Leaky Clutch master

I clearly was a bit overoptimistic in my last report. After the Triumph Festival last Sunday I thought it a good idea to check the engine bay thoroughly when everything had cooled down a bit. Which is what I did last Monday. Everything on the engine turned out to be fine, no more visible leaks and the slot underneath the water pump was completely dry ...

So everything looked pretty much OK, until I removed the cap from the clutch master cylinder that is. The level had clearly dropped a bit and the fluid was looking rather dark and murky, not a good sign. A quick look inside the foot well confirmed what I feared. There was a drop of (very dark) brake fluid hanging underneath the dust cap. So a clear sign that the seal from the clutch master cylinder had perished. Luckily there were no visible traces of fluid on the carpets or the pedal box yet. Clearly found the leak just in time.

So a change of the master cylinder was on the cards. Luckily I had a rebuilt one lying in the attic. Plan was to change the cylinder today but as I was home from work rather early last Thursday, I thought it a good idea to start with the preparations for the change. 45 minutes later the rebuilt cylinder was in place. It only needed bleeding, but as it was dark by now I kept that for today.

As the clutch hose and slave cylinder were still full of fluid I could use my proven bleeding method, using the self bleeding abilities of the system. Depressing the pedal slowly and releasing it quickly got all the air out. As I had no assistance this time I took my time, giving the little amount of air in the system plenty of time to collect at the top of the clutch hose ...

With the bleeding finished I turned my attention to the leaking cylinder. Taking the piston out clearly showed why it was leaking, the seal was well worn ...

As the bore looks undamaged, I’ll clean it in the near future and put it in the attic for future use, together with a rebuild kit.

And with the weather being rather fine for a Dutch autumn, I decided to put the roof down and take the car out for a spin, to see if everything was working OK. Was rather enjoyable dodging the various rain showers ...

A few firsts for the DHC

This weekend saw the 6th edition of the Belgium Triumph Festival. Having missed a few years and with nothing better to do we decided to give it another go. Another reason to go there was the fact that this year’s edition was held at the rather lovely “Landcommanderij Alden Biesen” which is just over an hour’s drive from where I live.

Although it remained dry all day the weather wasn’t very bright, which probably resulted in many Triumph owners keeping their cars under cover in the garage. Resulting in a car park that could have done with a few more Triumphs. At least we managed to bring 4 cars over (Spitfire Mk IV, Dolomite 1850, Stag and of course my DHC)

It was actually the first official meeting which I attended with the DHC. The car seems to be pretty well know already, as several people came over to talk about the restoration. She indeed managed to attract quite a lot of interest

Luckily there were more interesting and nice cars around to enjoy, like this nice French 1300TC

A very yellow GT6+

An equally yellow Vincent Hurricane with gorgeous period alloys

A rare Herald Courier van

And a very lovely long door TR2

Although some people seemed not to be too impressed

And while preparing the car yesterday I found another first, the first stone chips!

So with a water pump that looks OK, I can safely say that the restoration of the DHC is finished at last. And she should be fit for some proper use 😎 (edit - this turned out to be wishful thinking).

Water pump, here we go again ...

Returned from the Alps with an oil leak from the water pump. So in the previous weeks I removed the carburettors, manifold etcetera again, in order to rectify the problem. As I already have covered that not so long ago I won’t bore anyone with the details. With the pump cover removed I wanted to undo the impellers bolt, to fit a big washer, so I could lever the pump out easily. I needn’t have worried, at the first turn of the spanner the complete water pump assembly (including brass cage) came out. So no need to use this simple but effective puller again ...

With the pump out in one piece, the cause for the leak was easy to spot. The oil seal that should sit snugly on top of bearing, was completely visible through the holes in the brass cage. This means that one way or another the seal got dislodged from the brass cage, enabling oil to leak out. Either I didn’t fit the seal properly or there is something wrong with it.

As I only fitted this pump two weeks ago it hadn’t endured much in the way of use, making dismantling it rather straightforward. There was no visible damage to the seals so I reused both of them. Only this time I made double sure that the oil seal was properly pushed into place, with the water thrower tightly on top of it. Followed by the coolant seal and the impeller.

Having finished the pump, it was time to put everything back. Only little problem I encountered was the manifold + carburettors assembly. Before I fitted these I had glued the gasket and O-ring to the cylinder head’s mating face. But while fitting the manifold (with the carburettors fitted to it) I managed to dislodge the gasket. But I got it in place in the end. Only to find out, while refilling the coolant system, that there was a leak from the O-ring. Turned out that the supplied O-ring was to small, as a result of which it had moved inside the recess while I tried to reposition the gasket, causing the leak ...

As you can see the inside diameter is spot on, but comparing the original O-ring with the supplied one clearly shows the size difference ...

Should have done that before fitting the ring ! But it turned out that the supplied ring fits perfectly inside the original one. So to prevent this happening again I used both rings, glued in place with sealant ...

And with the manifold ready for refitting I had another go at removing the old gasket. Nothing difficult there, you only have to be careful not to drop bits of gasket into the inlet ports. And when it happens the air compressor is very useful indeed ...

After that is was a fairly long wait for the new gasket to arrive, which eventually arrived last Friday. So yesterday morning I started reassembling the manifold and carburettors. First I glued the gasket to the head with a little bit of sealant ...

After which I fitted the manifold. As I removed the carburettors from the manifold this was much easier, then the previous time. But I did use a few drifts, just to make sure the gasket couldn’t move too much ...

Also used a small 13mm socket with a flexible joint to fit the bolt that sits underneath the thermostat cover. As it is slightly oversize I didn’t tighten it up with this socket, but used a ring spanner with the correct size (½”).

And with the manifold in place ...

It was just a matter of transferring these parts from the boot to the engine bay ...

And take her out for a spin ...

Back home I found a little bit of oil underneath the water pump slot, and I had to tighten one of the radiator hoses slightly. Will see how that develops in the near future ...