• Hi Guest!
    If you appreciate British Car Forum and our 25 years of supporting British car enthusiasts with technical and anicdotal information, collected from our thousands of great members, please support us with a low-cost subscription. You can become a supporting member for less than the dues of most car clubs.
    There are some perks with a member upgrade!
    **Upgrade Now**
    (PS: Subscribers don't see this gawd-aweful banner
Tips
Tips

Post-War Other Herald on Craigslist

Share this page

Trust me Andy, I would NOT be giving it away in that case!

Or at the very least, it would already be gone :laugh:

I do have some early Sports 6 bits that turned up when we moved a shed, but I need to ask the car's new owner if he wants them first. And folks don't get nearly as excited over 1600 manifolds & whatnot (for some odd reason).
 
TR3driver said:
You may find the performance a bit disappointing though ... even the VW Bug had more power and less weight.
Click to expand...

Not exactly the same but my 1970 Herald 13/60 will easily beat my fathers 1970 VW bug in a very slow drag race :jester:

Of course the 13/60 does have 60hp! quite a bit more than the early 1200s and way more than the bug.

By the way, having driven the Herald and Bug enough to compare, overall, the Herald is a nicer car to drive. Since I replaced anything that can wear in the suspension, the Herald handles better than the bug and of course the 1300 makes it much easier to keep up with traffic.
 
A couple quick questions for the brain trust.

1) What is the drive train swap that would be most favorable for the Herald? Are there certain year Spitfire drivetrains that have better performance that would suit this purpose?

2) Who are most common providers of spares for a Herald. I have always been able to find anything I need for the TR3 but when I go to TRF, Moss, and others, few support the Herald.

Thanks

Pat
 
Pretty much any Spitfire engine/gearbox would be ok depending on preference and availability, as they'll all pretty much bolt in. Mk3 or early MkIV 1300s are nice, and the MkIV three-rail, all-synchro gearbox would be nice as well. Nothing wrong with a later 1500 engine/single-rail gearbox, either.

Best 'support' for Heralds comes mostly from the UK, vendors such as Canley Classics and Rarebits4classics (also Rimmer Bros. and others). TRF, Moss and such do support the Herald; they just don't know they do (there's a fair bit of interchange with Spitfires and such)! :wink:
 
Although they don't officially support the Herald, there are actually a fair number of mechanical parts available through TRF. To find them, you'll have to find the original factory part number on your own (best to get a factory Spare Parts Catalogue for the car) and then look them up by that number on TRF's site. For example, the clutch slave cylinder is Stanpart 110762, which TRF shows in stock (and even on sale).

But for body, trim, interior etc. you are pretty much stuck dealing with vendors in the UK. Canley Classics (formerly John Kipping Spares) is my favorite (in spite of a few misunderstandings)
https://www.canleyclassics.com

I'll let Andy comment on the most favorable swap. I don't recall offhand if the Herald 1200 had the same strengthening as the Vitesse or not. But if so, I would guess that dropping in a GT6 driveline might not be too hard. A dual carb 1300 would still be easier though, and supply some 30% more oomph than the stock setup.

Can't think of the man's name offhand, but there is a Herald here in CA somewhere with a Mazda rotary engine. License plate says "ITS HARY" and I don't doubt it a bit!
 
PatGalvin said:
A couple quick questions for the brain trust.

1) What is the drive train swap that would be most favorable for the Herald? Are there certain year Spitfire drivetrains that have better performance that would suit this purpose?
Click to expand...

The 1300 small crank engine or 1500. Either of these are much lighter than the 6 pot engines.

My herald has a 1300, with a later 4 syncro three rail gearbox. I have shaved the head to raise compression a bit, and have a 1500 head which has larger valves but that probably doesn't make much of a difference. It is fast enough to keep up with the crazy drivers here so it should be possible to drive just about anywhere.

Most mechanical parts are identical to the Spit so parts aren't a problem.
 
TR3driver said:
Can't think of the man's name offhand, but there is a Herald here in CA somewhere with a Mazda rotary engine. License plate says "ITS HARY" and I don't doubt it a bit!
Click to expand...

He moved back east somewhere a couple years ago and took the car with him.
 
Hi Andy

Vin is VIN# is GB21440LCV

Is that helpful? I assume it is same as Commission Number.

More info tomorrow.

Pat
 
Andy, I know this is a lame question but...

What is distance between front wheels on a Herald. From inner front tire to inner front tire. Will a tow dolly with 41" distance between wheel wells work for towing? I'm planning my conquest...

Some tow dollies are better suited for wider track American Cars

Herald specs on the web show front track to be 49 inches. But I don't know what "track" means. Inside wheel to inside wheel or outside wheel to outside wheel or center of wheel to center of wheel?

pat
 
I find the inside is about the same as the spitfire. So if you can load a spit you can load the herald.
 
We have a guy in our car club, he has convertible Hearld, and he has put a 1500 in it, I remember him and the other club member that help him do the conversion talking about the 1500 tranny being a issue, but the beers were flowing and I wasn't listening all that closely :smile: Also the Vitesse was very simialr in design and it had the straight 6, our local race team, Team Moon Racing, years ago, back in the 80s, had the ex Katsner/Cline Trans Am Vitesse race car, that thing was a blast, it toted the front inside wheel in almost every corner, it now out on the West Coast being vintage raced in it's orginal Tran Am livery.

I think Herald are neat cars, I don't know if I would want to hot rod one much, it's more of tool-around in, and chill out car, the 1147 is not a bad engine, especially if you get the later one that had cam bearings in the block. Also the Herald 1147 cylinder head were a little different than the spirfire head, less of a combustion chamber volume, very popular with the racers as less material had to be remove to make compression ratio. I built a 1147 vintage race engine about 10 years ago with Herald head, with that combo I could get it to around 12.5 to 1 with flat top pistons, to go higher I would have needed dome pistons.
 
Excellent points, Hap, and I agree with all of them! I just picked up another Herald, a '66 sedan. As it does not have the original engine (later 51 hp as opposed to the 40 hp early 1147 currently in it and stuck anyway), I'm sorely tempted to throw in a Mk2 Spitfire 1147 engine along with a Mk2 Spitfire-vintage gearbox with overdrive. That would give me a bit more "pep" while the OD could keep up with the economy aspect of the car.

And that's one thing I thoroughly enjoy about my '62 1200 Herald, with its original and still quite willing 40 hp. I'm about due to replace at least the front tires and possibly do a bit of front end maintenance, which will hopefully elminiate the very slight vibration I currently have around 55-60 mph. But eight years ago, this is the very same car I drove from NY to MN and back on the Interstates at a steady 65mph +, with no problems keeping with traffic...and getting a good 35 mpg or more on said trip. With the mixed driving I'm currently doing (mostly commuting), I'm getting 31-33 mpg. The only downside is that it really wants premium fuel, but I can live with that!

As for a 1500 gearbox, I don't think it would be an issue -- nor would a complete GT6 drivetrain -- IF the Herald (as noted earlier) is a GB series or a GA80001 or later. These, from mid-1962, had virtually the same much beefier chassis as the Vitesse 6 / Sports 6, including provision of space for fitting the OD gearbox and much sturdier rear area where suspension and differential mount.

I personally would NOT convert any Herald to a Triumph six. To do so essentially means a: one has to completely gut a GT6 (fine if you've got a terminally rusted one with a good drivetrain); and b: it makes for a nice car but one with totally different character than a Herald. There recently was a Sports 6 on eBay sans engine; that would be the perfect candidate for a GT6 parts car yielding its drivetrain bits.

(BTW, Hap: do you know Vernon Brannon?)

And I know what you're saying about Herald heads and Spitfire racers. I've had a couple very knowledgeable folks tell me that one of the very best heads was the early 948 Herald head (I think the twin-carb head). And I've also got some spare heads that came with an old Spitfire 4 ex-GP Prod. SCCA racer a friend and I bought years ago to autocross. One of those heads is milled down so much that it actually appears to have cut into the bottom of the threaded area for the spark plugs! It is VERY thin on the bottom!
 
Vernon is in the Charlotte, NC, area -- member of Triumph Club of the Carolinas and former president of VTR. He owned one of the Trans-Am Vitesses at one point; I can never remember which one, though. Was it Ralph Thomas (think that's the name) whom you dealt with on the Vitesse?
 
Back
Top