The Peerless & Warwick Discussion Forum

Dean · Status: Offline

Do any over off the shelf headers fit?

mikerf · Status: Offline

Dean, I suggest you have a word with SU/Burlin who are/were developing a modern DU4 & 6. I know there was a TR3 that sported a pair of these strange beasts a few years ago. a race car, I believe.

If anyone knows if there is a stock manifold that fits, it will be the people at Burlin. But don't expect a quick answer. I've been chatting to them about my twin HS6 set up and they sometimes take a bit of time to get back due to Covid-19.

Erik V · Status: Offline

4 SU carbs on a TR engine, quite an impressive sight.

mikerf · Status: Offline

The DU6 was actually a twin choke carb, Erik. So in reality only 2. The plan was to develop a rival to Webers DCOE carbs but was surprisingly unsuccessful. Hence the reason they're rarer than hens teeth. Still looks very nice, though.

Erik V · Status: Offline

Ah, I've never known that.

They look great.

Every day you learn.

Dean · Status: Offline

These are rebuilt and ready to go. I had to cut a few new gaskets, but the good part is I did that with a computer program, so I can make millions for all the DU6s in existence. While the bodies are unique, the brass bits all cross to available parts.

I have an intake manifold that should work, it is the exhaust side that I am not sure of yet... I am worried that the long tube header will drag on the ground.

Dean

Greg Haskin · Status: Offline

Dean, you already had "the most unusual car" award locked up with the Warwick, now you are just showing off.... Can't wait to hear how these carbs perform.

wingleton · Status: Offline

Hi

They look great!

Attached is a picture of Paul Hogan's TR3S tribute from 2015 when it was running DU6's. It looks like it has a narrow pully conversion and is running an alternator which could make a difference.

I have a Phoenix performance exhaust manifold which fits ok between the engine and the chassis frame but I run SU's. These are available off the shelf in the UK.

Will

Brewco · Status: Offline

Hey Dean,
sorry, don't know of any off the shelf units that would work, but with your fabrication skills and a little ingenuity ( which you've shown you have repeatedly ) I'm sure you could make some up that would clear everything necessary. Bye the way, with what little I can see of it in your pic it looks as if you have a pretty snazzy shop to work in, did you have to build from scratch again or did your new place already have the existing workshop? Anyway, good luck and as always progress is looking good

Wayland

nigel c · Status: Offline

Dean, they are like rocking horse S**T! you jammy bu**er. I know a guy who has a pair and I am one of many that are circling his place like buzzards just waiting for him to sell. disbelief I could ask him what he ran them with/on etc if you want??

I think my 4 into 1 is a Phoenix stainless steel manifold as well. Clearances are OK but I am thinking of dropping down to a smaller alternator as it gets very hot and I have already changed to the high torx starter motor ......just because the old one caught fire

which was not nice evileye .

I have a couple of second hand units and contemplated fitting but after the fire and inaccessibility of it I thought to hell with it and just bought new. it is very good and smaller too.

mikerf · Status: Offline

Did you know there is a DU6 carbs Facebook page?

Dean · Status: Offline

I did not know about the FB page. I am not a FB user, so I'll have to sit with my better half and convince her to look at carbs...not likely.

I think I am hearing that a possible solution is the Phoenix long tube headers with an extra heavy ceramic heat coating and maybe a few heat shields. Hmm

mikerf · Status: Offline

Tbh, Dean, there's really not much to see on the FB page. I only looked as a result of reading this thread.

Re the Phoenix manifolds, I too have one fitted and, by the look of some of your photos, would guess that it might well be a contender. I've also got a pair of the Moss s/s heat shields but doubt they'd be big enough to protect your DU6's. Making up a heat shield yourself shouldn't be too much of a problem though.

Dean · Status: Offline

Thanks Mike. I am going to buy the Phoenix header. Probably from Rimmer if it isn't too expensive to ship to the US. I can't find anyone in the US that carries it. Good tip in the heat shields. Sounds like I'll need to protect the carbs, starter and generator. Nothing is simple!

nigel c · Status: Offline

I have to say it does dump a s**t load of heat in the engine bay. I wrapped mine initially but was not happy with it and it likely to become a wick when getting oil/petrol etc on it.

I did have a gig lined up that would have got it ceramic coated as a test bed but that fell over

I'm thinking "when" I drop the new engine in I'll get it done but the waiting time last time I spoke to them was 3 months! I guess I could by new, get it coated so its ready to go and sell my old one?

I have a rebuilt overdrive gearbox sitting here already waiting for the "big day" evileye

mikerf · Status: Offline

I'm not a fan of wrapping manifolds either. I did this on the s/s manifolds I fitted to the Essex V6 on my old Se5a. It was an all weather daily driver and the wraps were usually wet/oily/dirty/coming loose. Whilst the Peerless won't be a daily driver it will get a fair bit of use but I'm still not going down that route again.

Dean, I concur with Nigel. The Phoenix manifolds do give off a lot of heat and that's before I even get the body on. I'm not too worried about the alternator as it's a bit away and in the 'wrong' direction to the manifold but I am seriously contemplating some sort of shielding for the starter motor.

Do Moss in America not carry the Phoenex range?

Frank · Status: Offline

I would caution about using the Moss TT manifold. They are a fair bit cheaper than the Phoenix and period correct, but the fit is challenging to say the least. I expected a bit of cut and shut to clear the chassis, and this is easier with single tubes, but the fit to the head is not great. It doesn't hang as low as a Phoenix either, and there's loads of clearance around a geared started and mini alternator, so I don't use a heat shield. Photos if required.

F

Dean · Status: Offline

Moss in the US doesn't carry the Phoenix header... So I get to pay international shipping. I lined up a shop that can ceramic coat them in flat white. I have a set of headers for my Lotus 2.0L that I can take in at the same time and get the V8 price:)

A friend said his Phoenix set is 1.5" below the lowest part of the oil pan. I can probably live with that. The measurement that concerns me is the starter clearance. He said it allows 8" of clearance to the bell housing and my starter is longer than that. I am hoping he can't use a tape measure. I don't want to switch out the starter, but if I have to I guess I can.

My son is making me a drawing for a set of wedged shaped gasket plates with o-rings so I can tilt the DU6's up a bit and clear the brake box. The wedges on the head side will be aluminum. The spacers between the carb and manifold will be phenolic.

I am trying to make this as complicated as possible. So far I am succeeding.

Dean

mikerf · Status: Offline

You'll need to be mindful of under bonnet clearance if you tilt them upwards. There's very little clearance even with a normal inlet manifold at the top of the dash pots. There's been a fair bit of chat on here about the space under the hood. The other alternative is, of course, hashing the hood around to suite.

mikerf · Status: Offline

I take all that back. Completely forgot this is on a Warwick. No idea what the under bonnet clearance is like and my thoughts were based on my own Peerless experiences.

-- Edited by mikerf on Friday 26th of June 2020 09:00:42 AM

Frank · Status: Offline

No, you are right. Under hood space is no better on a Warwick, in the carb area it's even worse, because it doesn't have that blister that Peerless have.

In fact the top of the front carb is in contact with the hood, and the float of the rear HS6 is in contact with the chassis, so there is no movement possible in any direction unless you mount the whole body up a bit higher. Nigel says that Dolomite sprint carbs have a shallower piston chamber, but Ive never found the part number for them. I'm seriously considering going for DCOEs, if I can get them to clear the brake pedal mount.

F

Dean · Status: Offline

Looks like these boys got them to fit under the hood. I don't think I see a bump in the hood and I don't know if they took a little out of the pedal box...

Dean · Status: Offline

So I am learning a little about TR3 starters... The header says it fits the "Long type" starter only. Perfect, I have a humongous starter. It is really long. I can't see how my starter can be any longer, yet it isn't a "Long Type". It is in fact a "Bomb" starter which is LONGER than the LONG starter. So I have to locate a short starter called the LONG TYPE, right?

On the Long (shorter) starter I see that the starter gear pulls into the flywheel from the back instead of getting pushed from the front, so don't tell me that my ring gear is now on backwards...

Does any of this make sense?

Dean

mikerf · Status: Offline

Do you know if your ring gear is the shrink on or bolt on type? Given it's a Warwick, I would assume bolt on but that could be a dangerous assumption. Bear in mind that the number of teeth on the ring differ between the two.

Re the starter motors, as far as I'm aware both the bomb and the long operate in exactly the same way.

Dean · Status: Offline

Mike,

Not sure if the ring gear is bolted or shrunk to fit. I replaced the clutch and rebuilt the trans a few years ago, but no photos of the ring gear...

I found this on the interweb... I don't know if it right. I think if I committed to a gear reduction starter it would engage from the same direction as the bomb starter, but it is so modern...

Dean

Dean · Status: Offline

Mike Mike Mike!

You are correct. I see that the shrink on ring gear is one tooth less than the bolt on. I found my receipt for the shrink on ring gear (Moss part no 590-000), so either the header fits, or I need to get the a high torque starter for an early TR3 (pre ts50000). Thank you for steering me in the right direction!

Dean

mikerf · Status: Offline

Dean, if I were you, I'd double check by counting the teeth on the flywheel by looking through the casting on the bellhousing where the starter fits. I did this by putting a spot of Tippex on every tenth tooth (so I didn't loose count). Having said that, it's also fairly obvious if it's bolt on. Getting the wrong starter can have fairly severe consequences. Unless your receipt is recent, I wouldn't assume that it still has a shrink on ring.

I fitted a hi-torque starter and, tbh, it can hardly be seen down in amongst all the other bits. Highly recommended.

nigel c · Status: Offline

just catching up on this one sorry!

Yes there is a one tooth discrepancy (for some unkno.....oh hang on, its Triumph)

so do I read this correctly Dean, you have a bomb starter but a shrunk on ring gear? if so I think, in time, they would have chewed each other up???

IMHO go for the hi torque starter......it does sound like an F1 car in the pits the first couple of times you use it but then, at our age, you forget what it did sound like originally but do remember it turning over a lot slower in the past!

gives you more room round the 4 branch manifold. Just been out to look at mine and I would say I have a good 3" all round clearance using this manifold and starter arrangement......tried to take a pic but doesnt really work.

On the carb side of things I was given a later inlet manifold by a TR Guru and told they are better for air/fuel mixture etc due to the extra length. I fitted it and this threw everything out...but yes, I persevered blindly on for ages and made a whole new air intake which does work well and gives me "clean air"

Took it to my mate who was going to rolling road it and he sent me away again as he noticed the wedge shape blocks on the manifold to carb that I had made to get the bonnet clearance etc and he said the float chambers need to site level no matter what the carb is doing.

I hadn't really thought/noticed this area...so I had to get the section from the float chamber to the carb body cut, rotated about 8* and then re welded together disbelief

What a pa-lar-va! all works fine now but would I have done it, in hindsight.....

you can see the wedge blocks and the float chamber to carb angle in this pic and also the Dolomite tops that give more clearance too.

Also, just gone back and looked underneath, my down pipe levels out and in the horizontal area it is level with the bottom of the sump, it doesn't drop below it.

IMG_20200627_112455 (Large).jpg IMG_20200627_112551 (Large).jpg

Erik V · Status: Offline

Very nice setup Nigel,

Looks like you made some special air intake contraption?

Is the airfilter positioned in the nose section of the car?

nigel c · Status: Offline

yea, it always seemed to suffer from poor starting once hot, I assumed under bonnet temp was high at that point so I wanted to get clean air to the carbs as much as possible and there was no real way round this and keeping it looking standard.

In the end, running and running well is more important IMHO than kicking it in the guts repeatedly only to have it cough and splutter for ages before catching and firing up.

This seems to work very well and with modern fuels running hotter it will probably be the future.

The two TR6 felxi air intakes are mounted to a fixings I made to bolt onto the air filter mountings on the carbs.

They then pass through the flitch and hook up to a larger diameter cross tube that runs down the inside of the inner wing (USA read: fender) and into a matching dia flexi tube to then go through the existing front wheel arch inner panel.

this is the view from behind the headlamp.

then I made an air box in the front panel/nose with two intakes, One from the radiator mouth and one by cutting the back out of the headlamp bowl. Large K&N filter fitted (where no one can see it!)

By making the box I was trying to make a water trap to reduce possible water impact/suction in flooding/deep water/heavy rain etc....I have "tested" this twice since!

The copper tube "thing" was my idea to try and use up the breather oil gases from the rocker cover and draw them in through the air intake but evenly between both carbs.... the bit at the end is me trying to make a venturi type effect in the airflow.....dont know if it works but the rocker cover is clean and so is the oil filler cap and not that much cream cheese coming from the crank case breather either (after 70,000 miles).

this exits through the black panel at the back which is fixed to the back upper section of the rear part of the wheel arch panel near the peddle box (on RHD cars) so not really seen either.

DSC_1326 (Large).JPG