Thread: 2.6 Engine Improvements

Originally Posted by bacicat

Even a basic RWC (just to transfer rego) here costs $150 now as the work involved to keep Vicroads happy is enormous. They have to take heaps of photos to prove the condition of the vehicle when tested and keep the records for 10 years. These new laws saw half the testers get out or fail their licence renewals.

Club Rego would have been another option because depending on the Club, you do not actually need a roadworthy. Unfortunately this is about to change in the next few weeks.

I'm looking forward to using my FFR (with it's original 6-cylinder motor) to find out why everyone has such a dislike for them. I have a spare engine that came from a fellow forum member which was run on gas for some time before it was removed. Handy as a backup but I might invest in a set of exhaust valves to carry in stock......

I'm seeing a mate who owns a 3 litre Rover tomorrow, I'll find out if he has a spare head or complete motor.


Colin

Unfortunately Club rego isn't an option as it will be a daily driver. Also, LROCV had already gone to a mandatory RWC system already.

If you come across any spare motors or heads, let me know, I may need some bits and pieces, and I also want to play with a spare head if I can get one to see what I can and can't do to it before it is unusable.

I have a '69 original numbers Landy ute from Tenterfield that I purchased a few years back fitted with the 2.6 6cyl. I did a quick in frame rebuild including remove ridge off the bores, put in some new standard rings and put a near new '76 model head on it from the donor engine I got with it. Big end bearings still like new so they went back in. Tuned it, and man they are soooo much nicer to drive than the fours I have owned. Fuel economy was an issue as everyone mentions, so point of this post is to share my apparently very effective solution. Took the oil bath air cleaner off and fitted a very cool Supercheap Auto chrome intake pod (like the young fellas fit these days) directly onto the SU carby intake elbow. Fitted two inch exhaust after the header pipe with ford 4 litre size muffler exiting just behind the cab- quiet but breaths well. Improved fuel economy from 20 mpg to about 25-26mph. Even more if I keep it under 90km/hr on the road. Oh yeah and on the 6 cyl marketing side of things it has 'Landrover SIX' (upper case) written across the back tray and 'Landrover' on left front guard put there from new by the dealer Annand and Thompson, so I assume there was some 6 cyl marketing going on.

P1170102.jpg

P1170105.jpg

P1170094.jpgAttached some pictures.

Originally Posted by bacicat

Unfortunately Club rego isn't an option as it will be a daily driver. Also, LROCV had already gone to a mandatory RWC system already.

If you come across any spare motors or heads, let me know, I may need some bits and pieces, and I also want to play with a spare head if I can get one to see what I can and can't do to it before it is unusable.

Gav

You should do a run up to see cookey, he has sectioned a head to see how he can improve air flow and ported the exhaust on an engine he is building up for a customer. Worth having a look see while its still without the head. Unfortunatly I think the head may go on tomorrow.

You can still see the exhaust porting till the exhaust manifold goes back on.

Diana

So, had a thought yesterday - I know how dangerous that can be, but here's a thought. Rather than start from scratch with the fuel injection, what about starting with an OEM setup ripped from another car? Was thinking about the VN-VT Commodore V6 setup - I can get an entire running car for $200 to play with and gut it for all required parts. The ECU seems very simple and is a stand alone unit like the early LR injection and I think I can fit all the sensors to the 2.6 without too many dramas. The inlet manifold on the 2.6 LEDs itself very well to the Commodore throttle body and there are plenty of people out there playing with chip upgrades for them, so I'm sure someone could write one to work on a smaller engine...

A closer look at the inlet on the 2.6 shows that I could mount all 6 injectors without too many dramas.

For a couple of hundred dollars, it wouldn't be the end of the world if I couldn't get it to work...

One of the only hiccups I can see so far is that it looks like the auto box is involved somewhere along the line, it I don't know what it would do if there was no transmission to talk to.

Thoughts???

How easy is the commodore ecu to tune?

Originally Posted by Dougal

How easy is the commodore ecu to tune?

Quite easy by the look of it - there are heaps of tuners out there working on these - one of the reasons I think I can get it to work. I don't think you can connect a computer directly to them, but rather flash an EPROM and install it. It may take a bit of findling around, but doable I think.