Car was on rolling road with Jon Wood at Eastbourne the week before last for a check over, brake system tweaks and rolling road. Made 144bhp on the
rollers and he gave it a good going over. At the time it had I temp gauge so he had the temp gun on it regularly at was reading consistent mid to late
80's.
I put a durite electric temp gauge on prior to brands hatch track day, and once I got it working, was reading quite high at idle. 95 +.
I have heard about some reliability/ accuracy issues with the digital temp gauges, so figured that it was reading high as it had only just been given
the all clear on the rolling road.
When at brands, drove great for a good 3-4 very hard driven laps but then started to experience a stutter, so brought it in. Temp gauge was pushing
120. Let it cool down and went out again but same again. The stutter felt like it was coming at random times.
Speaking around, I wondered if it was fuel starvation, due to some of the long corners. I don't have a swirl pot but tank is baffled. Filled tank
to the brim, to be sure and still had the same stutter after 3-4 hard laps.
Temp is my initial thought as to the issue. Rolling road had the bonnet off, so wondered if hot air is struggling to escape.
Prior to the firt bout of stuttering, the plastic cover on the air flow meter fell off. I made a replacement cover out of plastic on the day and
gaffer tapped it on.
Some people suggested that my polo rad is too small for the red top, however I don't understand why it was ok on the rollers but not on the
track.
One thing was that varley redtop battery did seem to loose its charge after hard driving, even though the alternator light is correctly off.
Didn't take long on trickle to get it back up to full power and enough to start the car again.
Final thing is that after the car was stuttering a lot in the afternoon, I did get a couple of plumes of black smoke out of the exhaust a couple of
times. I have heard of oil getting into the rocker cover after hard cornering but not sure if this is the same thing.
Any help would be great!
Cheers
Matt
quote:vacuum in the fuel tank can give these symptoms.
When at brands, drove great for a good 3-4 very hard driven laps but then started to experience a stutter, so brought it in. Temp gauge was pushing 120. Let it cool down and went out again but same again. The stutter felt like it was coming at random times.
Speaking around, I wondered if it was fuel starvation, due to some of the long corners. I don't have a swirl pot but tank is baffled. Filled tank to the brim, to be sure and still had the same stutter after 3-4 hard laps.
As above,charging would be my first port of call.
ECU's don't like low voltage some times either.
The other thing is faults will not always show on a RR,was the stutter on hard acceleration when the engine was pulling its hardest?
Alternators don't like excessive heat nor over revving. I've also known them to not charge and have no lit warning light, test with a multimeter
quote:
Originally posted by rusty nuts
Alternators don't like excessive heat nor over revving. I've also known them to not charge and have no lit warning light, test with a multimeter
your polo rad if its a standard one is 100% too small for tracking it. your going to need something 2-3 row with a minimum of 50mm core thickness.
60mm core if you can find one. it was fine on the rolling road as they have a continuous high air flow on the rad and a few high power pulls is
nothing to miles of thrashing round a track.
i learned the hard way. it cost me a head gasket and a set of big end bearings before i realized it was a cooling issue
Thanks everyone. It all makes sense and straight forward to test. Hopefully I haven't cooked my engine!