Mk2 1.8 HL Automatic update

[balmy]

1st August 1979 onward is when cars have to be emissions tested. Before this date it's visual only.

August 1975 and before is visual only.


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[MarinaCoupe]

Sorry guys,

Visual test only if before 1st August 1975.

01.08.1975 to 01.08.1986 is CO not greater than 4.5% and HC not greater than 1200 ppm.

Here is an extract from the MOT inspectors rule book

Here is the full 'Bible'

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... -and-7.pdf

[Morris McKinnon]

oh. Has the date changed recently? I was always told it was 1979, even read it in Practical classics once.. though I haven't bought that mag for about ten years now.

[balmy]

oh. Has the date changed recently? I was always told it was 1979, even read it in Practical classics once.. though I haven't bought that mag for about ten years now.

Hasn't changed as far as I know and certainly not for a long time.

I find MOT testers never know whether to test or not. I've had it both ways-trying to test a pre '75 car and not testing a post '75 car!

[mickthefitter]

My MoT tester is 60 so he's been around for a while! He used to banger race cars like ours (well he said he used to banger race Triumph 2000s when I had one and took it to him) but he gets quite a few classics through his doors. I'm not sure what I'll do when he retires.

[david painter]

Has never changed since Emissions testing introduced back in the early 90's. Should never be tested on wrong dates. The dates for different tests are selected to the Gas Bench Computer with reg letters on first screen before car details are entered.
Dave

[Morris McKinnon]

Well, bloody hell! I always thought it 1st August 1979 I'll have to dig that mag out that says it was 1979 because it refers to a 1979 Vauxhall chevette. I remember it clearly because I had 79 mk2 Escort estate at the time which didn't get emissions tested the first year I bought it but did the year after and failed! It never ran right after that and swapped it for a mk2 Escort 1.6 Ghia... which was a W reg and never got emissions tested ever in the four years I owned it.

[david painter]

Shortly after the introduction of emissions testing, some old cars engines were alleged to have gone bang, whilst been tested. So emissions testing was suspended for a quite lengthy period whist the then Vehicle Inspectorate investigated the cause.
Dave

[PHUQ]

My '78 was tested under the regs Chris linked to and the '74 has always been visual only. Probably just as well really, I think it would have struggled...

[Morris McKinnon]

It always confused me since my older car got tested but not the newer one! This would have been around the late 90's early 2000's not 1979 I was one years old then!

[PHUQ]

That is slightly bizzare!

Well done on getting it running by Mick, and the MOT.

Must admit we thought the Dolomite was pretty good but after getting it set up properly on a rolling road it made a pretty big difference, in that case we lost the big flat spot in the mid range. Again twin SUs, but an AC Delco dizzy (which is more of a pain to set up than a Lucas one, due to parts availability as much as anything else). Fuelling was almost spot on but the filter was strangling it and the advance curve was waaaaay off.

Hopefully you'll have similar improvement after your man has done some fettling- even if he doesn't achieve perfection he should at least be able to point you in the right direction!

[mickthefitter]

I could have taken my Marina to him, or someone like him, last year, but you see with my so-called 'experience' of playing with basic four cylinder engines since my teens, plus an assumption that these days professionals with knowledge of setting up twin carbs would be few and far between, I thought I'd be better off and quite capable of having a stab at it myself. The only complication being two S.U.s rather than one. But it hasn't worked out that way. Plus of course, originally, the car wasn't only not running right, but it had an overheating problem, a knackered fuel pump, bodged starter circuit wiring, a broken choke knob...all things which made the car a bit of a liability to hand over to someone else to just do a tune-up job, so I persevered at my own pace to try to get somewhere, and certainly most of the other faults I just mentioned are now gone. But I just can't tune it up. Either Glyn will do it, in which case I'll accept that I'm just rubbish at setting up twin carb engines, or he will find out something else is wrong that I don't know about. It wasn't until I took my 'modern' to him for the MoT last month, when he asked about the Marina and said he wanted to see it, that it dawned on me he could do twin carbs because I mentioned the fact that I'd had a bit of trouble with the rebuild like with the missing idle speed screw, and Glyn said he'd probably got one somewhere and he'd got all the kit for setting them up. For what it's worth I'm 100% certain I've got the bloody things perfectly balanced with that German 'snail' shaped synchronometer, but of course Glyn has got to go through everything I know I've already got right to satisfy himself where he's at. Every renewable service item on the ignition is new, the dwell angle is perfect, the timing is what it is, set to the service manual values with a strobe at 1000 rpm, the carbs are supposed to be as-new, and it still runs like s--t. I can't do any more.

[Morris McKinnon]

Does the throttle return spring still have good tension? I have in the past fitted two small throttle springs as the original wouldn't pull the throttle all the way back resulting in high rev at idle. Even new springs tend to not be up to the job. I think it's just the way the cable is angled to the linkage. I have a pretty hefty return spring on my car which means the pedal feels hard, but you get used to it after a while.

[mickthefitter]

With autos and twin carbs the pedal feels very hard! There are three springs. The outer two, which are quite strong, act on each carb. The middle one, which is weaker, pulls on the linkage bar but is hooked around the cable clamp. Or at least, it is meant to be hooked around a small tab that can pivot on the cable trunnion. I had one when the carbs were sent away, but it didn't come back. The new shiny spring was hooked around a clearly used, re-plated trunnion pin. I bought new from Mini Spares, 'cos some Minis had two HS4s, and in dropping the spring hook-up point by a few mm by fitting the missing tab, the new shiny spring is now almost under no tension at all with the throttle closed - because the old tarnished spring must have been stronger. I did consider putting it back how Andrew Turner left it and disregarding my new linkage parts, but in the end I left them on because even stretched further by hand, the middle spring was no better at pulling the throttle stop lever against the choke linkage bar. Its only off by about 1/16" though and the throttle linkage bar wasn't under tension because the free end float clearance was easy to feel.

[mickthefitter]

Because the car is going in to be worked on on Wednesday, and it hardly had any petrol in it, I've just driven it to get some. Now how it has been left after having the mixture weakened to pass the MoT, by guesswork, it is really, really struggling to achieve 30 mph and is virtually stuck in second gear. Yes, it's going to get sorted, hopefully, but sometimes I think I can be forgiven for thinking nothing short of a heart transplant is going to cure this car. Apart from the totally smoked £400 Viva I bought in 2003, I've never bought a classic car that has been so completely useless at being a car as this one has been. And I know it is sacrilege to say so on a forum like this, but I completely understand why people buy new cars and scrap old ones. The youngsters who write for the classic car magazines now keep crying about Rover 75s being scrapped and reckon things like late 90s Fiat Bravos are good classic buys, and that everyone should drive a classic car every day and not buy new cars, but honestly, when they cease to be any use, people dump them and buy something that works. I get it. And yay, on the way to the petrol station, my bloody fuel and temperature gauges packed up simultaneously. This car never fails to depress.