Finished building a +.030 1275 out of two and installing it in my bugeye.
After getting everything hooked up, it wouldn't start. Checked everything
over at least 3 times. It seemed like an obvious timing problem. Even went
back in and removed and aligned the new timing chain again. Was using a
Leyland
Cars Workshop Manual for Sprite Marks II, III and IV & Midgets I, II and
III (15th Edition). For installing the distributor drive it has a drawing
and
says the slot should end up in approximately the two o'clock position. In
two places it says that the you should have "....the large offset uppermost".
The drawing also clearly shows the large offset in the upper position.
After many hair pulling sessions with a knowledgeable friend, a third friend
discovered that at TDC the valves for #4, not #1, cylinder were in the correct
firing position, thus the dizzy was 180 degrees off. As a quick check we
switched spark plug wires so that #4 was the new #1, etc. and it started
immediately. Did some initial tuning and it sounds really good. Will go in
and
change the dizzy drive later. ( Afterwards I checked a B.M.C. Workshop Manual
for the Mark I Sprite. They show an actual picture and, guess what, the
large
off-set is in the lower position. Their text only says to install it like
the picture.) Anybody know the author of the Leyland manual????????
Have one obvious problem, a good amount of oil leaking from both the front
and rear oil pan seals. In the rebuild I used a Payen gasket set with the
rubber type sump seals. Any suggestions to lesson this leaking?
Will need to go in and rebuild the bugeye differential in the future. Seems
like, with the 1275, a lower gear ratio than the 4.22 : 1 would make sense.
Can a lower ratio gear set be installed and what are some recommendations?
Thanks, John F.
p.s. Don't have enough hair left to go through many more of these sessions.
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