Bob Lang <LANG@ISIS.MIT.EDU> asks:
Subject: Re: TR7s and 8's (long)
does anyone have any production statistics regarding Dolomite Sprints?
By this I mean: 1. how many were manufactured 2. were there many
variants?
3. are engine/transmission combinations readily available?
Can't offer you any hard facts, just blather: The Dolomite Sprint was _very_
common in the UK in the 70s. They will have made tens of thousands. It was UK
Saloon Car Champion for a number of years driven by Andy Rouse, Tony Dron and
others.
The basic Dolly engine, as also supplied to SAAB, was 1850cc.
It may have been taken out to 2 litres before or after the
Sprint head was fitted. The Sprint head I believe was SOHC, with rockers for
some
of the valves, a la H*nd*. The standard carburetion I think was twin Str*mb@#gs,
beloved by Triumph. The racing versions were tuned very effectively by
Broadspeed,
and had twin 45 DCOEs. There was only one road version of the engine, as far as
I
know, with 4-speed manual. Everyone expected the heads to be fitted to the
Stag, but
no, and to the TR7,but no, although I think the factory rally versions
campaigned by
Tony Pond had the Sprint engine. It was quite robust for its time - compared
with the
Escort RS1600 anyhow, which used to devour a cylinder head every 20,000 miles.
There should be lots of them in breaker's yards over here - I don't know how
they would
fit into a TR7 - the engine may be taller.
Cheers,
Paul.
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