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Tabcon
Jedi Warrior
Offline
I've had my "new" '64 TR-4 now for a little over 3 weeks, and during that time, I have driven it very little. If I drove it at all, it was around a block or two surrounding my home. One of the main reasons I have kept it off the street was that I had not received the title to it yet and it wasn't plated.
The restoration on this car was completed in 2007, and the car has been driven a total of about 2,000 miles since the completion. I suspect that most of the driving, based on the attention to detail the restoration received, was mostly the stop and go in town type, cautious, don't get my car dirty type driving.
During "dry dock", I installed a new Pertronix distributor, new Magnacor spark plug wires, new NGK plugs, removed the horribly clogged attempt at an emissions system, de-gunked the carbs and polished the air assembly pistons, checked the cylinder compression (150#'s across the board), new Moto-Lita 14" steering wheel, changed the oil, flushed the coolant, installed all new cooling system hoses and clamps, greased all the fittings, machine polished the body with Meguiars No. 80 Speed Glaze and No. 21 Synthetic Sealant (great products - highly recommended), removed the aluminum moldings around where the top stows to fine sand and polish, installed 2 NOS Lucas PL700's I found on Ebay and fitted them with Sylvania Ultra halogen bulbs (the previous headlights were like 2 flashlights strapped tot he wings), installed a new vacuum line to the carbs, fixed the small oil leak, installed a free flow exhaust and generally just detailed the heck out of the car. Now, it not only looks better, but drives significantly better as well.
Last night, I finally took it out for a decent drive where I could get it up to speed and stretch it's legs a little. I have to give kudos to the guy who restored it because this little car is rock solid and pulls extremely well for a car that is almost 40 years old.
I got it up to about 80mph, kicked in the overdrive, and it tracked straight as an arrow with no shimmy, shake, rattle or roll. It literally drives like a new TR4, but probably better due the the suspension upgrades the car received during restoration such as poly bushings throughout, aluminum steering rack bushings, etc. The engine hummed effortlessly through the gears and would have kept pulling way past 80 had I wanted it to. Maybe another time since I still don't have plates yet. The overdrive is a great option for these cars, and well worth the upgrade if anyone is thinking about doing so.
The ride and cornering characteristics could use a little tweaking as the car has a little too much roll and the ride is a bit choppy on concrete roads with expansion joints. I suspect that a front anti roll bar, changing out the rear leaf springs (he installed competition springs and the car sits way to high in the rear), re-valving the rear lever shocks and installing new softer springs and nice gas shocks like QA1 may solve this problem. There is a neat Aussie site,
https://www.smithees-racetech.com.au/historic/triumph.html
where these guys really...REALLY get into some detailed suspension upgrades for TR's. I'm not too sure how much of this is necessary, but it's an interesting read.
To sum it all up, I couldn't be happier with this car and I look forward to tinkering with it for a long time to come.
Tab
The restoration on this car was completed in 2007, and the car has been driven a total of about 2,000 miles since the completion. I suspect that most of the driving, based on the attention to detail the restoration received, was mostly the stop and go in town type, cautious, don't get my car dirty type driving.
During "dry dock", I installed a new Pertronix distributor, new Magnacor spark plug wires, new NGK plugs, removed the horribly clogged attempt at an emissions system, de-gunked the carbs and polished the air assembly pistons, checked the cylinder compression (150#'s across the board), new Moto-Lita 14" steering wheel, changed the oil, flushed the coolant, installed all new cooling system hoses and clamps, greased all the fittings, machine polished the body with Meguiars No. 80 Speed Glaze and No. 21 Synthetic Sealant (great products - highly recommended), removed the aluminum moldings around where the top stows to fine sand and polish, installed 2 NOS Lucas PL700's I found on Ebay and fitted them with Sylvania Ultra halogen bulbs (the previous headlights were like 2 flashlights strapped tot he wings), installed a new vacuum line to the carbs, fixed the small oil leak, installed a free flow exhaust and generally just detailed the heck out of the car. Now, it not only looks better, but drives significantly better as well.
Last night, I finally took it out for a decent drive where I could get it up to speed and stretch it's legs a little. I have to give kudos to the guy who restored it because this little car is rock solid and pulls extremely well for a car that is almost 40 years old.
I got it up to about 80mph, kicked in the overdrive, and it tracked straight as an arrow with no shimmy, shake, rattle or roll. It literally drives like a new TR4, but probably better due the the suspension upgrades the car received during restoration such as poly bushings throughout, aluminum steering rack bushings, etc. The engine hummed effortlessly through the gears and would have kept pulling way past 80 had I wanted it to. Maybe another time since I still don't have plates yet. The overdrive is a great option for these cars, and well worth the upgrade if anyone is thinking about doing so.
The ride and cornering characteristics could use a little tweaking as the car has a little too much roll and the ride is a bit choppy on concrete roads with expansion joints. I suspect that a front anti roll bar, changing out the rear leaf springs (he installed competition springs and the car sits way to high in the rear), re-valving the rear lever shocks and installing new softer springs and nice gas shocks like QA1 may solve this problem. There is a neat Aussie site,
https://www.smithees-racetech.com.au/historic/triumph.html
where these guys really...REALLY get into some detailed suspension upgrades for TR's. I'm not too sure how much of this is necessary, but it's an interesting read.
To sum it all up, I couldn't be happier with this car and I look forward to tinkering with it for a long time to come.
Tab
