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Kelvins OTHER SD1, The Vitesse


kws

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Thanks guys. I have somewhat become addicted to these silly lumps of British metal. My EFI is still a gorgeous car, but the sound the Vitesse makes is just an eargasm.

And no, wasnt too bothered by mechanical issues. Its easier to get a whole Rover V8 than to find Vitesse interior bits, so thats a huge relief.

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^ Clint beat me to it. In relation to your shaking steering wheel, I would damn near put money on it those tyres have flat spots from sitting in the same place for too long, unfortunately you can't fix it once it has started. Easiest way to check for you is bolt the wheels off your other Rover, before forking out to have them balanced.

They do look quite old too?

Nice find on the dizzy, Im surprised the previous owner hadn't tried it himself!

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2 hours ago, cletus said:

let the air back out of the valve to lower it again.

theres a minimum recommended pressure, I think its 15psi

Tried this with a pin but didnt work, will try with the tyre inflator tomorrow. No idea what brand the shocks are yet, so dont know what the specs for them are. They were dead empty when i got it.

1 hour ago, CUL8R said:

^ Clint beat me to it. In relation to your shaking steering wheel, I would damn near put money on it those tyres have flat spots from sitting in the same place for too long, unfortunately you can't fix it once it has started. Easiest way to check for you is bolt the wheels off your other Rover, before forking out to have them balanced.

They do look quite old too?

Nice find on the dizzy, Im surprised the previous owner hadn't tried it himself!

The tires are quite old. Not sure how long it was sitting in one place for, but you could very well be right since its rego has been on hold since 2013 and the fuel was varnish. Good tip on swapping the wheels over, will give it a try at some point. Its not too bad, but quite noticeable at lower speeds.

The previous owner tried swapping the whole dizzy, but as i have that spare dizzy in the parts box without a cap and rotor i do suspect he swapped those parts over, thus carrying the fault with it. The rotor physically looks normal, so no idea how its failed. He has said that the actual fault is intermittent, and the starting issue wasnt the actual fault he had (apparently the starting issue happened only recently). I knew it had a different fault, where the car will begin to misfire after a period of time until you cannot give it any throttle, but im 90% sure i replicated it yesterday and it hasnt happened again today since replacing the rotor. I need to keep testing it and then head down for a WOF check to see what i need to do.

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Also, i have a pair of what appears to be new old stock Monroe standard shocks. They are in mint condition, but i can compress and extend them by hand, albeit reasonably slowly. That doesnt seem normal to me?

Theyre blue, but have no stickers or anything on them. They were in monroe boxes that were moisture damaged and i cant see any identifying model numbers.

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35 minutes ago, kws said:

The rotor physically looks normal, so no idea how its failed. He has said that the actual fault is intermittent, and the starting issue wasnt the actual fault he had (apparently the starting issue happened only recently). I knew it had a different fault, where the car will begin to misfire after a period of time until you cannot give it any throttle, but im 90% sure i replicated it yesterday and it hasnt happened again today since replacing the rotor. I need to keep testing it and then head down for a WOF check to see what i need to do.

This is exactly the problem I had with the hunter that went away after I replaced rotor too. Been sweet ever since. 

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2 minutes ago, locost_bryan said:

Faulty repro rotors seem to be a widestream problem in the UK.

Cheap chinese clone distributors in general seem to be causing widespread issues in the SD1 community. Thankfully the Vitesse has an original Lucas (haha, "thankfully") one and the EFI has the chinese one (being used only to drive the oil pump due to wasted spark coils but worked mint before that).

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3 hours ago, fuel said:

Pics don't work on your last update broseph. Says can't establish a secure connection to your site, regardless what browser I use. 

/maybe it's just me.

Damn. Sorry, did some changes on my site that must’ve borked it. Should be ok now. 

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Old man had a Vitesse when I was a wee lad. Max pines. Don't think I have seen any locally since he sold it ~20 years ago. Can't be many around these days! 

I laughed at your garage entry conundrum, he had the same issue and had to pour a small concrete slab so he could get it in the garage. 

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According to my records i have 7 Vanden Plas EFI, 16 Single Plenum Vitesse and 3 Twin Plenum Vitesse in NZ. There are no doubt more hidden away in garages that i havent spotted, and some of these cars have since been scrapped or taken off the road. Not many of them are on the road and being used regularly.

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