The 1957 Dope Dauphine

[Big Steve - Raider]

Surely a rad’s a rad?? Hopefully it fits of a fashion??

 

[Adey]

Surely a rad’s a rad?? Hopefully it fits of a fashion??

fingers crossed, worst case ill chop some of the front boot out and fit it up there like the dauphine protos.

 

[Turbell]

Should be OK at back, obvs as OE fan is running all time, so don’t know if an electric fan will cycle on and off quite a bit hooked up to a rad fan switch.
I find mine either takes an age to get up to temp, or when it gets hot it takes a fair bit of moving airflow to settle it back down.
It’s boiled fuel in carb before and vapour locked itself when in traffic for long periods, but that’s probs down to ethanol in modern fuel?

 

[Adey]

So not much has happened really, starting to get to the smaller jobs. Parts deliverys are now slowing me up. The new condensers turned up so I fitted one of those so all the major ignition components are fresh. The drive belt arrived also so that allowed me to knock up a tensioner for the dynamo. This was just the original bracket flipped and bent then bolted though one of the engine mounts/engine cradle. Sorted the throttle linkage out with some threaded bar and 2 8mm sockets. The radiator hasnt turned up yet.... apparently theres a delay at the warehouse. I've removed all the old cooling system and bolted some aluminium channel to the gearbox. This will allow me to drill holes and mount the newer rad with its pegs and rubber bushes. I've also pigeon shitted the gear selector to a plate I made that then bolts to the gearbox selector. It's not pretty, I'm not proud of it but I did it upside down whilst fitted to the car. Seems to select all the gears nicely though. It's meant to have some rubber bushes in but mine were ruined so its solid mounted currently. I'll add it to the sort later list. The next major milestone will be the cooling system completed as I should then be able to test drive it. Give me another couple of weeks and we will be rolling

 

[Adey]

Exhaust ideas

 

[Turbell]

Cheap tack carbon bike exhaust along back.

 

[Adey]

Ive got a couple of big box's here donated by @Jezer101 that look similar, they just look huge when near the car. Unfortunately my phone keeps corrupting the pictures so i can upload any to show what i mean. The old dope exhaust is on for now but ill probably focus on the exhaust once the rest has proven itself. Had a text from DHL to say my rad will be here Monday. Ive just been out and tightened the rear hub nuts and fitted the wheels, popped the speedo cable in the box (though i dont think its the right one) and everything else is tightened up as far as i can tell. To have a test drive i need to fit the carb gasket set when it gets here, fit and the water system and fill the gearbox with oil. There's a list of other niggles but they are the majors to see if it all works properly.

 

[Adey]

 

[binge]

Holy shit balls! I didn't know these were rear engine. Never really put any thought into it really. Very cool indeed!

Defo wants a bike can mounted sideways across the rear of the car!
I used to run a Micron bike can on my Renault 5. Mounted conventionally of course. But the rolled tip used to sit so nice in the little arch on the GTT bumper. And being a carbon can, sounded soooo good.

 

[Adey]

Holy shit balls! I didn't know these were rear engine. Never really put any thought into it really. Very cool indeed!

Mounted with the engine hanging off the back, its basically a Porsche

 

[binge]

Haha love it!

 

[Adey]

Carb gasket set arrived today so I've fitted the required gasket to sort the leak followed by the radiator. It's nice and fits well but, it's a touch too tall really. My understanding is my header tank should right at the top of the system, the higher the better. I will get some hose so I can pipe it and and see how it fits as I need to find somewhere to mount it. I'm tempted to fit it against the rear bulk head in front of the radiator but topping up will require me to unmount. That said when doing it on a 5 I tended to unmount and hold it higher anyway. Hmm. I'll get down to forge in the next few days and see if I can grab what I need. Other than that it all fits up well.

 

[Adey]

looking around i have found inline filler necks, could possibly fit one at the highest point in the upper rad hose and just have an overflow pipe to a catch tank/bottle? Are they able to pull fluid back from the bottle if needed? Any know if its a good idea?

 

[Norwich Nick]

I think it would work, having the header tank higher reduces the chance of an airlock. Having the filler higher would help stop airlocks when refilling the system and an overflow bottle would be how any trapped air could escape.
It wouldn’t be able to draw any coolant back but as long as the overflow bottle has the right pressure cap it wouldn’t need too, you’d just have to check level after a few runs and top up as needed. it was a fairly common setup back in the day iirc.
That said I’m no expert in engine cooling but Jonesy on rr used to be so that might be the place to ask for a second opinion

 

[Adey]

That said I'm doing a little test over night. I've rigged up the header tank and bled the engine. With the cap back on in a sealed system the coolant level never changes irrelevant of how high or low the header tank is. Obviously because its sealed and under a little pressure. I will leave it over night at a height I'd mount it and see if anything changes. That in mind as long as the engine is bled happily and I only fill it when holding it higher than the engine I don't think the fitment height should cause much bother??

 

[Adey]

Ive kept the header as high as i can get it, effectively when bled there should be no extra air getting into the system apart from that trapped above the water in the header tank. The tank setup is a flow through as well so kind of like a swirl pot setup. Anyway i left it over night and nothing changed, so i fitted some more permanent hoses and bled the systems few times over and have ran it very hot (no rad fan or temp gauge yet) about 4 times today and it all seems to behave quite well. I can see the coolant level expand when hot and drop back down when cold. Ive knocked up a quick bracket to hold the header tank that i will tidy up at somepoint. I think i will give it all a go in the current setup and swap it if i have an issue. As i have the 6v dash and temp sensor i will "T" the sensor into one of the coolant pipes so i can get a reading on the dash. Will order a fan and other bits i need this eve.

I also need to look into the gearbox and clutch. From what i can see i am fully disengaging the clutch but when i try and select a gear with the engine running it just grinds. I really hope it just needs a little adjustment and its not something more sinister.

 

[Adey]

So i added some more adjustment to the pedal and it very much looks like I've got some major clutch drag for some reason. Jacked up I can get in the gears but even with the clutch depressed fully it's still driving the wheels, so much so I can stall the engine using my brakes with the clutch fully depressed.

Any ideas? answers on a postcard.

 

[Duncan Grier]

Assuming a clutch cable, has it stretched beyond adjustment? Anyway of spacing the mounting point to check if extra travel solves the drag?

 

[Adey]

I can view it underneath the car and its disengaging fully from what I can tell. So in my head the input shaft must be stuck in the flywheel?

 

[Adey]

I'll give it another look today before I condemn myself to removing the engine again to inspect it all