- sarah photos 2011 098.jpg (1.01 MiB) Viewed 9047 times
back on saturday from week in france with "Ruby" (our ex Russell gold coupe mk 3) - took a little while to get used to the amount of interest generated on french roads by a Midas- almost the norm for the passenger of every car overtaking us to peer across at our car and smile .
Quite funny to come back to the car in supermarket car park and find people looking at her !
Ruby went brilliantly other than 2 points on which I hope others will be able to help me?
First was on the way over - came off ferry (very hot day) and cruising on french motorway at 60-70 - pulled out to overtake up a long hill and without warning Ruby engine lost power almost as if running out of fuel - backed of throttle and pulled back in and after a few seconds the powerfade and uneven running went and all back to normal - same thing happened several more times over next 50 miles and then not again for rest of trip (and never happened before) - checked all that I could whilst away and nothing visibly wrong and had refulled from near empty just before boarding ferry - my guesses are that it could have been fuel getting too hot (was a hot day and engine running under load) such that it was not getting through quick enough when under most demand and hence once it missed for a few seconds and car had slowed down a bit - fuel supply caught up with demand - or could it have been muck in the fuel lines ? any suggestions please on what I ought to check (mind you having done c 350 miles since without missing a beat hoping it is a self fixing problem!)
Second point was on saturday night on way home from ferry port - typical was dark - wet and pretty yucky weather and stopped off at son's to drop something off and on getting back into Ruby - dead on key - bump started and carried on remaining (fortunately only 15 miles) to home and whenever I put mainbeam on radio display faded out - realised it was a charging fault and effectively running on battery but made it home with lights and have now checked and found drive belt very slack - guess this meant when alternator on load (as it would have been that night) belt slipping and alternator not charging hence battery running down - seems to make sense to me ,
reason for slipping belt clear on inspection - one of the lugs forming the casting of the alternator casing has sheared off so alternator loose hence belt loose - magnet test shows casting is alloy (or not iron) - looks to me like should be straightforward to have welded back up - is this something any welding place should be able to do or is alloy welding very specialised?
thanks all
ps small world - stopped in honfleur for lunch and found space in busy carpark next to triumph TR - french one left hand drive