Rover time, Part VIII: Fuel, ignition and coolant

I spent a good part of the weekend, and nearly all of my day off Monday, getting bits and pieces of the Rover reassembled. I had rebuilt the carburetors months ago, but that’s only half the battle – I also had to reinstall them on the intake manifold, reassemble the linkages and make what adjustments I could on the bench. Rover never seemed to take the simple way out. See that black cylinder between the carbs? It houses a big spring that can be adjusted to make certain that the carburetor bodies are perfectly square with the manifold. The carbs attach to a metal adapter, which mounts to the manifold with – what else? – big O-rings. The Rover engineers never saw a piece of machinery that couldn’t be improved with two or three O-rings.

Thanks to Rover enthusiasts Dirk Burrowes and Steve Manwell, I got a big CARE package of Rover parts last week. Among them were these intake manifold gaskets. The 4-into-2-into-1 exhaust header is factory Rover. I had had it brazed where it had cracked; you won’t see any of that once the carbs and their heat shield are reinstalled.

Here the carburetors are back home. The only fiddly bit was getting the accelerator linkage lined up.

It took me two tries, but I got the distributor installed the right way ’round. I think. The factory manual called for setting the engine at TDC, but with the number 4 cylinder on the compression stroke, and lining the distributor rotor up with the number 4 spark plug contact. I don’t know why they do it that way instead of using number 1….

Another rare example of forethought: I had the radiator cleaned out a few weeks ago by a local shop. Good thing, because they found a few small leaks, too. Should be all set to go.

Here’s how things are looking. I really like the looks of the 2000 TC’s engine bay, with all that shiny aluminum. All I need to do now is to install one more coolant line, plug in the spark plug wires and reconnect all the loose wires, and I should have a running engine. No promises, but I’m hoping to have the car roadworthy for Dirk’s big Rover show this month.