Thread: The Series III Lives!

Dave
Great to see you are having fun there are a few things I think you should do.
Get a tin of carby cleaner and pull the bottom and top off of the carby clean everything thoroughly I would suspect that the choke is stuck and if you put the carby cleaner through all of the orifices you should resolve your issues with it running rich. I would also suspect the diaphragm in the top of the carby if it isn’t split yet it will be soon if the car hasn’t been driven for a long time.
Don’t go too wild with making it run leaner with the mixture adjustment on the bottom of the carby these engines were a nightmare to run 25 years ago when we had better quality fuel.
Unleaded fuel will surely be the death of this engine you can run an upper cylinder lube and drive it carefully but they are not only called an F engine because of the inlet over exhaust design.
I remember in 1983 I fully reconditioned one of these engines with stellite valves, extractors, upper cylinder lube and new everything (worth a small fortune) and it still burnt valves and blew a head gasket within 10000 ks the beauty of these engines was the fact that they could be completely shagged and still sound as though they were in good condition.
The performance when in good condition (105kmh) was adequate they will use oil and burn valves and only return 16 mpg at best.
If you are an absolute fanatic find a 3 litre version of the engine from a rover car and you will have some real fun. These were a good engine in the Rover cars but in the Land Rover they were labor intensive to keep moving.



Have fun it will surprise you what it will do usually more in the bush than the modern stuff.

4bee - No worries, I'm laughing about it already.

djam1 - Already done the carbi cleaner stuff and the diaphragm was replaced shortly before it was left behind the shed (about 4 years ago) and is still in good nick (I've checked).
"completely shagged and still sound as though they were in good condition."
Uh oh! That would explain a lot!

How did they ever get one of these engines in a normal car? The thing's about a metre tall!

" Have fun it will surprise you what it will do usually more in the bush than the modern stuff."
Thanks, here's hoping!

G'day DiscoDave
The lack of an advance tube would certianly have an effect on the motor not responding to the throttle on acceleration, you can durry-rig a vacc hose using somr thin rubber or plastic tube, length does not overly just keep it clear of hot exhausts and linkages, just use any spark plug lead of a similar length to replace No1 lead if suspect, then you will have a good chance to set the timing.

The 2.6/3.0 litre Rover motor was fitted to the Rover 90,100,105 Sedans the old "Auntie" Rover shape before the P6 and the SD1 3500 sedans that used the Alloy V8 that saw sterling service in the Range Rover, that basic motor also saw service in the Leyland Terrier Trucks and in the Australian Designed P76 in 4.4 ltre form and REPCO also played with it out to 5 ltre.
Bung-Tiddley.

Hi DiscoDave
With my old girl once performance went to poo (backfire starve for fuel)I would top up the Dashpot on the carby. I recall it hapening whilst out cruising in the bush,had no spare oil,ended up cracking the sump plug into an opened beer can to get some oil,it did the job.If within a day or so the conditions would return I would top up the oil again.If this fixed it I would order a new carb kit,it was just as cheap to buy the complete kit than the diagphram.
If the oil was full it was time to adjust the valves.
4 years for a carby kit is a LONG time for these motors,I had mine for 3 years and I was replacing that diagphram evey 6 months or so.Its the nature of the beast,valves adjusted every 6 months max.Once you get to know the old girl you will know what she wants
Andrew