Sounds like you could probably go into business for yourself rebuilding
Spitfire SU carbs. If I had a set, I'd be asking you for your address!
Best wishes,
Jeff in San Diego
'67 RHD Spitfire Mk3 aka "Mrs. Jones"
Jeff's Classic '67 Spitfire Mk3 site & Vintage Spitfire Webring
http://www.ohms.com/spitfire/spitfire.shtml
home of the NEW Totally Triumph Auction
"By Triumph enthusiasts, for Triumph enthusiasts"
http://www.ohms.com/cgi-bin/TRauction.cgi
and... The Triumph Autos/Parts Wanted Listings
http://www.ohms.com/cgi-bin/TRwanted.cgi
...plus a few other surprises!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
----- Original Message -----
From: Nolan Penney <npenney@erols.com>
To: Spitfire-Enthusiast <spitfire-enthusiast@egroups.com>;
<spitfires@autox.team.net>
Sent: Wednesday, June 14, 2000 6:48 PM
Subject: Spraying SU's fixed
>
> I won I won I won! They don't spray gasoline any longer!
>
> A while ago I complained about my SU's spraying gas out the vent's on
> top of the bowls. I fiddled with them for ever it seems, and finally
> temporarily gave up in disgust, putting the Stromberg back on. Well now
> they're fixed, and it's an interesting tale, or at least it's
> interesting to me.
>
> I already had the Haynes carburetor book, but I also purchased the
> complete set of manuals from Burlen Fuels or however that's spelled.
> The people that now make SU carburetors. Lots of nifty information in
> there! Everything you ever wanted to know about those colored bands on
> the fuel tubes, why different jets are different colors, and all that
> stuff. Made it real helpful when looking through piles of stuff at swap
> meets too. Learned where some things on my carburetors weren't
> "correct," though I didn't appreciate the significance of it at first.
>
> To cut to the chase, I discovered that Spitfires require a special bowl
> bushing of a dampening characteristic made only for Spitfires. Nasty
> old black bushings, of which I have dozens, just don't cut it. I also
> discovered that after market rebuild kits don't always have precisely
> the right length bowl mounting bolts, so they don't provide the right
> tension in holding the bowls against those special Spitfire only
> bushings. And by jove there is *definately* a difference in how the
> bowls are affixed when done correctly, with oem parts.
>
> So I rebuild the carbs for the nine millionth time, and mounted them on
> the car a few hours ago. No fuel spraying! Not only that, the car runs
> phenomenally better then it did with the bowls improperly mounted using
> generic rebuild kit parts and "good enough" bushings. I'd surmise that
> the bowls were vibrating and flapping with the wrong bushings, resulting
> not only in fuel spraying out the vent holes, but screwing up the fuel
> mixture royally for the engine. Which made the engine run rough,
> vibrating and flapping the fuel bowls even harder. Oh heck, there's no
> surmising, that's exactly what the problem was.
>
> Scouts honor (I was one once, until the police intervened, but that's a
> different story), I started the car without setting the carburetors up
> at all, and it purrs. All my linkages are lose, nothing is
> synchronized, the jets are just screwed in and not matching in height,
> the only thing right and matching are the float heights. Yet the car
> runs much better then it ever did with the single Zenith, and far better
> then I could ever get it to run with the SU's, using the wrong bowl
> bushings. Oh I can't wait to find out how it runs when I can actually
> use the gas pedal (it's not connected yet either)!
>
> Moral of the story? Get the right bowl bushings (purple and beige), and
> the right bowl mounting hardware. Wow! What a difference! How old are
> your bowl bushings?...
>
> You know, for the money I spent in learning this, I probably could have
> installed fuel injection...
>
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