Hi Mike,
Still lots to do on my motor, I'm afraid /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif , but I've generally decided most of what will be done and have been working gradually in the right direction. Things change, I'm afraid... for example, I'm now leaning toward 89mm or larger P&C, instead of the 87mm I'd planned to use.
With $3K, the ability to do all the machining yourself (and necessary skills), some planning and care you should be able to build a pretty strong engine.
I'd suggest you spend your first $$$s on Kas Kastner's tuning manuals (
www.kaskastner.com) and Roger William's "How to Improve Triumph TR2/3/4" (Veloce Press, avail. at Amazon.com & elsewhere). Between these, you can get a lot of good ideas where to start and what to do. You might also think of this project in stages, with this being the core rebuild and further improvements planned for the future.
By the way, Williams' book "How to Restore Triumph TR 4/5/250" (or his separate volume "How to Restore Triumph TR 2/3/3A") has a well illustrated and organized, step by step rebuild. This section is not included in his "How to Improve..." books.
Your next $$$s might best be spent tearing down and cleaning up/inspecting the engine parts you've already got, to determine if all is usable or if any major items such as crank, head, block or conrods need replacement or significant repair work.
In a nutshell, your biggest improvements will come from:
1. More displacment. 87mm P&C set are about the same cost as stock 86mm, but are really only a small increase in overall displacement (2.1 liter to 2.2 liter, approx.). I've got a set of 87s on hand, but am considering using 89mm or larger in this particular motor instead. The larger bore has the added benefit of gaining a little more room around the exhaust valve (as Rob/trfortune has pointed out previously), which otherwise is a pretty tight area in the combustion chamber. 89mm do cost more, roughly double what 86/87mm would. 91 and 92mm are possible, but are a lot more costly because the block has to be machined for larger diameter cyl. sleeves.
2. An improved cam. In purely general comparison, the stock cam has about 244 degrees duration, most "street" improved cams have 260-270, some hotter ones are in the 280-290 range (I'm using a #149 grind with 282 degrees) and "full race" that would likely be quite unpleasant to use on the street are 300 degrees or more. There are many other factors to consider, besides duration, so spend some time choosing a cam. A regrind is not expensive, but will need to be hardened and at the very least new cam followers and springs, and possibly upgraded keepers and pushrods, are in order. New cam bearing will be needed, too.
By the way, how "hot" a cam is also relates to displacement, to some extent. The more displacment you've got, the "hotter" a cam that might be needed to give similar performance to smaller displacement with a milder cam.
3. Cyl. head improvements will make a big difference. These can include larger valves, especially on the exhaust side. But note that with a cam giving both longer duration and higher lift, stock-size valves might be adequate, especially on the intake side.
Might as well put in unleaded valve seats while you are at it. New exhaust valves, in particular, and all valve guides should be "unleaded" compatible, too, of course.
There's a lot of porting work that can be done, as well as milling the head to increase compression of the engine to a point that's "comfortable" for you (and allows use of gas you can easily get). This also involves reshaping and rebalancing the combustion chambers. Porting and combustion chamber work are well illustrated in Kas' books. These head improvements involve a lot of careful hand work, and can involve some welding too (on the exahust side). If unsure about doing it yourself, it might best be handed over to a pro, but that's pricey.
Part of the cyl. head improvement can come from the head gasket itself, by using the shim steel type (about $100, but needs to be matched to the cyl. bore you choose) to increase compression a bit without milling the head (or in combo with minimum milliing). This "trick" was used in production class race cars back in the day, borrowing this thinner gasket from the decompression kit that Triumph offered (that kit also used a spacer to lift the head and reduce compression, was intended for use in areas with poor quality gasoline).
We've discussed headers and exhaust systems ad nauseum elsewhere here on BCF, so I won't go into them any more than to say that I consider them to be part of the porting process. Whatever can be done to help exhaust gases out of the engine efficiently is a good thing and will improve performance. Keep in mind that there's a balance between exhaust system I.D. size/muffling and back-pressure. Some back pressure must be maintained for efficiency, and a bit more is needed for a street car than for a race car. And, of course, noise-wise you'll probably want to avoid tickets!
4. Careful selection of conrods is important. The originals were always the weak point in the TR engine, and now are 40 years old. Have them magnafluxed carefully before subjecting them to the added stresses of a strong running engine. Ideal would be to replace them completely with Carillo (or similar) conrods, but that would eat up a lot of your budget in a hurry.
The stock crankshaft, in good condition, is usable up to about 6000-6200 rpm, but revising the rear main seal is recommended ($150 for a seal kit). A stronger billet crankshaft would be ideal (up to 7200-8000 rpm) but would wipe out your budget entirely, by itself.
5. Ancilliary stuff includes carbs, ignition, cooling and oil.
A set of Weber DCOEs are great, but costly and a lot can be done with SUs, in particular, or ZS relatively cheaply.
Webers might be added later, since a new kit for your car would take about half your current budget.
With stock carbs, the original vacuum advance dizzie/ignition might be retained, if in good working order. With Webers at the very least the orig. dizzy needs to be modified to eliminate the vacuum advance, but a Mallory dual point or fully electronic, non-vac advance dizzy might be even better and give a stronger spark. A coil needs to match up with whatever is done (I.e., Lucas sport coil with orig. dizzy, Mallory sport coil with Mallory dual point, or Mallory high output coil with Mallory electronic dizzy/CD box.)
There is also the possiblity of adding a multi-strike capacitive discharge ignition box with either a modified orig. dizzy or a Mallory. Again, some of this can be done in stages.
All this beefing up of the engine means it will produce more heat, and likely will need improved cooling too. An electric fan and improved water pump, proper sleeved thermostat all come to mind. However, it also is part of the engine building process, being sure the block is very clean inside and possibly some improvement/matching of coolant passages, etc. At the expensive end of things is replacing the stock radiator with an aluminum one, both to improve cooling and reduce weight. At the very least, the original radiator should be checked and recored as needed, for maximum effect.
The oiling system is important for lubrication, of course, but also can provide some cooling benefits as well. For this reason I installed a 16 row oil cooler. However, some care is also needed to prevent over-cooling the oil, which leads to sludge and can cause lubrication problems. For that reason, I've got an oil thermostat installed.
Finally, the drive train and suspension are involved. I.e., how well power produced by the engine is transmitted to the rear wheels and how the traction/handling setup makes best use of it. This includes the flywheel, which can be lightened to allow the engine to spin up faster, but only to a point in a street car that sometimes needs to operate comfortably at lower rpms. Also, clutch, gearbox, driveshaft and diff all come into play. Gear ratios in the gearbox and diff are important to take best advantage of the power in the range it's being produced. Heck, even wheel and tire size play a role.
There are a lot of little engine building tricks noted in both Kaster and Williams' books. Pay particular attention to Kas' visit to Greg Solow's Engine Room in Santa Cruz, Calif. Greg is a master builder of the TR 4 cyl. motor. A lot of his tricks are mentioned in the book, but it sounds like he's still keeping a few of his building secrets (I can understand that).
When looking at these books, and perhaps some others such as those by Vizard, keep in mind the end use of your car. If it's to be a street car, some restraint with modifications is important or the car might be pretty unpleasant to drive around town or on the highway. If you think you might go auto-crossing or vintage racing, you'll want to consult the rules pertaining to any particular class, too, before starting to modify. Production classes, in particular, can be pretty restrictive. For example, this is where 87mm (actually 87.2mm) pistons came from... That's the largest "stock" oversize bore originally, as large as allowable in the production race and rally classes. On the other hand, as these cars have aged, most classes have been less restrictive about necessary replacement parts, such as improved conrods.
Hope this helps! Keep us posted about your project.
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