Hi Joe,
I've been running a lucas PI for around 5 years on unleaded. The only
problems I had were at the change over between the leaded and unleaded
fuel. The mixture of the two different sorts of fuel melted every o-ring
and seal between the fuel tank and engine. I had to do a complete rebuild
of the system. Fortuanately, the fuel company paid for it. The only ones
that weren't damaged were the hardened rubber in the banjo's on the
metering unit.
Friends of mine who don't use their cars as regular transport made a clean
switch from leaded to unleaded and had no problem with damaged seals.
There are a couple of companies in the UK capitalising on the unleaded
changeover by suggesting that the metering units need the lead for
lubrication and that owners will have lots of trouble unless they get a new
"lead free" metering unit. My understanding is this is basically rubbish.
The Tetraethyl lead in the fuel only lubricates after combustion.
There is a special seal for the PI pump motor shaft which may need to be
removed. This is available from the UK. Pretty much all the other orings
are available from the local engineering outfit.
Since replacing the damaged o-rings and seals, I've done around 100,000
km's with no further problem on the unleaded.
Personally I think unleaded fuel is an improvement over the leaded. My only
real gripe is the petrol companies in NZ by unleaded fuel with very high
quantities of aromatics (benzene, xylene, tolulene etc) which evaporate
lowering the octane of the fuel. One has to be careful where one fills up,
because if the petrol station tanks are getting empty, the octane may be
lower than what it should be and on the high compression PI cars this can
be a real pain.
Since the change, the car exhaust system lasts longer. With leaded fuel, I
would have to change the rear muffler at least once a year (the leaded fuel
is full of wonderful scavenging by products like sulphuric acid which
doesn't do the exhaust much good!).
Hope this is useful....
CHeers
Bernard
At 04:11 20/07/00 +1000, you wrote:
>With all this talk of unleaded and effects on valves can anyone share their
>experience on the effect of unleaded on all injection components, for those
>that have the mechanical LUCAS system
>
>Joe Santamaria
>Call Centre Consultant
>E-Communications Design and Implementation
>
>AVAYA communication
>
>*Tel: +61 2 93529287
>*Fax: +61 2 93529287
>* mailto:jsantamaria@avaya.com
>Please note my new Avaya e-mail address is: jsantamaria@avaya.com
>Please visit our website at www.avaya.com
>
>AVAYA is the former Enterprise Networks Group of Lucent Technologies
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Chris Young [mailto:pzs83j@ndc.gmeds.com]
>Sent: Wednesday, 19 July 2000 23:52
>To: 6 Pack List
>Subject: [Fwd: FW: Unleaded OK?]
>boundary="------------415862FBEB7D81C7B9FFBC64"
>
>
>This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
>--------------415862FBEB7D81C7B9FFBC64
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>
>
>--------------415862FBEB7D81C7B9FFBC64
>Content-Disposition: inline
>
>X-Mozilla-Status2: 00000000
>Message-ID: <397476D0.F1DF57E1@ndc.gmeds.com>
>Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2000 11:25:05 -0400
>From: Chris Young <pzs83j@ndc.gmeds.com>
>X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.51C-SGI [en] (X11; U; IRIX64 6.5 IP30)
>X-Accept-Language: en
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>To: Bert Van der Stee <bvdstee1@yahoo.com>
>Subject: Re: FW: Unleaded OK?
>References: <01BFF0CD.2A960560.bvdstee1@yahoo.com>
>
>>
>
>I'll have to agree with Dick T on this one... The value of unleaded fuel
>was
>the action of the lead on the valves, seats and guides....The function was
>one of lubrication. Of course without the lead the wearing of the
>components
>would/could be accelerated. Well, this will depend on individual cars but
>in
>my case the head "lasted" until 65,000 miles before the just on start up and
>acceleration smoking was just becoming noticeable and started to annoy me.
>After a compression check, I had the head rebuilt with the new guides and
>had
>seats installed. Now my compression is about 170 across the board with a
>10%
>variable in two cylinders.... Oops of track......Basically the cars will
>run
>and run fine on unleaded. Eventually the guides will wear. Sure lead may
>have made them last a little longer but the well known irregular pressure
>the
>rockers put on the valves with the minimal oil the upper section of the
>motor
>gets is, I think is more of a factor in this. Since the youngest TR6 is now
>24 years and Unleaded fuel has been prevelant in most parts of the country
>for at least 15 to 20 years, what could be the actual cause of the valve
>guide demise? Lack of lead, original design( ie, material), simple wear?
>Who really knows.....What is known; Mechanical items wear out....When it's
>time for a rebuild, just update it...simple as that. Europe is starting to
>go through all of this now. They are finally phasing out leaded and in the
>English car mags, owners are writing in inquiring about lack of lead...Some
>use additives, others just let it ride....... In any case, the cars will
>run.
>
>Now another question....Does anyone know to get those blasted headrests off
>the the seats? They have a tab on them that keeps them from pulling out.
>They were removed last year by the upholsterer, retrimmed and put back.
>Well,
>now I'm taking them back out to have them redone as the seats are great bit
>the headrests he didn't french seem to match....Now he can as he now has the
>machine at work.....I have a sliver of metal with a handle I got from the
>guy's in the shop but I'm not having a lot of luck getting them out. I
>don't
>want to damage the leather so I don't want to be to aggressive with poking
>around through the hole.... Any experience would be greatly appreciated!
>Otherwise I'll have to wait to drive the car in and have him do it...I
>wanted
>to get a jump on timing since he's not the fastest guy in the world....
>
>Chris Young
>
>74TR6
>76TVR
>94BMW
>93Ducati
>
>
>--------------415862FBEB7D81C7B9FFBC64--
>
>
Regards
Bernard Robbins
NEC New Zealand Ltd
Network Solutions
P.O. Box 1936
Wellington
Ph (04) 381 6274
fax (04) 381 6284
email brobbins@wlg.nec.co.nz
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