[TR] 50 Worst cars of all time?

[Randall]

> There is nothing inherently wrong with the Stag engine or its 
> design for the time. 

I'm sorry, John, but I have to respectfully disagree.  The location of the
water pump, for example, was simply inexcusable.  Clamping the cylinder head
with not only a mixture of lengths of fasteners (thereby ensuring unequal
stress during thermal cycles and encouraging warpage), but putting them at
angles to each other was another brain-dead decision.  Running the camshafts
directly in the head (no bearing inserts) was a mistake that should have
been learned 20 years earlier (when inserts were added to the Vanguard
engine).

The tight clearance around the head studs (which absolutely invites having
the steel studs locked into the alloy heads by corrosion) is another
mistake; not to mention the almost complete lack of allowances for rework.

And mind you, this was some 5 years after GM's alloy V8 design, which has
been so immensely successful that production of them only recently stopped,
some 40 years after the design was completed.

The Stag motor (and it's kindred) I believe also stand out as the only
"interference" design that Triumph produced, which seems particularly silly
when the camshafts are driven with bicycle chain!  My 90cc Yamaha motorcycle
literally had a stronger drive chain than the Stag's timing chain (and much
easier to both check and replace).

Honestly, my take is that the engineers who produced the Stag design were so
disgusted at being told to work with those ### Swedes that they deliberately
sabotaged it.

By comparison, the gearbox was a work of art! <G>

-- Randall