Uncategorized – Page 24

The sound of a toasted Sprite gearbox

July 15, 2016 by bugeyeguy

Every Sprite gearbox has some wear, and they do just fine if you are nice to them, even when they are worn. In fact, “Gumby’s” gearbox has been whining more than normal in first gear since 1978, but with no additional grinding, it has lasted just fine for 36 years, and hasn’t gotten any worse. But a lot them get abused due to operator error, and this is a sore spot for me, because it’s a lot of work for us to build inventory of rebuilt gearboxes, and to get good gearbox parts. If we could all learn to love these wonderful little gears, they would last just fine, but due to operator error, many boxes are failing before their time.

(Rib)Case in point, the car featured in this video is a recent acquisition, and the gearbox has a bad noise on deceleration in all gears. It sound like a loose gear tooth is rattling around inside– a remove and rebuild is required. Take a listen, and please join the army of educated British car drivers who are most kind to their gears.

There is absolutely nothing to be afraid of or intimated about with a non-synchro first gear. Just be at a standstill before engaging first and/or reverse, and all else will be fine!

Bugeye Police Force

July 14, 2016 by bugeyeguy

Here’s one final note about Bill’s stolen Bugeye which was recovered last week at the San Francisco airport. One of our readers “Elliot” saw our announcement that the car had been recovered and wrote with the note and pictures shown here, of the car parked at the airport, where it must have sat for a while before the police intervened.

“That’s crazy! I saw that bugeye parked in SFO parking lot and took pictures because (a) it was immaculate and (b) I was surprised someone would drive a bugeye to the airport and leave it there. They did however leave the tonneau nicely zipped up. It sure didn’t look abandoned!”

We were impressed that one of our readers saw the car before the police recovered it!

Stolen Bugeye Recovered!

July 8, 2016 by bugeyeguy

Good news about the stolen Bugeye we built that was lifted in The Bay Area… police found it in a San Francisco airport parking lot and it has now been returned to its owner. “No damage,” he reports! Here’s the car at the impound yard where he recovered it…

Blown and injected Bugeye heads to Michigan (with new o2 sensor)

July 8, 2016 by bugeyeguy

Here’s our super Bugeye on the lift gate loading for the trip to the midwest. This nine month project has come to an end, leaving us with lots of great new options for future Bugeyes. We were sad to see it go!

Before the car left, the last thing to do was add an O2 sensor into the center pipe, so that the fuel injection can adjust fuel delivery after accurately reading what is coming out the exhaust pipe. If you are unfamiliar, the original set up relies on the pre-mapped computer program and is automatically edited based on information received from the temperature probe, throttle opening, crank sensor and altimeter. The o2 sensor supplements that information and allows the computer to edit the fuel needs based on what is actually coming out of the combustion chambers. This is a great upgrade to an already impressive system.

In order to accomplish this goal, we need a way to read the exhaust coming out of the tail pipe, so we weld a bung into the main pipe and then hook up the oxygen sensor to that. Here are some pix of Russ welding in the bung, which in turn allows access to a wealth of new information to help the system automatically manage the fuel flow into the engine.

Fun Sunbeam Tiger exhaust grunt

July 8, 2016 by bugeyeguy

Here is a quick video of The Sunbeam Tiger’s V8 grunting around a turn. Click here for the whole Sunbeam post, this wonderful car is for sale!

Rare two-seat tri-carb Austin Healey 3000 Mk2–one of just 355

July 1, 2016 by bugeyeguy

We just completed an interesting project with this 1962 Austin Healey 3000. The new owner had been looking for a two seat tri-carb car, of which they only made about 355 (most were 2+2). We found this car for him in Minnesota, had it inspected by a local big Healey expert and given the high marks, shipped it our shop in CT. Here we customized the car to the new owners specs.

One of the biggest challenges was removing the head and putting in hardened valve seats. I encouraged the client to leave it as is, simply because we didn’t want to remove the head of such a museum piece unless we absolutely had to. But he insisted, so we very carefully unbolted the entire top end and had the head machined.

He also wanted zip-off seat covers, a trunk mat, bags for the top and tonneau and a hardtop rack with cover, all of which we put together here. New wheels and radial tires as well as a smaller diameter wood steering wheel also went on, as did a spin on oil filter and pertronix ignition per his request. And we checked over and sorted anything else that needed it.

Now, this is a stunning concours car can drive anywhere. It’s absolutely beautiful!

We have a somewhat similar two-seat 1959 100/6 for sale, in Colorado red, in similar condition! Click the picture of that car (left) if you would like more information!

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