TR2/3/3A Newbie in need of help TR3

[BritishMike]

So last year I purchased a TR3 which has been quite the bank drainer. So back at the beginning of the year I took it off the road for a few overhauls. I re-did the front suspension and rebuilt the carbs and replaced quite a few parts to try and get it daily driver worthy. Upon trying to start the car again and the full rebuild of the carbs and new gaskets and seals ..ect. The car is missing on the cylinders one and two I've set the timing properly tried whole different distributors so I think i have ruled ignition out. I throughly sprayed looking for vacuum leaks all around the manifolds. And I have good compression across all the cylinders. Any suggestion or can anyone point me in a good direction.

Cheers,
Michael
PS I claim to be no expert infact Im 99% enthusiasm and 1% knowledge so go easy on me!

 

[TexasKnucklehead]

A TR3 that's a "bank drainer"? Mine was free and if I'd have known how much I was going to spend on it, I wouldn't have taken it. But that's another story...

Tried multiple distributers? Only 1 and 2 are missing? Are both carbs drawing the same amount of air? Did you try swapping plugs from 1/2 to 3/4? Are the valves adjusted?

 

[BritishMike]

They are drawing equally, brand new plugs and switched them around as well. Valves are adjusted too.

 

[AEW]

Try sorting out if it is flooding or starving in the lead carb..... A choke linkage not right could flood one carb. But my hunch is rather that it's starving. Did you center the needle in the carb after you put in new parts? It may not be falling down to the stop and flowing too much air at idle.

 

[NutmegCT]

Mike - welcome to BCF!
If you did all that suspension work yourself, you are more knowledgeable than I am, for sure.

You say it's missing on cylinders 1 and 2. You mean there's never a spark on 1 and 2?

And of course, did you balance the two carbs after all the work? By the way, ditto on AEW's suggestions.

Hopefully you have a workshop manual, or the Practical Hints booklet, which gives step by step advice on adjusting the carbs. In case not, here a PDF:

https://www.triumphtr.com/manual_tr3.pdf

Tom

 

[Marvin Gruber]

While the car is running (and let it run for a couple of minutes), see if the front carb is cold. It will feel like its been refrigerated. If so then its starving for gas.

Marv

 

[Member 10617]

Mike,

Welcome to the Forum. I warn you, it is addictive!

As for your trouble, I asume you have checked not only the plugs but also the spark plug wires (for any breaks in them), and the connections in the distributor cap. If the wires are old, they sometimes go bad. Also, check the contacts in the distributor cap.

Sometmes the connection with the spark plugs will be defective, and the spark will arc to the engine or elsewhere. In the dark, you can see if there is arcing.

Also, be sure you have your spark plug wires properly sequenced. It is easy to run them to the wrong plugs.

Also, as I have discovered, not all these distributors (especially the rebuilt ones) call for the degrees of BTDC that you find in the manual. Originally, I believe it was 4 degrees BTDC. With some rebuilt ones, you need to set it at as much as 15 degrees BTDC. It all depends if someone changed the advance curve in the distributor you are using. That shouldn't result in missing in one and two, but it is worth considering. Just a wild thought....

Recently, when my car began missing, I discovered that the wire to the condenser had vibrated free (the little screw had come out somehow). Did you try changing your condenser?

These are stab-in-the-dark suggestions... but it is worth checking them out.

 

[Geo Hahn]

FWIW -- I once had the Grose-Jet in one fuel bowl stick in the closed position... no fuel to 2 of the cylinders. Ran poorly though not as poorly as I would have thought given the extreme nature of the problem.

A quick check would be to take the top off of the fuel bowl and confirm there is fuel in there.

 

[sp53]

Look at the distributor cap closely because the placement of the wires in the cap is not linear

 

[Kleykamp]

Look at the distributor cap closely because the placement of the wires in the cap is not linear

Yep. And also turn the shaft in the distributor and see if it wobbles. I had a bent shaft one time and the rotor ground down the contacts in the cap. Thought that was pretty odd, but had the same thing on a car several years later.

 

[BritishMike]

Sorry for not updating between regular work and being in the shop with the TR3 Ive been extremely busy. But I think I have nailed down the culprit. I believe it is one of the carburetors. I switched them and it helped the miss on the front two cylinders. But no matter what I do now the car seems to be running rich even with the jets all the way up. And the engine has a constant shake or wobble to it while it idles.

 

[Member 10617]

Sounds, in part, a like timing issue or spark plug wires not properly sequenced (???) Then, again, could be any number of other gremlins at work.