> Date: Tue, 13 Oct 92
> From: paulg@cme.nist.gov
> To: british-cars@autox.team.net
> Subject: Weekend LBC sightings
The continued warm weather seems to be extending the LBC driving season
everywhere. Sunday while traveling north on I 680 from San Jose towards
Sacramento I spotted what appeared to my untrained eyes to be an XK120
Coupe heading the same way; sort of. At the time it was smoking rather
badly and was exiting 680. A bit later on I saw another XK120/140(?)
roadster on a trailer also going north. I'm guessing they were both
heading for Sears Point. The Trailered Jag had an SCCA sticker on it.
Perhaps there was some Vintage racing going on this weekend.
On the reptilian front: I only had about an hour to spare for the snake
this weekend but I did manage to install new plugs, the last step in my
new electricals replacement plan. The new plugs had no effect
whatsoever on the erratic running problem I've been trying to track
down. About all I was able to accomplish was to reconfirm that the
problem is related to temperature in some way. Everything was fine
until the engine warmed up. Two possibilities exist in my mine at the
moment: 1) since the engine is running with full choke cold, it's
somehow related to carb mixture. 2) some electrical connection (or
component) deteriorates with temperature. About all I had time to try
was to change the idle mixture adjustment on the carb. Increasing the
richness helped but didn't eliminate the problem. Of course, this
could have somehow been masking an electrical problem.
When the problem occurs, the engine doesn't just run crummy, it
completely cuts out briefly. To me, this seems like either complete
fuel starvation or loss of spark, not just poor mixture or a weak spark.
Hopefully this weekend I'll have the time to nail this problem down. On
the mixture side, I'm going to force the choke closed after the engine
has warmed up. This a is quick and easy test to try. My guess is that
the problem will still be there to some degree.
Roland Dudley
cobra@hpcdcsn.cdc.hp.com
CSX2282
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