Well this afternoon I decided to carry on playing with the fiat... Managed to stop the rocker cover leak (turns out it had bent a little... I put it down to possibly a slightly bent stud and dodgy washer perhaps... but maybe I had managed to over tighten it previously to deform this new cover
, not admitting to it though! Also changed the gasket for one I know I had it sealed up with before.).
The symptoms continued for a while... no smoke till warm and then smoking when warm. But I decided it was time to start playing with the carb... I came to the conclusion that the engine was running rather lean and generally possibly running just too hot (perhaps the thermostat is sticking slightly?) the idle was hunting a little to after me leaning the idle out too much. (theres also another couple of screws on either side of the carb... decided to turn these right in)... the engine ran much better! My dad had a play and did a little fine tuning and never had the engine sounding and running/revving so nicely... also the smoke appeared to be going through phases of coming and going... the fan mechanism is working correctly now... and the smoke problem seems to be just disappearing... Could it be the engine was just running too lean and getting far too hot, and an aged slightly rusty thermostat (despite the dash temperature remaining in a safe area) could be causing the oil just to reach a temperature its not too comfortable at?
I'm thinking its time to remove the thermostat and just run it cool, hopefully its not too bad in the winter but I don't plan on driving it around much (although gotta be the car for having some drifting fun!).
Water seems to have stopped leaking from the jacket/block (possibly through rust build up! but i'm not complaining and possibly a candidate for a k-seal test) and no steam espacing anywhere... Also no combustion gas's in the coolant as I made sure to have a good look.
Still not managed to bleed the heater matrix at the front even with trying to pull a vacuum so must be blocked... thinking to drain the coolant (water and replace with something proper!) and then blow through the pipe with compressed air to try and dislodge anything that might be blocking the path.
Not sure if i'm being hopeful that the car might actually be finding its own way... maybe someone took pity on me and decided its time for it to work! lol. But definitely considering carb/fueling could of even been the issue in the first place... and perhaps the rings are starting to bed in nicely.
Had a few runs round the block whilst all this was going on... and even had a couple with absolutely clear exhaust fumes... Hopefully the smoky periods will disappear!
I have to say, the engine is very spritely and responds great with no flat spots and pulls very nicely! The second throttle opening works great to. As for the 20-50w mineral engine oil in the box (halfords made by comma) the gear changes were smooth and light
.
Now I definately need to order those gearboxs mounts.
Maybe someone can shed some light...
Thinking its time for another copper head gasket soon... and maybe try and get her in for an MOT asap.
A friend came with me for the ride... they were hilarious when I took a corner at 15mph they were acting like it was 50mph!
Feeling much better about everything finally... hope its not premature!
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After this I decided to plug in the color tune I bought earlier in the year from Rusty, to be honest it did not like it at all and started backfiring although when it did work... the spark was bunsen blue before the yellow balls of flame from backfiring appeared... this continued when I put in a dirty spark... but seemed to clear up after a while. I will only know if this problem reappears on trying to start the car again tomorro when its cooled down a little. But I think the spark was just a little fouled!
