omegaman

Yes my 77 Federal has decals.

I think maybe you are in the wrong section, the Esprit did not come with a 1.8 ltr engine.

No, I removed the radiator from the car to clean it, I left it overnight with white vinegar in, rinsed, and then put some strong limescale remover in it for an hour, then rinsed with detergent. The heater core was flushed out a few times when I removed it from the car a few years ago. I'll hook up the heater blower switch next week and see what kind of heat it kicks out.

I haven't looked at the heater core yet 🙂 I guess that would be easy enough to pull the feed and return pipes off and fill it with cleaner. I think I may add some water wetter just to finish it off.

Well that was a right pain in the backside to do. I was quite surprised having only measured one shim and guessed the old gasket thickness, that once I fitted all the new shims and used flange sealant, the clearance on all valves was 8 thou....a tad high but acceptable. When I pulled the cambelt off, the pin fell out of the cam belt tensioner, took me ages to get it off and put it back together again....I don't want to do that again in a hurry. I'm not quite sure how I changed an exhaust valve on my old S2 on the side of the road when I was 25, with just basic tools. I have a workshop full of tools and my own 2 post ramp now, and it was still a right pain just doing the shims. Having a removable side window came in handy though.

Well after a few more flushes and a bottle of limescale remove and a litre of white vinegar overnight.....finally it doesn't overheat. At idle now, as soon as the water is up to temp and the fans come on, they only stay on for 60 seconds and then shut off. There is way more heat being blown out from under the front wheel arch. Temp 80 deg out of the thermostat and at 58 at the pump return hose. I took it for a drive and the needle doesn't move now, when I pull over the temperature stays stable and the header tank is at 70 degrees, before it was 102.

Here is what came out after an hour of cleaning, not too bad but definitely not the best.

I used a 91 thou shim in place of a 96 thou and managed to get some clearance to measure. I found that I need to remove 6 thou from all the shims in the end. The old gasket when pinched tightly with the micrometer reads about 15 thou, which explains the zero clearance when I bolt the carrier in place without the gasket....valve clearance was 15 thou before I removed the gasket. Shims and sealant should be here tomorrow.

"So is it the standalone thermostat as fitted to early Turbo or the more conventional drop in unit? Is there some fault with how the rad, pod and airdam are assembled? Insufficient airflow while underway could account for this state of things." Drop in unit in the S1, the housing is part of the water pump. The front scoop is new and it's clear from obstructions. I removed the radiator this morning and used a central heating cleaner in it for an hour.....quite a lot of bits came out, I might give it another soak tomorrow. "the best way I found to fill the system (do this when cold)is not by the expansion tank but to leave the cap on , remove the heater hose at the rear of the head , use a spare bit of loose hose and put that on the connector on the head. You should now hold the two open ends up high and pour the coolant in to one of the hoses until it overflows from the other. Quickly remove the spare and reconnect the original heater hose." Thanks for the tip, I don't think there is an airlock anywhere though......the entire system gets hot and the coolant is circulating.

Thanks....I'll take a look. I should be able to get some kind of gap measurement by placing the smallest shim in where the largest one currently sits......bolting it back together without a gasket gives me pretty much zero clearance with them all in the correct positions. Once I can figure one out, I can calculate the rest and pop down to SJ Sportscars in the afternoon.

Yeah I hear ya, they are 3 thou over at the mo, what's that in mm? 0.07mm? Actually I have no idea what pistons it has in it.....I'm assuming low compression being a federal car, but the cams have been changed for European spec, maybe they changed the pistons as well. Is there a visual difference between them? I could have a look inside the plug hole with a scope.

@JimmytheTurboI just read that thread, I think that must be a later car. The 907 2.0 engine has the cold return pipe go into the side of the pump and the thermostat housing is all part of the same assembly. I guess you could stick the thermostat in the housing upside down but I have tested the stat and it was in the correct way up.

Low? well it's a Federal car so it would have been standard over there. If it was over cooling then I may have considered swapping it for a higher temp one......as it's boiling over, I don't think the thermostat opening later would help matters. What do you mean housing? how can the housing be the wrong way around? If you mean is the thermostat in upside down? no it isn't 🙂

Yes its between 5 and 7 thou for inlet and 10 and 12 thou for exhaust. Exhaust tends to heat up more, so being on the high side of the clearance numbers not so much of an issue. I'll probably leave those at 15 thou and just sort the inlet out.

Yep 🙂 definitely the correct way up in the housing, and I boiled it and checked the opening temp and kept it that way for 10 mins just to make sure it wasn't closing after a few minutes. Fans come on around 80 something, otter switch working fine, I fitted a relay to the fans to take the load off the switch. Fans pulling air through the radiator.