Ian Macquarie

Tyrone, Yes, a crossflow - I'm planning on fitting a Pace 5 port, so direct driven. Pictures would be very helpful - I'll blatmail you my email address. Norman, Thanks, I know that in principle the filter can go anywhere (though in my case the space in front of the drivers footwell is reserved for the tank), I'm just trying to make sure that I end up with a neat solution that still preserves some access to other parts and shortish pipe length. I also need to get to grips with which filter head and fittings to buy (there a bit expensive to just buy a selection and see what I use!) Graham, Thanks for the warning about getting the pipes the correct way round. I'm being a little slow here - by upright do you mean with the filter acxis vertical? How do you prevent the rack getting covered in oil at change time?

Does anyone have links to pictures of an x/flow dry sump installation? I'm particularly interested in the positioning / piping of the remote filter and how the pump has been piped to avoid the steering column. Thanks Ian

Thanks Brent, I thought he was wrong - but as I initiated the contact to ask for his technical advice about oil cooling, I started to doubt myself. Ian

Pooh_R, Thanks, struggled a bit with the URL. That's how I thought it worked. He said the opposite. The worrying part is that I'd phoned him up to ask technical questions about his oil/water heat exchange product - How much weight do you think I should give to anything else he told me? Ian

I have just been talking to someone who asserted that:- "hot water goes from the engine into the bottom of the radiator and then comes out of the top of the radiator cool and then back into the engine" I expressed surprise to which he replied that most people get it wrong - Old systems without a pump went the other way (ie hot at top cool at bottom) but modern ones with a pump were as above. Who's got it wrong him or me? (I'm sure my xflow system is hot at the top and cool at the bottom.) Ian

pjh, "Its is plumbed into the radiator top hose " Does this mean it's a laminova type of oil/water heat exchanger? (or is it the older tube type of Mocal oil /water heat exchanger? Ian

pjh, Where was your oil cooler placed in the system? In the scavenge return or in the pressure feed to the engine? Tryone, Do you have an oil cooler? If so what and where as above? I think I'm going dry sumped and have been debating with myself as to which is the best place to put a laminova. Thanks Ian

"What is the HCS engine? Ford's designations are confusing at the best of times, but I've not even heard of HCS." Someone else can probably describe it better than this but it is the last evolution of the crossflow available in 1100 and 1300cc only and with a block designed to have a coil pack mounted where the distributor should be. - Used in fiesta's about '89 to 90? "What length are the leads as well? I want to mount the coil pack on top of the passenger footwell rather than making a bracket up to suit a crossflow and most leads are too short to reach." In reverse order, the leads will just about reach my coilpack mounted at the back of the head above the gearbox. They wouldn't reach either of the footwells. Ian

Thanks Dave, I know that they are pretty similar, from pictures it looks as though the orientation of the scavenge ports are slightly different (the pace being more "horizontal") I wondered whether this gave clearance issues with the Caterham "dry sump" engine mount. Also as I understand it there are clearance issues between some (one?) of the ports and the steering column. I wondered if the slight differences between the pumps made one easier to fit than the other. (Mind you as I've only seen pictures, there may be less difference than it looks.) Ian

Not sure exactly which pack this is but if it is the one from a Zetec, it was also fitted to HCS engines as in later fiestas. I used leads from a fiesta - the plug end is more suitable than the Zetec ones. The coil pack will fire 1&4 together and 2&3 together. You do not need to swop the leads, however in my installation it was convenient to use the numbered HT leads in different positions. As long as you connect coil terminal 1 to plug 1 or 4, coil 2 to plug 2 or 3, coil 3 to plug 2 or 3 and coil 4 to plug 1 or 4 you should be OK. Ian

Are there any subtle differences in the pump size, or positioning of the ports, which makes one or other of the above 5 port pumps easier to fit? The pumps look slightly different but without having both to hand it is difficult to judge whether one has advantages over the other. As a secondary question, is one better than the other in operation? Thanks Ian

Paul, Details of the mod would be very welcome. Thanks Ian

I know that the Caterham recommendation for the SuperSprint is B8ECS. I use these and have been quite happy with them. My engine is fuel injected and I note from other threads that resistor plugs are preferred in this situation. This started me on a hunt for an equivalent resistor plug (I now know that you can get a BR8ECS) Before I found that out I noticed that there are other recommendations for crossflow plugs and wondered what the advantages / disadvantages were. BR8ECS Resistor equivalent of Caterham recommendation - plug with short angled ground electrode. BPR8ES Burton recommendation – projected nose. BR8EIX NGK recommendation – iridium tipped plug. The “standard” fitment for standard crossflows would seem to be the projected nose style. Does anybody know why Caterham recommend the short electrode? (Come to that, Roger King seems to be of the same opinion - a quote from an earlier thread …”But they must be B8ECS specifically and not any other type of 8.”) Are there any advantages to using the iridium tipped plugs suggested by NGK in an email reply to a query to the technical link on their website? Is anybody aware of any back to back testing that has been done on 1700 supersprint spec engines with different plug types on a rolling road or dyno? Thanks Ian

I'm also interested in the answer to this question. Whilst they may be all basically the same, are there any subtle differences in the port positions that make some easier to use than others in the Caterham? I have seen an old Minister one that had one of the ports angled at 45° upwards. As there is a problem with clearance to the steering colunm that would be useful. Ian

I don't think so. I thought all the figures in the advance section of the .fig file were double the actual advance. The start up value is only for start up and does not affect the advance when running. In your example I would expect cranking advance to be 8 deg and the running advance to be 20 15 11 3 6 10 15 20 ......50 That may look a bit odd but I suspect the 3 and 6 are an attempt to achieve idle. Ian

I've gone the x/flow to injection route. My solution was to fit the caterham injection tank, pump, filter and fuel line. Between fitting the tank etc. and the actual change over to injection, I ran the car on carbs. The tank connection that will be the return for the FI is in the same place as the outlet on a carb tank. This inlet/outlet can be used as a suction line for a carb system - I ran my car like that for several months whilst I was waiting for the M3DK to be available. Ian

It looks like the connector that was fitted to accept the lucas electronic ignition module that was fitted to Xflow cars around 1990 - Does that make any sense? Ian

Back to the original question. On a 1990 DeDion Xflow One thick wire goes from Battery to alternator. The other one goes from alternator to the rest of the loom. The thin wire adjacent to the thick ones is the ignition light. The separate thin wire goes from the alternator to the battery. It would seem to have no purpose as it is electrically connected to the same point on the alternator as the two thick brown wires. On my car it broke on several occasions with no apparant effect on anything. Ian Edited by - ian macquarie on 17 Sep 2002 17:25:59

Steve, I have a 1990 deDion, so am not familiar with the live axle set up. My "A" frame is two separate links with no cross member. Under braking (and to a lesser extent acceleration) the base of the A frame wants to change width. When I had a clonk (under braking) it was due to the pressed in bush at the base of the A frame moving in the tube. I hope that makes some kind of sense. Ian

This was an attempt to get the spacing better - it didn't work! how do I get a "table" effect here? Edited by - Ian Macquarie on 19 Jul 2002 08:33:35

JAG, Thanks for the info on piston sizes. I don’t follow your point about brake balance though – I had it as follows: Caliper Dia Total piston area Sierra rear 43 1452 M14 48 1810 Alcon front 38.1 & 34.9 2096 AP front 41.3 & 38.1 2480 I took this to give Front/rear splits of braking force (or at least force on the brake pads) to be as follows M14 / Sierra 55% / 45% Alcon / Sierra 59% / 41% AP / Sierra 63% / 37% This would mean that either of the upgrades would move the balance to more braking at the front and reduce the likelihood of locking the rears first. Is this correct or have I made some errors somewhere? Ian

Thanks Phil, that's the same info as I have (from James Whiting's site. What I was trying to find was the data for the other calipers and pistons so that I can make an informed judgement of the likely changes in brake balance / effort required with different caliper / master cylinder combinations. Whilst we are at it would someone like to confirm (or otherwise) that the master cylinder bores are.... Standard 5/8" Uprated 13/16" Ian

What diameter are the pistons in the standard brake calipers? Front Girling type 14? Rear Ford Sierra? and while we are at it the Caterham uprated rear? Thanks Ian

Thanks James, So on your figures I should expect a 4 mm drop ground clearance going from 195/50 15s to 185/70 13s, everything else being left as it is. Is this other peoples experience? Ian

I've read most of the past threads about wheel and tyre sizes and come to the conclusion that most seem to reccommend a change from my current 15" michelins to 13" somethings (probably AO21s as most of my driving is on the road). I still have a few questions I'd like to ask. 1. George Polley and DT each has a list of Yokohama tyre sizes for AO21-R which would seem to imply that the optimum wheel width is 5.5" - why does everyone (including Caterham) seem to suggest using 6" rims? 2. The rolling circumference is less than pi X diameter (For a 185/70R13 it is 1790, diameter is given as 587, piX587 = 1844) I presume that this is due to the fact that the tyre is squashed under load. If I want to see the effect on ride height, is it reasonable to calculate "rolling radius" as rolling circ divide by two pi and then comparing for different tyres or is it not as simple as that? 3. AO21Rs are listed as competition tyres. Are there any issues with using them on the road - either with police or insurance companies in the event of an accident? Ian