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Re: New AH Owner Questions

To: BRUCE HARDING <bkharding@verizon.net>
Subject: Re: New AH Owner Questions
From: Dave & M <rusd@velocitus.net>
Date: Wed, 02 Nov 2005 23:46:19 -0700
Hi Bruce,

If you are familiar with working on cars you should be able to handle
quite a bit of the project.

First, get a good shop manual, Moss has some, & study it thoroughly.

Check compression to get an idea of engine condition. I would expect a
"good" BT7 to have 160 psi or better.

Check ignition timing. Retarded timing can cause quite a power loss. The
vacuum advance shouldn't have too much affect on power. It will give
better fuel economy while cruising. Someone will likely give you a lead
on rebuilding vacuum units.

I would expect the BT7 to have more low end power than a TR-250. Enough
to easily spin the tires on dry pavement if you so desired.

There are a lot of parts vendors both here & in the UK. Everyone has
their favorites. Moss & British Car Specialists of Stockton come to
mind. Denis Welch, UK, has a lot of good performance oriented parts.
Others may list many more.
http://www.britishcarspecialists.com/sitemap.html
http://www.bighealey.co.uk/

It's not exactly easy to pull the engine & transmission since they are
pretty heavy & the aluminum panels surrounding the engine are delicate.
It can of course be done if you have a mind to. Once you get the engine
out finding a stopping point is hard. "Shame to go to all of that work &
not do a complete rebuild" & such.

You will get a lot of good help from this list. Also consider joining a
local club & one or both of the National AH clubs. Their magazines &
advertisers alone are worth the price.
http://www.serve.com/AHCA/
http://www.healey.org/index.shtml

A huge list of vendors:
http://www.dimebank.com/monster/vendors.html

You can go here & search the previous messages of this list for answers
to a lot of questions:
http://www.team.net/archive/healeys


Good Healeying,
Dave Russell
BN2

BRUCE HARDING wrote:
 > I just picked up a 61 BT7 and have a few questions...
 >
 > The car doesn't seem to have much grunt when  starting from a
 > standing start. Tonight I found that the vacuum unit on the
 > distributor wouldn't hold vacuum, the carbs were out of synch, the
 > front carb had no oil in the damper and the back one was running
 > slightly lean.  After I made the changes the rain started to come
 > down hard so I didn't take it for a test ride.  So here are the
 > questions:
 >
 > 1) Is there somebody that rebuilds the vacuum units?  It's an early
 > model and according to Moss as NLA 2) Should the AH have as much low
 > end torque as my Triumph TR250? 3) Is there a list of parts vendors?
 > 4) How difficult is it to pull the motor and trans?  I'd like to
 > detail the engine compartment and it appears to do it right I need to
 > do this.
 >
 > Thanks for any advise! Bruce Harding 61 AH 3000 BT7




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