Westfield

Steve I have an offer on it at the moment from Richard, just waiting his reply. If he does nor come back to me then it’s yours. Westy is next in line! Thanks all Tony

I have a rocker cover from a 1700 super sprint for sale. Its in excellent condition and comes complete with Allen bolts and an oil filler cap £35. this is the alloy cover with “1700 Super Sprint” cast into the top. Tony

I have seen this many times in the past on cars with this type of carburettor. Reliant Scimitars were also particularly prone to it! The most effective modification I have used is where the brass push in pipe is removed and a brass washer/collar soldered on whereby it can later be safety wired in place. I always allow the solder to “tin” the pipe so that it is a tighter fit as its bushed back into the carburettor. On the subject of fire extinguishers I never work on the car now following an incident in the garage a couple of years ago. I was doing some work on my Lancia Thema when I removed what I thought was a small water pipe. It turned out to be a fuel pipe under pressure. As I undid the clip and pulled on the pipe it came off and sprayed petrol under the bonnet and down the back of the engine. I had a small electric fire on the floor and as I turned around to switch this off, the petrol ignited. The results were frightening to say the least as flames engulfed the engine and set fire to the under bonnet material. By sheer luck I had always kept a small fire extinguisher on the back of the bench that I had acquired some 15 or more years previously. I had actually found it in the boot of a car in a scrap yard! Thank god it worked! Although after all that time it had very little pressure in it, but enough to extinguish the flames. What amazed me was the smoke in the garage from such a small fire. I actually thought the lights had fused; it went so dark so quickly. This was the first time in my life when I actually went into shock! Needless to say this prompted me to buy a decent couple of fire extinguishers that are kept in the garage and the kitchen…

Hi Dave I decided against the manifold from Richard because I brought the engine to go into a Westfield and I would not have fitted. He may still have it, have you contacted him? Regards Tony

I am just about to fit a 10 row oil cooler to my car. Do I mount it rigid or use some form of rubber mounting? How are they fitted to most cars? Thanks Tony

Hi Robert. I originally had a change light but found on a couple of occasions when going for it that I had passed the RPM limit by some margin. Glancing at the rev counter it was coming down, god knows where it had gone up to! In the end I fitted an Omex rev limiter, which has worked very well over the last couple of years. I chose it because : It allows the user to set the limit (some you have to tell the company and they set it…) It allows you to set it incrementally. IE factory set to 6000 RPM and then set by pressing buttons. Each press of the button increases the limit by 100 RPM. The advantage of this is a cross check to tell if the rev counter is accurate. It comes with hard and soft cut options. Soft cut is a little gentler on the crank! Hope this helps Tony

I have been using one of the Machine Mart blast cabinets for a couple of years now and would offer the following observations. As someone has already said you need a BIG compressor! Aluminium oxide works well on steel and alloy. Particularly effective is to blast parts with the oxide first and then follow up with the glass bead. This puts a nice sheen on the material., both alloy and steel. Alloy parts stay bright for ages and resist the dirt well following this process. If you blast parts with the oxide, particularly alloys, the finish is a bit rough and it’s difficult to remover oily fingerprints. Ideal for preparing the surface for painting though as paint really bonds to this. I have found it absolutely invaluable for restoring parts, particularly on motorcycles. Blasting parts has the tendency to reveal any cracks present that are not always noticeable normally. I cleaned some alloy disk brake bells recently from a Laverda Jota and was alarmed to see just how many cracks there were in one of them. They looked fine before I started! The blasting medium goes EVERYWHERE! At first I had mine in the garage but I found that even with the lid tightly down and a new filter fitted, abrasive dust managed to escape. I tried vacuum extraction, which was better, but I still found that after a while a layer of fine abrasive dust appeared on horizontal surfaces in the garage. In the end I could not live with this, particularly as I build engines and have machinery in there. It now lives outside at the back of the garage, which is fine except that you have to empty the blasting medium in damp weather, as it tends to clog the gun. Blasting medium is expensive from machine mart. I buy it from a local blasting company for a quarter of the price MM charge. The Machine mart cabinet was not very good quality; I took the blast gun back three times because the trigger failed. In the end I converted to foot operation which took the air trigger outside the cabinet and away from the blast medium. Much easier to use too! Don’t blast carbs unless you are prepared to spend hours cleaning them! I blasted a pair of Weber DCOE’s once and had to strip them right down, even the throttle spindles out! I know people who use common salt for this although I have never tried it and don’t know if there are any health hazards associated. Apparently you wash the carbs off in hot water after blasting and the salt dissolves! All in all I would not be without it now… Hope this helps your decision!

I have just brought a Crossflow engine (thanks Richard!) from a 1989 car that I am transplanting into my Westfield. The engine came complete with a Bosch distributor and also a Lucas electronic ignition amplifier. Can anyone advise me of how its wired.? The amplifier has 6 wires Black Black Red Green Black and white White The distributor has 3 wires coming from it Red Green Black Which wires go where? Also the distributor has a vacuum advance unit on it, should I leave this disconnected? Thanks in advance

Thank you all for the replies. I have decided to go back to the inertia type starter so I have changed the starter ring gear today. By a stroke of luck the local engine reconditioner had a ring gear, old stock. He supplied and fitted for £20! Just putting the engine in today, cant wait to give it a try!! Thanks Tony

Thanks Alan. I already have a Caterham starter which I think is the Sierra type. Due to the design of the Westy manifold it wont fit, the solenoid fouls the down pipes. I have almost resigned myself to the fact that I will be going back to the inertia type unless someone has any other ideas… Tony

I have just managed to find a good specification Crossflow (thanks Richard!) for my Westfield. The new engine has a pre-engaged type of ring gear so I would like to use a pre-engaged starter. The problem is that the pre engaged starter that came with the engine wont fit as the solenoid fouls the exhaust manifold. I have been to the motor factors to see if they do a starter with the solenoid in a different position only to find that the only other alternative is to have the solenoid hanging down below the line of the sump! Not a good idea.. Before I change the ring gear to an inertia type, does anyone know of a starter that would fit? Thanks Tony

I may be interested, have mailed you Tony

Roger You are quite right, I guess these would have been ok for a few thousand miles but the engine has done around 17,000 miles since it was built. These have probably been on there all that time…. I don’t really know the history of the engine other than it has a piper 285 cam and puts out around 110 BHP at the wheels. What modifications do Caterham do to the standard retainers to make them suitable for double springs?

I got into conversation last week with an engine builder about the valve gear on the Crossflow. When I told him that I had anodised alloy valve spring retainers he said these were of very poor quality and design and prone to the collets pulling through. I took the valve cover off yesterday to check and was confronted with 3 of the 8 valves where the collets had sunk right down into the retainer! You can imagine the result of the collets pulling through completely… I have now changed them for the steel type which was a fairly easy job to do with the head still in place. To keep the valves in place while I removed the springs I removed the plugs and fed in some soft rope while the piston was at the bottom of the stroke. By turning the engine gently until the rope compressed against the valves I was able to change the retainers, and while I was at it, the stem oil seals. The old alloy retainers had also fretted badly where the springs sat on them. What an inappropriate material for this application… If you have this type of retainer, take a look soon as you can! Tony

I have a 1700 Crossflow with a type E 4-speed box with a separate bellhousing currently in my car. (Westfield) I am rebuilding an engine to swap over and would like to have the crank, flywheel and clutch balanced together. Problem is I don’t know what type of clutch to buy. I don’t want to take the old engine out just yet as I want to do a complete swap over. The flywheel I have is for a 190mm clutch – did they ever fit a 215 mm clutch to a Crossflow? Also, there seems to be 2 types of cover available for 190mm, one with straight fingers on the diaphragm and one with raised fingers. Which one should I get or are they interchangeable provided I use the appropriate thrust bearing? I guess I don’t want to get the wrong clutch, have it balanced and then have problems when I come to fit the engine. Any help would be gratefully accepted, in particular part numbers for the individual parts. Thanks Tony

Brent How much for the gearbox and the clutch? Also where are you based? Tony

Thanks Casbar, Just what I needed. Tony

Can anyone help me with the wiring on a Lucas competition constant energy ignition with a Lucas distributor? The unit has 4 wires coming from it. A Black and white – which appears to go to the negative on the coil A White that appears to go to the positive side of the coil Grey and white (two of these), which go to a block connector The distributor has a orange and a purple wire The ignition unit also has two spade connectors on the side. If anyone has a diagram that would be even better! Help!! Tony

With compressors bigger is definitely best! It tends to be something you only buy once so go for the best you can afford. Places like Machine Mart tend to categorise their compressors by theoretical CFM (cubic feet per minute) that is calculated by the size of the piston/stroke and the running RPM. This is usually a higher figure than the actual delivery. Be careful when making comparisons between makes. If you can run to it, buy one with a belt drive. There are a couple of reasons for this. Firstly, as someone has already mentioned the direct drive ones are very noisy. Secondly, my mate who works on compressors tells me that if the motor OR pump goes on a direct drive one – its usefully the motor, the replacement cost is more than the cost of a new compressor. With a belt drive one you can always replace the motor. As Graham has already said you are limited on a domestic supply just how big you can go. From a 13 AMP plug the practical limit is 2 HP although you can run some 3 HP, but it’s on the limit. You can of course run a separate supply from the mains (like in the case of a shower or cooker) but this all adds to the cost. To sum up, a 2 HP belt drive with as big a tank as you can get is the ideal for home garage use. Once you get it you will wonder how you ever did without it! Its great for getting the BBQ going quickly! Tony

Thanks for the replies. My car has a 4 speed box and the starter is fitted on the exhaust side. Casbar, A part number for a Lucas starter would be great. Does the solenoid sit on the top or the bottom of the starter? Can anyone confirm that the pre engaged ring gear has 132 teeth? Many thanks Tony

I am just building up a Xflow to go into my Westfield. At the moment the car has the inertia type starter and I was considering changing to a pre-engaged type as I have a spare lightened flywheel with a pre-engaged starter ring on it. A couple of questions: Any problems swapping over? Are there any clearance problems with the bulkier pre-engaged type? Most important - What car does the pre-engaged starter come off? Can I use a Fiesta type or from any car I am likely to find in my local scrap yard? If not, does anyone have a part number for a new one? Thanks Tony

Just saw this and it got me wondering why you have to machine the crank to fit a duplex gear? I have just had my crank ground and was not aware I needed to machine it to fit a duplex chain set. Can anyone advise how / what you machine? Thanks Tony

Went to collect some AE cast pistons for my Crossflow from the suppliers Saturday. When I opened the boxes (which were AE) the pistons appeared to be of very poor quality. The finish on them was rough, they had major burs on them, the crowns were engraved with the size/part number, not stamped and worst of all the gudgion pin was a VERY loose fit. So loose in fact that it dropped out when I turned the piston over! You could wobble it when it was fully inside one half of the piston! Also, there were no casting marks on the underside of the piston to identify the manufacture. I almost felt that I had been supplied counterfeit parts…. The supplier denied this of course…. He has agreed to get some more in later today from another supplier to see if there is a difference. This is not what I expected of an AE piston, has anyone else had similar problems? Tony

Hi Robster I am in a dilemma what to do. The engine in my car at the moment has done 20k miles and is in need of a refresh It produces around 110 at the wheels (130ish at flywheel I guess) and has a big valve head, piper 285 cam etc. The plan is to build up my spare engine (bottom end) and then swap the engine over along with the head. I had a look today and found that the cam profile/lift of the 234 matched the 285 I currently have in. Looks like I will go for a 244 that is somewhat more hairy by the look of the profile. I would swap for a 244 if you (or anyone else?) have one. The Piper 300 cam is in perfect condition and comes with matched followers. Cheers Tony

Thanks for the reply. It’s a Piper 300 as confirmed by them when I rang. The power range is from 3000 to 8000 rpm with 310 duration and a 11.43mm lift. The timing is 51 / 79 inlet and 79 / 51 exhaust. I think it’s much to wild for the purpose I had in mind which is a road based 1700cc engine with standard crank, rods and pistons. Any one like to comment on its suitability? Looks like I will have to buy a Kent 234 or a Piper 285 which is what I had been told this was when I purchased the engine. Anyone want to do a swap? Its in perfect condition only having done 1000 mile. Thanks Tony