[TR] Valve seats

[brserv at aol.com]

I also thought that I did not need hardened valve seats in my 1966 TR4A with only 24,000 original miles. However, after a 5 hour run at a steady 75 to 85 miles an hour, my exhaust valves receded 0.005" to .006". I am using Shell 90 Octane non ethanol gasoline. So, I removed the head, and had hardened seats installed. I also used the opportunity to replace and seal the push rod tubes, since they were badly leaking.
 My 1959 TR3A got hardened valve seats as part of its complete restoration two years ago. Alex Levy59 TR3A66 TR4A  
In a message dated 10/23/2024 2:10:31 PM Eastern Daylight Time, grglmn at gmail.com writes: 
I never heard about the adoption of hardened valve seats early on for Triumph or other imports.  Word on the street in the 80s was we needed to get hardened valve seats, find leaded fuel, or run an additive in our fuel for our sixties and early seventies cast iron head  British cars.   I remember using some kind of lead additive/octane booster in my daily drivers at that time, don't know if it made any difference.   Since then I have had many hobby cars and many thousands of miles of use with no lead or additives and no problems. Greg Lemon68 TR250
On Wed, Oct 23, 2024, 11:36 AM Don Hiscock <don.hiscock at gmail.com> wrote:
I’ve never heard that bit about satellite seats, John, but it’s certainly possible.  My recollection is that unleaded fuel first started becoming available in America circa 1973-75 and it became dominant in the 1980s. It’s hard to imagine engineering changes by the British motor industry being made in the 1960s for unleaded gasoline in the USA. Later on, perhaps. 

On Wednesday, October 23, 2024, John Macartney <johnbmacartney at gmx.com> wrote:

Does anyone out there have documentary evidence (in the form of Service Bulletins issued by the factory or Leona NJ) that makes specific mention of the introduction of stellite valve seats in place of earlier and softer alternatives? I do recall BMC making something of a hoo-haa about stellite seats being used in the MGB and Healey 3000 back in the sixties. Same applied to Rootes Group and Jaguar.
There is hearsay in the UK that hardened seats went into heads for the US market at about the same time because of the introduction of unleaded fuel. That hearsay also suggests hardened seats were territory specific but from an ease of production standpoint, having two different types of seat during machining and manufacture just doesn’t make sense. I can think of other examples where Standard-Triumph adopted a “one type fits all” applied and that goes for other British makes.
It’s clear that valve seat recession fears in Europe has been a kneejerk reaction to a problem that never really existed which suggests stellite valve seats were fitted for all markets. An engineering or service bulletin back in the day would have confirmed this but I never remember seeing one. Thoughts anyone?

Jonmac
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