[Healeys] Oil Changing Questions

[John Harper]

This may be of interest because it happened to me recently. I have high 
hydraulically lifting ramps and lifted the front of the 100 very high to 
work under the front.

When I looked underneath I could see  oil dripping from the cotter pin 
so assumed that engine oil was flowing from the sump, through the 
Archimedes screw and down the rear of the backplate. I quickly lowered 
the car a little and the dripping stopped after a while. Just as well 
that the cotter pin was a loose fit as intended.

This is not the end of the story. When I came to look inside the car I 
saw that steering gear oil had run back up the column and down the 
steering wheel. Fortunately I had a seat cover temporarily fitted.

So be warned you cannot raise the front of a 100 beyond a certain point.

Regards

>Regarding that little cotter-pin sticking through the hole in the bell
>housing -- hard to believe in today's world, but that is the best of British
>just-make-it-work engineering in the day. Starting at the back of the crank,
>what keeps the oil inside the engine, given that they didn't have a good way
>to seal a shaft spinning at up to 5,000 rpm, is a "reverse archimedes screw"
>which acts like a screw pump, constantly acting to throw oil passing out
>along the rear of the crankshaft back into the sump.

-- 
John Harper