After running the 2l Pinto engine for a couple of years it was time for a change... The standard 2l pinto left Ford with about 98bhp using a twin downdraught weber carb. At first this seemed like plenty in what is a light car. Certainly the torque is useful permitting lazy 5th gear drivability from 20mph. Still after a while there are always 3rd/4th gear moments that demand just a little more. The demise of 4 star was also a good excuse to go for an unleaded head. I returned from a visit to Vulcan Engineering (185 Uxbridge Rd, London) with the solution.

thumb The basic package consisted of a 2.1 litre SOHC (overbored 0.09"), Vandervell bearings, reground crankshaft and resurfaced block. Top end is their ported Maxiflow II head (45.5mm inlet and 38.0mm exhaust valves). Cam fitted is a Kent cams FR32 "fast road" (285º/280º Inlet/Exhaust duration) with .275" lift. The engine was run in using the standard carb. This was expected to run slightly rich - no bad thing for running in a tight engine. It was never rejectted because I happened across a pair of 40mm Dellorto sidedraught carbs.

thumb The next part of the story is familiar. Good opporunity to clean up the engine bay...

thumb thumb Due to the gearbox support forming part of the chassis the engine and gearbox need to be pre assembled.

thumb Not wishing to have another opportunity to clean the engine bay again in the near future :) clutch and release bearing were replaced too.

thumb Assembled with engine mounts attached ready to thumb ...drop in to the hole. It is a tight squeeze with some jiggling necessary to get the gearbox and sump to clear the radiator and lower scuttle area all at the same time !

thumb A couple of hours adding the ancilliaries - alternator, startermotor, inlet and exhaust manifolds, silencer (whinge again) carb, dizzy (eventually to be replaced by a Ford EDIS and MegaJolt), electrics and plumbing, set the timing roughly ...and not forgetting some oil and we are ready.

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And of course the battery is flat Doh! (spot the change!)

Following the advice given by vulcan revs held at 2000 for 10 minutes to let the new cam bed in and we are in business.

She wouldnt idle sensibily at less than 1100rpm but this was partly because the standard ignition timing proved too retarded at idle with the extra cam overlap (effectively lowers the compression ratio until the cam starts to work). This was fixed by reducing the slot width in the distributor to give about 14º at idle increasing to 37.5º at 3300 upwards. A year later having swapped to sidedraught carbs and therefore lost the vaccum advance I built an electronic system to let me program any desired ignition map -but more about that on another page. A weaker spring was also found to speed the off idle advance. This imporved idle and off idle performance and smoothness dramatically. Things were very tight for about 1000 miles and 5000revs wasnt attempted until 1500miles had been covered by which time smooth idle was reduced to about 800rpm.

thumb So what next? How about camping in Scotland. You might just spot my 'patented' luggage rack in this piccy. Big enough for a fortnights camping kit for 2. Hooks on around the roll bar. So now it is properly run in...