9/11/12

Nope, I'm not even going to mention it.  So I told y'all about the new plan for Lil' Wiggly yesterday.  I also mentioned the fact that there are other plans afoot for George.  Today we’ll go into those plans.  But before I do, I'd like to apologize for the over use of the phrase “pretty much” yesterday… at least in the first sentence.  I type in a sort of “free form” manner, much like George Lucas if Juan were to really examine the dialog in the “Star Wars” films.  This leads to some rather awkward sentence structures from time to time.  I seem to repeat qualifications such as “though” and… wait, I'm digressing WAY too much here.  Let me get back to George.  One of the things John and I discussed while at the shop Saturday is the fact that everyone he has talked to about over boring a Datsun L-series engine says they ALL run hot if bored more than 0.080” over stock.  It is entirely possible that George's block is bored 0.160” over!  I know boring an A-12 to fit A-14 pistons is approximately 0.120” over, which is NOT contraindicated by the Tech-Wiki on the datsun1200.com website, by the way.  However, I seem to remember that the machine shop I used couldn’t get stock 76mm pistons for some reason.  All they could find were 77mm.  That would make for an additional (approximately) 0.040” for a total of 0.160” over bore.  I knew at the time that it was a gamble, but went for it anyway.  I think now that I screwed up.  So, what I'm thinking now is that we will disassemble that engine and use the ceramic and thermal coated bits in an A-14 bottom end.  My original thought here was to even use the balanced A-12 crank in the A-14 block but I'm not sure if that would make enough compression to even run.  Oh, it would probably run, but it would have such a soggy bottom end, before the turbo came on boost, that it wouldn’t be any fun to drive.  I'm not 100% sure of the amount of compression we’d lose though, so I'm not ready to totally abandon that option.  Of course, that balanced bottom end COULD be used in the Spit’s A-12 I suppose.  Hmm, yeah.  That seems like a better plan.  Of course there’s always the old plan of turning Herman into the “Slowster.”  That car was always intended to have an A-12 and four-speed if ever built.  But I digress, once again.  A “built” A-12, making 75-80 horsepower, should still be pretty fun in the Spitfire.  That would be a 25% improvement over the stock horsepower and I plan to get the weight down from the factory’s 1,580 pounds as well.  It won't be the quickest car in the fleet, but it otter be a fun little hooning car.  Ok, I have to go do actual work.  I think I will try to get back on the original train of thought after lunch.  Ok, I'm back from lunch.  I was talking about the turbo project in George.  I'm still not ready to give up on it.  So, like I said above, I think I'll salvage the ceramic and thermal coated pistons and cylinder head, as well as the head studs and whatever else is in there, from that engine and use them in an A-14 with all the rest of the turbo bits.  I think the rapscallion A-14 in Lil' Wiggly will probably get re-rebuilt with a stock A-14 cam and go in the Spit.  I know I just was talking about how an A-12 would be a 25% improvement over the stock Triumph engine, but that de-smogged A-14 with a side draft and header would be at least a 50% improvement!   The next question is four or five speed in the Spit.  I guess we’ll burn that bridge when we get to it.  As for Lil' Wiggly, when I told Gregg that I'd bought a 289 for it, he first questioned why that over a 302.  I said we wanted the shorter stroke so it would rev better.  He agreed with that logic.  Of course the whole thing is moo since I already have the damned engine sitting on the floor.  Were we still shopping I might be convinced as to the merits of the 302.  Hmm, I just thought about it and the difference in stroke is the diameter of a BB: 0.17”.  That doesn’t really seem like all that much.  John and I have been texting about it and agree that over the length, and prossibly more importantly the breadth, of a V8 crank every little bit helps.  And the general consensus is that the 289 and 260 DO rev freer and higher than the 302.  So, I'm sticking to my guns on this argument.  Anyhoo, after Gregg and I discussed my reasoning behind the choice, he said he’d ask his circle-track buddies if they have any aluminum heads for it… on the cheap.  I would love to swap out the cast iron heads for aluminum if for no other reason than to shed a couple hundred tons.  And yes, if I get a set of aluminum heads cheap I will gopher an aluminum intake, four-barrel carburetor, and headers.  But until that day arrives, I'm planning on total cast iron, including zorst manifolds, and a two-barrel carburetor.  Actually, I'm thinking about just dropping the lump off at a machine shop and telling them to clean it up and make it a fresh, non-smoker for me.  Doing that would prevent me from going hog-wild while inside the thing… which I know I would do.  No, a nice freshening up is all we need with that engine.  Of course the thing might be junk… but I'm not going to think about that unless/until I have to.  And now I've depressed myself by thinking that I may have thrown away $200.00 on a junk engine.  I'm going to call it a rant on that note.