LewisH

Great info, thanks. Funnily enough I stumbled across the penguin motors channel earlier this week, went down a bit of a rabbit hole for an evening, very interesting stuff. Sounds like my best bet is to go for minimal re-bore, up to 91mm perhaps? allowing me to upgrade to HC pistons, re-use the standard rods and then save the rest of the dosh for a vulcan head? No idea on what they cost though...I'll give them a shout. Had a quote earlier from my local engine rebuild specialist for re-bore and HC pistons 91mm @ £370. Sound reasonable?

After closer inspection, I have found that the engine I have bought is most likely a low compression version as it has NAT inscribed on the bell housing casting. I believe this means that it is from a transit and therefore has a compression ratio of 8.2:1. My question is, what is required in order to raise compression up to the standard 9.2:1 or higher? It is a 205 block, unleaded head so is it just a case of fitting HC pistons and rods from the standard 2.0 pinto? Does the head also need bigger valves? I have a 2.8 cologne engine also sat in the garage, I heard that the pistons from these can be used if I re-bore to 2.1? Can I use these with the standard cologne rods and just bolt onto the pinto crank after re-bore? or do I need to just buy new pistons & rods? Thankfully the engine was cheap and came with ZX6R carbs.

Thanks all. Yes cam was 180deg out, also set it on the exhaust stroke rather than compression which didn't help. Set it up correctly this afternoon and sounds great, tappets were also badly in need of adjustment which has also helped massively. Never realised how noisy it was before until now. Glad I experimented on the 185 first!

Hi all, I currently have a 185 block pinto with a fast road cam (not sure on exact cam make or model), I am also reconditioning a 205 block pinto, which will also have an uprated cam. In order to perfect the cam timing, I thought I'd get a DTI guage and experiment on the 185 block. It's currently installed I'm the Exmo so access isn't great, but doable. So I started with reading up on the several threads on here and other forums, found that the overlap method of working out the correct inlet cam lift was best. I am now a bit confused, because in it's current setup at TDC, both inlet & exhaust valves are closed...is this right? The car starts and runs OK. If I set the inlet valve on no1 cylinder full lift @ 108 deg ATDC the engine won't start and spits the fuel out of the carb rather than drawing in. Obviously this is wrong, but not sure what I am doing wrong. I am measuring the valve lift from the spring retainer top, is this right? When setting the valve lift, do I measure this from valve fully open or fully closed? I've ordered the Des Hammil tuning guide but currently out of stock, any advice in the meantime would be much appreciated.

I got one of these, very happy with it. https://www.coolexperts.co.uk/product/ford-cortina-ohc-lotus-7-aluminium-race-radiator-uk-made/

Thanks for all the info, very helpful. The ports have a sharp edge so must be a standard head, so I'll look at getting some head work done to improve gas flow. I've seen this priced at around £400 by pinto 'specialists' online, does this sound about right? I don't have a bucket of money to spend, especially as we now have our first rugrat on the way, but I'd like to eek out as much as possible from this engine before it goes into the car. Is it worth going up to 2.1? I was thinking of doing a basic refresh (bearings and seals), porting the head and fitting an uprated camshaft. Engine came with ZX6R carbs and manifold but running on luminition. Hoping to keep the spend under 1k.

Looks to be 37mm, so I assume standard size inlets.

Ah okay. If I run my finger around the top of the inlet, there is a noticeable profile change on all of them, but the inside of the ports are still rough, so it doesn't look like it's had any porting done from what I can tell. The head is stamped with P. As I understand it, this just means that it is unleaded? I can't seem to find any information that denotes an injection head other than oval ports and I would agree from looking at Bob's picture, my head is not pronounced enough in shape...just a bit pointy for some reason.

I've just bought an engine to replace my lackluster 185 pinto and trying to establish if the head is an injection type. I've heard that the inlet ports are egg shaped on injection, but I'm not sure if mine is or not...I'm hoping it is, but not sure if I'm trying to convince myself that they are oval shaped or not? Can anyone help identify this? Are these oval or am I going cross-eyed?

I gave up pretty quickly on option 1 after I realised what is involved, with my lack of the correct machinery and knowledge I think it will just be a long stressful swearing session. No part numbers from Dave, we've agreed a price, but not actually worked out how to do it yet. The main problem is trying to make something that can reliably take the loads in a mcpherson strut setup, but also fit under the narrow Exmo suspension buttress. I've given Dave lot's of images of the Exmo setup, dims, also shared the solution that Richard came up with, so that we can try and find a solution. Fingers crossed, I'll keep you posted.

Yes, beginning to wish I had done the same. Mine didn't look rusty, I'm assuming it's the rubber seals that have perished but either way it's extremely annoying. I've been in touch with Dave at Dampertech and to be fair to him he responded straight away with a solution and good info...however, they cannot be repaired apparently and are no longer made, so my only option according to him is to replace with a GAZ equivalent, which is £320 for the pair! I now have a couple of options; 1. Hunt for a replacement seal kit, I believe this is all that I need in order to repair these dampers. I assume all I need is a kit for a damper with the same diameter...probably more to it than that, but worth a try. 2. Go for the replacement units from Dampertech. Dave said that these have a 50mm body dia, I explained that my RH dampers are 42mm, but he has stated that 50mm is the correct size for mcpherson struts as they are load bearing. I just need to check the sierra hubs to see if it will accommodate a 50mm strut...and then find £320 down the back of the sofa. 3. Chop the front of the car off and engineer a double wishbone setup. Something I don't have the time, expertise or money to do.

Thanks! Yes, it was purely to raise the height of the belts. The C-channels that I used for the lower mounting points were 3mm gauge by the way.

Apologies, reigniting an old one here, but did you make these or buy them from somewhere? I have done less that 100miles in my exmo and have noticed today that both shocks are leaking. Admittedly they are many years old and have been sat under a tarp, but nonetheless very frustrating seeing as they are not an 'off the shelf' product anymore.

I can't remember the gauge to be honest, I'll measure tomorrow and let you know, but yes it was belt and braces for me as this was an area of concern. With the shoulder mounts I added a crossbar to my rollbar for the belts to run over. Pic below.

I did exactly this on my Exmo and passed in Feb this year with no comments on how I had mounted seat belts. I used some C-channels with captive nuts on the outside, with additional spreader plates on the inside of chassis. Pics below. I used top section of the rear tub for shoulder strap mounts, but fitted an extra piece of angle inside the tub to spread the load.

Unfortunately this is much smaller than the exmo tank and the holes for filler & sender do not line up. I've just taken the tank out and mine is 860mm wide...rivnut tool has arrived though so I am going to go down this route. Thank you for going to the efforts of the drawing though, much appreciated.

Ah ok yes definitely. I assume that the sender unit hole is to fit standard sierra unit? The main concern I have is whether it will fit in the exmo. Would you be able to send me some basic dims of the tank and also dims of where the holes are for sender & filler? The exmo has pre-cut holes in the monocoque that need to match the tank roughly.

I like the idea of cannibalising the sierra tank to fit onto the RH one, the cheapest one I can see on ebay is starting at £60...so I'll try rivnuts first and see how it goes, it's a tool I don't have currently so an investment if nothing else. If it still leaks I'll go down the sierra tank route or try and fabricate something like Jez. Many thanks for the suggestions gents

Hi all, After experimenting with the Exmo this week, I have found that the fuel tank is leaking around the sender unit. I then tried to tighten up the 6mm nuts that hold the sender unit in place, only for one of the threaded bars that is welded to the tank to come off in my hand! As I don't fancy tying to weld aluminum, I am now looking for a new fuel tank. Are these standard across the Robin Hood range? Can anyone suggest an affordable option? I have looked on kit spares and they are £180, but don't seem to have any provision for the sierra sender unit to be fixed in place.

Ok thanks. I will take this bit apart and give it a flush with carb cleaner. Fingers crossed!

Yes. So should this be in both or is it progressive i.e. First barrel under partial throttle then the second under full throttle? It's definitely working in the barrel closest to the engine, I've not noticed this in the other barrel.

I've recently had the tank out when fitting new fuel pump and refilled with new fuel. Carb also seems to fill fairly quickly when I've not used it in a while so fairly confident fuel lines and pick up are clear.

Hi, thanks for your reply. I've checked the plugs and they are a little sooty but not massively. Checked the float, looks fine and is sitting level. I've changed the fuel pump from mechanical to electric (low pressure facet), this didn't make any difference to the running, just saves the battery when I try and start it after not having done so in a while. All fuel filters changed as well. I've double checked every fitting/gasket/face on the manifold, pretty sure it's not leaking. I've double checked the ignition timing, was set at around 10deg, I've moved back to 6 as per Haynes. This seemed to help a little but still feels a bit gutless, engine still stalls if the choke is fully open and hard throttle - doesn't do this when choke is closed. This is when up to temp. The air jets are only a couple of £ each so might just bite the bullet and buy some to experiment.

Good afternoon all, I have an 1800 pinto with a Weber 32/36 carb which I cannot seem to get running right. The engine starts, runs & idles fine, but under acceleration the engine stalls, particularly if I open the throttle quickly. The engine is also very low on power and doesn't seem to pull under load. I have checked and changed the obvious; rotor arm, HT leads & dizi cap. My thinking is that the carb is for a 2litre and I am using it on an 1800. I have changed the primary & secondary main jets from 135/140 to 120/125 - although I haven't driven the car since, I have run in the garage and it hasn't stopped the engine stalling under heavy acceleration. I am now thinking I should also change the air jets, but I really don't know what I am doing here, it's all guess work. Can anyone offer some pointers here? Should I be reducing the air jets as well, or increasing the air jets? Was I right to reduce the main jets or should I be increasing these? I have looked for a rolling road near me (Maidenhead) but the only one I could find said that they only do Bike carbs...which is now tempting seeing as I am getting nowhere with the weber. Any advice here would be much appreciated. I've had the car on the road since Feb but haven't managed to do more than a 20 minute journey testing and then more head scratching.

Yeah I've looked at different engine swaps and can't really be arsed with the faff involved. Like the idea of a straight swap and from what I have read the pinto is a great lump, reliable and good hp potential