rkeywood

Just bear in mind that diagram is for the later live axles - IIRC the springs/dampers, ARB, and top wishbone(?) all differ post '95. The '88 manual is probably better for your car and does at least make reference to some of the pre '87 chassis differences. This doesn't give the rake and I'd have thought running over 1/2" between the points on the diagram would be a bit front heavy. Also, I'm not sure if the camber and caster are adjustable on a '96 car or if the figures given just for checking? The advice I got from Caterham when prepping my car for racing in the early '90s was 1/2" measured at F & R axles. The ride height for road use was based on 185/70x13 tyres so will be lower with 60s. For their race series Caterham specified a limit of 120mm at the lowest point on the chassis rail (with driver). If intending track use I'd go by the cornerweights with a front ride height between 120 and 130mm and no more than 55/45 F/R weight. The standard springs supplied on my car were, I think, 120 on the front and 75 on the rear fitted on awful Spax adjustable dampers. For the track the fronts were normally increased considerably - up to about 300lb - and the rears up to 140lb. I played with quite a few different springs (unfortunately on crap mandated dampers) when racing and settled at 280 F and 105 R finding the softer rear better for traction. I found this a bit stiff for the road and when I made the car a little less track focused a while back I went for 265 F and 90 R on Protech shocks. In hindsight I think should have gone for something softer on the front for the road and just swapped back to the stiffer springs if/when I go on the track. Hopefully others will jump in with their experience - I know Tazio (Alan) for example fitted 225 / 125 springs on his early car recently and it would be interesting to see what he thinks. Other things to think about, if not already done and will fit on an S2, might be a 5/8" ARB and the addition link that triangulates the front suspension, along with the 1deg (neg) camber wishbones.

About 1/2" would be the norm on a live axle S3 running standard spring rates. Caterham give the ride height at the front of the cockpit so if going from there it's a bit less than 1/2". On my car for track use it's 120mm front and 130mm rear (about 52/48 F/R weight) and for the road I put 1/2" on F & R (sorry for mixed units!)

BCS-automotive do a lot of modern and high end refurb'ing / refinishing with quick turnaround and might be worth a call as an alternative to Bigg Red. For exchange try Canley Classics as well - their refurb's I've seen have been decent. Wins are another who offered exchange. If there's any question whether your calipers are serviceable then go the Bigg Red route as at least they'll sleeve them, at additional cost of course, and you won't be left arguing about refund

The Bigg Red ones will be good. Does the quote include electroplated finish? If so, then the £20 extra is probably worth it. On the exchange ones check the finish being offered - some will clean and just blow over with clear varnish. Also check you're getting original calipers back not re-manufactured ones.

I think the ring gear might differ on the Kent engine. In any case I'd just get it refurb'd. I've had quite a few needing TLC over the years from both 7s and FFs and never had any that didn't come back good as new.

Engine running at about 80 deg C would be the norm. If there's a 'stat for an oil cooler that's usually 80 deg C. I'm assuming a road spec engine is wet sump with standard oil pump and filter. As standard you've only got the original pressure sensor tapping in the block to go off and I'd question the reliability of using this for electronic temp and pressure. Have you got an oil cooler? If not then the simplest way to get a reliable sensor point might be to change to a remote filter and put a mechanical sensor in the filter head, or maybe consider fitting a cooler if you're going to be spending a fair bit of time full beans. The standard Caterham early '90s cooler arrangement was a sandwich block (without a 'stat) between the pump and filter so you'll be able to fit a housing for a mechanical sensor in the cooler oil line. Also check if you have a 'stat fitted for the cooler. If a remote inline one is used then the housing just needs to be on the engine side but if it's a 'Thermoblock' in place of the standard sandwich block then it needs swapping to a remote one Hope this helps

I'm assuming that its a Girling Type 14 caliper (Spit Mk3), in which case you don't need to split. The Triumph workshop manual says DO NOT SPLIT but it's commonly done and easier to release the pistons and refit everything if you do. There's a small seal around the fluid hole between the halves that doesn't come in the repair kit but will almost certainly be serviceable or can be replaced if needed. Without an air line the easiest way is to give it a good dose of release fluid (Wurth Rost Off Ice works well) and work a pair of levers around the piston using the groove. Don't worry too much about damaging the end of the piston - they're only about £30 for 4 and worth replacing anyway. The repair kit only has the dust cover, retaining clips, piston seals, and bleed valve dust cap. You might want a pad fitting kit as well if you're doing a tidy job - this has the pins. shims and clips. Also the bleed valves are available separately. Rimmer Bros handily show everything here (although you might want to buy elsewhere). There's a couple of youtube guides showing rebuild of Type 12 calipers which is the same job. If you don't want to do them yourself then Rimmer and other Triumph specialist will no refurbs on an exchange basis or, as Alan says, send them to Bigg Red and get a lovely pair of electroplated gold calipers back :)

I'd go mechanical with a combined pressure / temp gauge and remote warning light - most crossflow track cars were like that in the early '90s when I changed mine. If you want to go with this then the temp sensor location depends on your setup. I have a dry sumped engine and use the sender connection on the remote oil filter head. What arrangement do you have for the pump / filter / oil 'stat / oil cooler? The pressure connection usually goes on the end of a tee piece in the block in place of the current sender with a separate pressure switch on the side connection wired to a dash warning light. An adjustable (0-50 psi) switch is handy. Think Auto looks like a good shout - the gauge looks like the Mocal one at a reasonable price with discount and it looks like they have everything else you need.

Are they the 'racing shims' Caterham supply that sit behind the washer to pack out the bush?

Should work out well. What springs do you use?

I run without a 'stat but with a restrictor plate fitted (711 block). My original 1989 Caterham engine had an 82 deg 'stat but that was a poor engine and ultimately unreliable when pushed so I wouldn't put much faith in what they did or say in assembly guides. A well respected FF engine builder put a new engine together fo me, fitted a plate instead of a thermostat and upped the water pump speed and it's run like that for 25 years including a lot of race use initially. The FF engines a friend and I had from other builders were also supplied like this. Hopefully Roger King will be along and bring some clarity (I believe he suggests a 74 deg 'stat with engine running at 80 deg)

Swap to Protech single adjustable? Without springs they'll probably not be much more than reburbishing the Bilsteins. I get on better with them than any of the other dampers I've used over the years. Mine came from ProComp who know a thing or two about building and setting up live axle (7 type) cars.

There's just enough space to split on later chassis but I've always pulled engine, box and prop together. Basically reverse of assembly instructions. Wiring prop to box and pushing a length of cordex into the bottom of the tunnel once the box is lifted off its mount helps things slide out. I've always found leaving the crane static and pushing the car away (with my foot) while lifting provides more control.

Most ignore the odd arrangement in the build manual and put it over the A frame. It then sweeps nicely to the axle.

The risk is leakage past the seals onto brakes. It sounds to me like you're at the level of the additional filler Caterham fitted.

I'd check the backspace / clearance. As said Caterham spec'd 19mm inset (negative offset) for 6" rims on live axle cars. However in changing to 7" rims with the same offset you'll increases the backspace by 1/2". The suggestion to use an ET 24 rim is probably to reduce this and give some of the clearance back but would increase the track marginally more. Incidentally why use 7"? That puts a lot of tyre on the road, assuming you'll be using 205s, and probably not good for F/R balance

1.8l down the breather is too much. I'd go back to the 1 litre to the plug and a pint down the breather. I've just looked at the oil left on the shelf and looks like I put about 1.6 litre in mine when last filled. A friend suggested, probably quite rightly, that I'm not waiting for the oil drain away from the axle tube and it settles a lot lower than the breather. He also reminded me that Caterham used to fit a second filler above the strengthening plate to allow overfill which would set a level just over half way up the axle. There's a later article in Low Flying (Nov 2017) which suggests not to overfill for road use only to avoid oil sitting in the axle tube all the time.

Reply to #8 TBH I've never measured how much I've used. I'd been racing with the diff for a couple years before the Sykes article was published - the advice I got from the axle builder was to get as much in as I could! Re-reading the article, the pint is the extra over I was thinking of. I'd see how much you can get in the fill hole, then put the extra pint in the breather and see what the total comes to and where the level is.

The quantity mentioned is the extra over the normal fill. That takes you pretty much to the breather - the normal way was to take the breather out and simply fill to there. I have the same setup as you and always done this without problem. Reply to #4 the Graham Sykes paper is in the Low Flying archive - March '93

Hopefully Chris will sort you out but if not the check the number stamped on the body, it's usually 3211.426. That's the body only and there should be a metal tab sandwiched between the reservoir and body with the master cylinder number, usually 4222-404. The cylinder was used on a bunch of Vauxhalls (eg Viva HC Firenza) and other '80s cars. Try Northwest or google should find some options. I've not seen the reservoir sold separately for a long while but that's 3251-789 and was used on quite few other bodies as well. There's also a couple of larger capacity variants of the reservoir that were used on the 3211 and other bodies that will fit. Lockheed catalogues can be found here Lockheed catalogues The usually Caterham period arrangement is Illustration 171 on Page 2497 Hope that helps

Surely the issue here is the assembler was unfamiliar with the need to modify the sandwich plate to allow easy sump removal in situ or was happy enough to pull the engine to remove the sump. The engine / gearbox assembly is the standard Ford arrangement designed for the Escort etc not the 7 and sump removable was pretty low on their priorities. If you do the job on an Escort you've got the chassis crossmember and steering rack to take off before thinking about the sump. The Ford sandwich plate is cut on one side as standard and the 'work around' to weld this cut and cut both sides to allow the bottom section to be removed has been around longer than CC who helpfully include the details in their build manual.

If you're sticking with an original steel sump then it needs a new gasket set. The original cork gaskets can seal OK as long as the sump is perfectly flat and not distorted, which it often is if the screws are over-tightened. The laminate gaskets (eg.laminate gasket ) are much better and I've always used these. The sump flange and block need to be thoroughly clean and I'd run a tap up the screw holes to make sure they're clean. You don't need sealant on either gasket type (if you use too much sealant on the laminate gasket it negates it 'self sealing' nature) but for ease of install I've always stuck the gasket to the sump with a thin smear of RTV (Wurth Super but any will do) and left overnight upsidedown on a flat surface with a heavy weight on top. Then fit without sealant on the block side and threadlock on a new set of screws torqued to 5 ft lbs initially and then 10 ft lbs final.

I think Graham has that CRB sorted but needs to swap the carrier as he's gone from a curly to straight finger plate. A chat with Mardi Gras may well help out with that

Hi Graham, You should be able to get a carrier / adaptor to suit that cover / bearing but that doesn't look like the right one - have another word with Burton. Interested to know how you get on with the Helix; are you planning to use the car on track? Robert

The original flat bottom ally baffled sump that Caterham supplied is not a great solution. The ground clearance is improved but being rectangular in section this leaves the edge very exposed to damage. I don't know if the later James Whiting / Jenvey alloy pans had a different section. At least with the steel sump it tends to be a glancing blow and the metal bends rather than fractures. Shallower baffled steel pans used to be available and a decent option if you can find one. Burton did one but no longer listed on their site. This was only just below the bellhousing - you needed a shortened pick up with it. I think the BG Automotive replacement pans were slightly shallower and are still available (but please check dimensions before buying). Also Vulcan Engines used to fabricate good shallow baffled steel pans so might be worth a try. Alternatively a decent fabricator should be able to repair yours and do similar. http://www.dwjenkins.plus.com/short-sump.htm is an example of the sort of thing.