale 560km of 50:50 winding and open 7.9L/100 on United 95

Armidale- Kingaroy 590km of staightish road 6.6L/100 on local 98. (probably Caltex)

Kingaroy-Casino 460km of straightish road 6.7L/100 on Caltex 95

Casino-Tamworth 400km of winding road 7.4L/100 on United 95

Tamworth- Orange 430Km of winding and open 7.2L/100 on United 95.

 

We always use less coming back from Tamworth to Orange than going North... very odd.

 

Anyway, I taped the webcam under the bonnet and ran the laptop as The Girl drove for a while, taking single shots and movies as she went up hills. With the sunshine on the road you can easily see the extractors, but when in shadow you can see the pipes glow. I had to lighten that photo so it looks grainy.

 

So, is this standard for cars with extractors?? Would anyone else like to try with a webcam??

[luk3333]

Maybe its because of the heat wrap at the top and the heat shields, and then when the four runners come together there is very little space for heat to dissipate?

[altezzaclub]

when the four runners come together there is very little space for heat to dissipate?

 

That is certainly where the last ones melted under the wrap Luke, each pipe heating up the one beside it.

 

These one's I'll watch for the paint suffering, they seem fine so far. I thought the last ones failed from 100kph lean runs up hills, but actually hauling a big load slowly up forest tracks at full throttle in 2nd gear was probably much worse for them.

[altezzaclub]

Tyre time... having put a rock through the sidewall of a Bridgestone Turanza, I figured I'd replace the pair. I fitted a pair of Bridgestones and a pair of Falken Sinceras at the same time back in 2010-2011 or so, I figure about 50,000km ago. They are worn the same amount, which agrees with their completely swappable handling! Putting either set on front or back doesn't alter the handling at all. They've only got a couple of mm left before they hit the wear marks anyway,

 

They were 175/70 x 13, and seeing there is a great lack of decent sports 13" tyres I thought I'd try a Maxxis UA603 as they come in 175/60 profile. They're $125 a hit compared to $90 odd for the others back when. This will drop the 3.9 diff ratio down to about 4.1 when on the back.

 

The plan is to run them up to Walcha on the back and check what they do for fuel economy, then swap them to the front for the trip back and see what they do for handling. The longer plan is to replace the Falkens when they wear out with a pair from the wrecker early next year to run all four out together, then decide if we want 14" or not. I figure a lower profile with an aggressive tread and better grip won't last as long as the old ones. By then I will have decided on which diff to use too.

Edited September 20, 2013 by altezzaclub

[altezzaclub]

...aaand, its a daily from yesterday... The wife got up at 6.30am & said "there's a problem in the driveway.." I checked, and NO PINTARA! Somebody stole her White Whale and it was already burning as we phoned the cops. Some scum stole the tools from the electrician's ute across the road and used her wagon to take them back home, then torched the wagon.

 

Anyway, the smaller tyres do make the KE70 more sprightly around town again, as we've now found out!