1978 Fisher Fury - whoosh!

[mylittletony]

Mini update

The tyres were at around 25psi, so I let them down to 20 all round.
Also checked nut torque and tried fitting caps, got 2 on and 2 were proving difficult so I'll come back to them.

I've also been looking at replacing my knob.
Here's the 'as bought'



The wood is ok, but not the vibe I'm after.

The previous owner had seen fit to glue this on... So the threads were full of hard glue



I spent about 10 mins trying to scrape it out then gave up and bought a die nut.

And here's the new one





That's a genuine little Honda piston from my C50 twiddling days, with a 3D printed adaptor for a 17mm internal hex (M10 nut) to 13mm gudgeon pin. Then a pair of M10x1.25 nuts glued into the hole.

I want to check the alignment and still need to sort out the cold start. Then use as much as I can before a certain weekend in May...

[mylittletony]

Well then
I've not really done much recently...

I took it for a blast on Sunday down to see Colonelk, which allowed me a few opportunities to stretch it's legs on a nice open derestricted road. It's fast!

The lower tyre pressure seems to have taken away some of the twitchiness, but I think a lot of it is me getting used to something so raw and direct.

I think the brakes are improving with bedding in. There's an occasional slight knock, which I discovered is coming from a sloppy bush in the RHS lower wishbone.
No point doing alignment until that is swapped out.

Sadly no pics, but I had a very enjoyable morning in it!

[Darkspeed]

The bush knock may be a metric bolt in an imperial bush - common issue especially with the long rocker arm bolt.

[bstardchild]

I'm looking forward to seeing it on track...............

[mylittletony]

Apr 23, 2024 21:21:16 GMT Darkspeed said:

The bush knock may be a metric bolt in an imperial bush - common issue especially with the long rocker arm bolt.

I saw your reply on Facebook, thanks. I'm taking it somewhere next weekend for a sanity check on everything, so hopefully I can diagnose better then. Would be nice if tightening the bolt to clamp the inner sleeve was the (short term) solution!

Apr 23, 2024 21:25:00 GMT bstardchild said:

I'm looking forward to seeing it on track...............

I'm looking forward to taking it on track!! 😀

[mylittletony]

Been a bit of a weird one...
Last week it went into a local place for a check over and investigation into the knocking.

This did indeed turn out to be M12 bolts through 1/2" bushes. Duly solved by fitting some 1/2" UNF high tensile bolts.

There were a number of minor issues documented during the check, which I'm going to work through, such as improvements to hose routings and my 3D printed bonnet frame joiner being split.
He also had a quick look at the tune to see if the cold start could be improved, but had no luck.

The rub comes when I tried to drive it home on Friday afternoon and it stalled repeatedly during the 3 mile journey.
It's basically undrivable and I'm supposed to be driving it to, and around, Goodwood.
(Insert many and varied expletives here)

Despite being rather busy over the weekend, I've managed to reload the old tune, just in case something had corrupted and tonight discovered that my coolant temp signal is all over the place, blowing hot and cold.

Here's a vid:


The enrichment is also all over the place as it thinks the engine is either stone cold or boiling over.

So I'm hopefully picking up a new sensor tomorrow and currently have everything crossed that makes the car usable again!

[Blown_Imp]

Great diagnostics dude, it is fun having the ability to delve into the data so easily and find issues like this.

I finally found the cause of my warm up idle causing stalls randomly, the exhaust VVT going momentarily to the stop. Why it is doing this is another matter entirely

J

[Darkspeed]

Sensors are usually pretty robust, kit car wiring and earths not so much - Always worth double checking that the engine is well earthed to the chassis / battery, and that the wiring associated with the sensor does not just pull out of the plug - although thats not always an indication of everything being okay if the wire insulation has been crimped rather than the core.

[mylittletony]

Yes a wiring check is very much on the cards too. I will have to double check this, but I'm sure I unplugged it and it stopped misbehaving.

The car uses most of the original loom, although I think it's been shortened at the ECU plug end.

Got a sensor waiting for me on the way home. Will check the above then plug it in looking for a steady, sensible reading, at which point I can swap them over.

[mylittletony]

Latest is that it's looking like it is the wiring.

I plugged in the new sensor, unfitted and the reading was still wonky.

So I've tried wiggling the wires with a continuity check on the multimeter, between plug and ECU which gives varying results. However doing it on my own is awkward...

Current plan is to splice in a new wire between plug and ECU. I also need to look into the earths, but I believe they are shared and I've only got one weird sensor.

Nothing like a bit of time pressure!!

To be continued...

[mylittletony]

.... last night was fairly long and very stressful!

I spliced in a new 'signal' wire from the coolant sensor to the ECU, which didn't solve the problem. So I then looked into the 'signal ground' which is shared between a lot of the engine sensors. The actual wires for the coolant sensor disappear under the inlet manifold, so I ended up tapping a new one into the unused lambda sensor signal ground, after triple checking they are connected on the wiring diagram.

The outcome of this was a steady reading, but permanently 120°. And me being very depressed as it was looking like no RRW for the Fury...



I frantically asked for help on the speeduino facebook group and was given a few basic pointers.

1. Measure the resistance of the sensor when cold - ~3000ohms, same as the new sensor.

2. Measure voltages at the ECU pins and sensor plug pins both plugged and unplugged. I got 5V at both ends unplugged and 2.5V at the ECU when plugged in. This effectively verifies that the wires work and the sensor is providing resistance to the circuit, e.g. working ok.





3. Check the calibration for the sensor. It's hard to check the current values, but I found a selectable option which matched some recommended values from an MX5 setup guide and my measurements from step 1, so uploaded that...

BINGO!!! A steady 20° reading. I fired it up and it ran up to temp as before:



So I'm now back to a poor starting, grumpy off idle car - but literally couldn't be happier!

As a mechanical engineer, I'm equal parts pleased and annoyed it's turned out to be a firmware and software issue

I then completed a few small jobs around the car, replacing my bonnet hinge bar joiner, new breather hose, fitting hub caps, adding some spring washers under the exhaust manifold bolts. I also tried to swap out my front indicators, but it became apparent it was going to take me too long so that can wait...

See you at RRW!

[EmDee]

Can't tell you guys how epic this thing is in the flesh. After convoying over with MLT on Friday afternoon I have even more love for this little green nutcase. It really does shift! My car is quicker than most of the stuff on the road and it leaves it for dead. Even if we did have to carry his tent 🤣

Have some pics:


















And a very short poorly shot video 😆

[mylittletony]

Cheers EmDee, both for the love and luggage carrying!! 🙏

Was a hoot blatting down there with you, bring some long sleeves next time eh?

[Davey]

That is a particularly good angle.

Looks awesome.

So long yet so tiny.

[mylittletony]

Thanks - I'm pretty happy with how it looks!

I had a few comments along the lines of "wasn't expecting that cute little 60s car to be so fast" which is exactly the vibe I was going for.

Unfortunately, I couldn't make the centre caps stay on, or 2 of them at least, hence the bare steels. The wheels also need rebalancing...

Performance wise, the brakes need more cooling for track driving - they got HOT and smelly, but luckily didn't fade. I had to lean hard on them, because it's so damn fast, and still nearly came a cropper saved only by the handling:-

I had been flat out down the straight towards the additional chicane at the entrance to turn 1 and basically braked too late. Ended up locking the wheels and having to attempt the chicane at what I considered "way too fast". Miraculously, it just went through it, with minimal fuss.

Added to this I got a little warning that I'd 'exceeded the noise limit' by the main chicane, when I hit the limiter and made a lot of noise.

Not wanting to crash, or have the entire session shut down, the second and third outings were slightly more restrained.

It was an utter blast though, so much fun and the car is really capable, actually quite comfortable and got me there, back and round the track without any breakages. Saying that, I literally drove it into the garage, still full of kit and flew to the states for work the next day - so I've not checked it over at all!!

I've acquired some 6" wide slots to perfect the set, I'm going to get them sorted and they can be used for harder driving as they have some ventilation and are considerably lighter than the steels. The steels will then be my 'pretty' wheels.

[markbognor]

[mylittletony]

I've left this thread about as unattended as the car itself!
I've not really used it, for a variety of reasons (needing to ferry children, and weather mainly) but I did yesterday and reminded myself that it's frickin awesome!

I established that 2 of the centre caps just didn't fit properly, spoke to JB Wheels and they sent out 2 replacements FOC. They're now fitted, but it's covered in dust so no pics.

More use incoming

[mylittletony]

I've had a nice long holiday in France, and a few days at home on my tod, so had a good clear out in the garage. I now have a lot more room around the car and also rediscovered my hardtop.
This is good, because the lack of roof has been a cause of lack of use, so I've decided to make progress.

Working on the wooden buck, the intention is that I can remove and refit this as required. So I made a cross rib that fits over the roll bar. I've also knocked up a rear cross rib and I will join these 2 with some adjustment for length and angle until I finalise the shape at the back

N.B. the cross ribs are grossly oversize until I determine the shapes, when they will be cut down. Adding structure first






I'm also going to have forward extending ribs and a support down to the tunnel. These will attach to the front bow, which I need to cut out of the old hardtop.

I also need to cut the tops of the B-pillars off as I think they will help shape the roof.




The lower portion also needs trimming, rearwards of the rough line shown below



I'm planning to rigidly attach all the ribs and existing grp pieces together, then form the rest using narrow strips of 3mm ply, which I'm going to buy tomorrow!

In other news, I've got a remote tune session booked to try and sort out the niggles in the map.

Might even use it at some point too 😂

[mylittletony]

Ahhh cars...

I had a very productive tuning session, until the car started to chuck out a fair bit of smoke, which then turned into more smoke, blue smoke! All while idling, low revs.

Turned the car off for a bit, then restarted it and again after a minute or so it started smoking which got progressively heavier.

I need to have a look, I think/hope it's turbo seals, so the plan is to remove the turbo and check for oil residue inside the exhaust manifold. If none, then it's the turbo. If it's oily, then rings I guess...

Either way I can't really use it, as best case it'll give bad readings for the remaining tuning, and worse probably kill the lambda sensor.

I wanted to cut up the hardtop some more, so cracked on with that. Mark it up



Choppy chop chop



And then trim the lower piece



And I now have this, ready for some shaping



I should be able to progress both the roof and the smoke leak concurrently, just need to find some time lol

[mylittletony]

Poop.

Checked the intercooler side of the turbo and it was dry as a bone...
Undid the turbo to manifold nuts and there was some oily residue in the manifold and inside the turbine housing.





I don't have a good feeling about this one, can't imagine turbo seals causing that much residue in the manifold, even if it's really failed.

Next step is a compression check I think 🙄