I took the crank up to Andy yesterday to see what he thought. As I was beginning to suspect he reckoned that the #2 and #3 big end journals were toast. This is a real bugger, as you can’t get undersized shells and therefore can’t get the crank reground.
Finally, I was getting to the root of the problem. And, indeed, demonstrating that it really was a problem. First thing, though, was to close up the top of the engine. So, I took off all the cams and drive gubbins, put the followers somewhere neat and tidy and put the cam cover back on. All this so I I could up-end the engine without the followers falling out. What’s more, with the cams out I can twizzle the crank around as I want without worrying about the pistons bashing into any valves.
So, I took the engine out, intending to get to the bottom of the oil pressure issue. I’m getting reasonably good at taking the engine out of this car, but as usual you always end up with a quantity of fluids falling out and making a real mess of the floor.
…whatever one of those is. (Actually, it turns out that it’s a small explosive device.) It’s what the Birkett turned out to be.
I’d got myself all ready well in advance, here’s the car sitting on the trailer and, after a morning lecturing to students. I jumped on the train, zoomed down to Cambridge and drove to Silverstone. There, miracles of miracles (they must have got some new security guards) we got in easily and parked up for the night.
It’s coming up to the final on-track extravaganza of the season in the shape of the annual 6-hour Birkett relay. This is a huge race at Silverstone with about 60 teams each with 5 or 6 cars. Luckily not all trying to get on track at once. Once that’s out of the way—and assuming I don’t bend the car too seriously—it’ll be time for putting car away and retiring in front of the TV with a cup of hot cocoa.
