PeteStupps

Ah I caught most of that last night, very thought-provoking. On the XR subject, there is definitely a strand of their activists who are just rent-a-mob anti-establishment types, with a new impervious barrier of XR to hide behind. Not saying it's a large strand but they inevitably take attention away from the well-intentioned normal folk, and alienate everyone who isn't sympathetic to start with. I'm not a fan of XR but am not hostile to them. They camped in two parks near me in London last year and left both spotlessly clean when they departed.

To be fair I have no idea about PS or SP but GT popped into my head when I read your description. It's surprising how sensitive some people in the car world are about these things.

There's a bloke round the corner from me who's been doing classic-EV conversions for a couple of years. He also owns a mk3 Spitfire but isn't on about converting that. He says you should budget around £20k* for a conversion. Which is too much for me! https://londonelectriccars.com/ https://m.facebook.com/LondonElectricCars * edit: his website says £12k for the most budget option.

I think SP was alluding to GT (see some of the old threads on head mods if you haven't already) who could occasionally be described as "disparaging about other people’s modifications whilst being a zealot about his own."

PeterC - is seat recession a result of micro-welding then? I didn't realise that. I've been running my Spitfire on unleaded (97 or 98 RON) and its exhaust valve seats had some very clear and consistent damage which maybe looked like microwelding. See pic below. I hadn't noticed any recession when checking valve clearances though. My pal uses a Midget (A-series) as daily transport and must cover 20k or so a year, up and down the country. He was sceptical about VSR until about 2 years ago when his exhaust valve clearances abruptly started shrinking every time he checked them. His conclusion was that lead-memory was real and he had eventually used it all up. So I don't think VSR is imaginary but whether it's a problem will depend on your mileage...

I came across this article almost by accident last year, and wondered why it hadn't got more coverage. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-50712500 After the bit about burning wood pellets, it says Drax is doing a pilot project that currently captures one ton of carbon every day. For reference, the internet tells me the average deciduous tree in Britain takes 100 years to store that much carbon (presume that must include attrition of all the saplings that don't turn into trees). Further down the article it says Drax receives £2m a day from the humble taxpayer. I would venture to suggest this would be a good place to spend all those offsetting pennies.

Just on this point, there are indeed losses all the way through your electricity generation, distribution, and end-use, but there are also 'losses' getting fuel from the oil field to your inlet manifold. If you tott them all up in terms of CO2 equivalent impact, my understanding is that electricity is comfortably the cleaner option. You're right to point out all the issues though, it's not going to be easy or cheap. I work in electricity distribution and was slightly involved in early stage design of the UK's first (allegedly) proper grid-scale battery a few years ago (see https://www.solarpowerportal.co.uk/news/ukpn_puts_landmark_leighton_buzzard_battery_up_for_sale). The main thing holding these back here seems to be regulation / cost; the first couple of years of operation it was able to pay for itself but then they (Ofgem I presume) slashed the rates for providing services (like fast-frequency response) to National Grid. Hence it's not really financially viable at the moment, without the right sweeteners from UK PLC. It's still operating though, and interestingly the degradation of the batteries has been much less than expected - like less than half what the manufacturers told us. This is an important finding from the project, because it improves the business case for large-scale lithium batteries.

This is a good point except for one element - the contrast between efficiencies of internal-combustion engines compared to CCGT generators means that you're still better off using a fossil-fuelled grid to charge an EV than you are burning petrol in an engine - in terms of CO2 emissions anyway. I'll try and dig out a reference when I get home, but this a point that I came across a few years ago doing power systems at university. Diesel and petrol engines are shockingly inefficient at converting hydrocarbons into motion, it turns out. Average something like 10% in real world conditions I seem to recall. Better in winter as the waste heat is useful. Generators can do better because you can run them at a fixed speed.

I believe that you're supposed to fit a G59 or G99-compliant relay between your battery and the incoming supply, as for solar panels etc, which opens an isolator if it detects a significant change in supply frequency (ROCOF protection) so this should not generally be a problem. Things aren't always installed correctly of course...

That sounds seriously crap, and surprising. I would definitely try and get the local MP on side if you can, at the very least they will contact DFT on your behalf, and whatever response DFT give will have to come through the transport minister. Doesn't mean anything positive will happen but it can't hurt.

Ah, oh dear! Yes that would be the 18-58 timing, which is presumably the same as you already have in the engine. You know what the next suggestion is going to be: can't you return it to Mike Papworth? If it's not what you thought you were buying. If you do get your money back there are 'new' Mk3 cams listed at Wins International http://www.winsintltd.co.uk/engine-parts4.html. Might be worth giving them a call to clarify what timing they are though. Pete

https://tecb.eu/onewebmedia/Triumph_Spitfire_mki_ii_Parts_Manual.pdf See page 80 for cam part no's, if it's any use!

That's interesting, where did you get hold of a NOS mk2 Spitfire cam? I was under the impression (from a parts catalogue available somewhere online) that the Mk2 cam is the same as the Mk3. Presume yours has got a part number which is not 212164..? There are 3 part numbers listed for Mk1-Mk2 cams, I reckon the low-lift ones were all Mk1. I am a novice in terms of tuning so don't take my word for it, but 9.75 static CR seems a bit high for that cam. I am aiming for 9.5 on my Mk3 Spitfire head. But I'm a coward.

The Samsung blu-ray / smart TV box thingy I bought in 2018 suffered the same fate in December! I bought the flipping thing cos our telly was too old for all the streaming stuff. Very annoying. Will have to stick to books instead, no software updates required (just the occasional eye test).

I suppose if they were significantly lighter you'd have a lot less reciprocating mass, so the crank wouldn't get as stressed, so you could rev it a bit harder. But probably not much in reality! This is something I was thinking about yesterday. My FWD engine needs a rebore after the exhaust valve breakage, but I don't really know how much so will have to take it to the machinist before buying any pistons, then he'll have to wait for the pistons to arrive before doing anything with the block. Sam I just checked my 'glovebox' workshop manual for the 1296 and 1500 Spitfires and it says: "Piston clearance in bore --------- 0.0009 to 0.0024 at bottom of skirt" [inches] So for a rule of thumb, I'd call it 1 or 2 thou! Interestingly the piston diameters are quoted at top and bottom, and they're slightly smaller at the top - didn't realise that. And the tolerance is tighter at the bottom. For example, a Hepworth grade F piston is 2.8752" to 2.8799" at the top, and 2.8976" to 2.8981" at the bottom Pete Edit: the dimensions in mm are given as follows: Cylinder bore: 73.66 to 73.64 Piston top dia. 73.15 to 73.03 Piston bottom dia. 73.61 t0 73.59