The block (an engine minus the cylinder head) is the building basis for the engine, any other mods are immaterial if this is badly or incorrectly prepared for the increased power and revs you will be gleefully subjecting it to.

        Thank god the block is made of good quality cast iron and will be more than capable of handling the extra power, the crank, rods and bearings are our major concerns.

Have it chemically cleaned as per the introduction.

Demon Tweaks:

        - The central main bearing oil way is the same diameter as the others in spite of the fact it provides oil to both the central con rods. You can by gently tapping out the distributor bush from the bottom of the engine drill the oil way out to 5/16". The passage is a dog leg shape and needs to be drilled both from the bottom of the central main bearing and the side of the block. You should use a thin stick to measure the length of the `legs` of the passage and put a bit of masking tape on the drill bit so you don't over cook it and bore a nice hole through the block!

Once done, very carefully and gently de burr the ends of the oilway.

        Also note that the distributor bush has a bit machined out to allow oil flow, you MUST put it back in facing exactly the same way as it came out otherwise oil flow around the critical oil gallery will be compromised.

        This is STRICTLY a mod for the nutter or serious racer and is undertaken totally at your own risk. More detail is available from the Triumph Official Competition Preparation Manual (available from the Triumph Sports Six Club (TSSC) in the UK).
If you don't know exactly what you are doing PLEASE DON'T DO IT!

Remember that this will create lots of mechanically lethal metal swarf, don't do it after you have just had it chemically dipped!

- If using a rocker oil feed then block off the oil feed from the rear of the block with a grub screw, tap the hole first of course. You should do the same to the cylinder head to eliminate that annoying back of head oil leak. As before this is a BEFORE cleaning operation and should under NO circumstances be undertaken with an engine not stripped totally and then taken off for cleaning. Also this is an `at your risk` one, if you want to do it but not yourself then get the engine builders to do it for you.

Other block operations:

        If you are fitting new pistons you will naturally get a rebore, the final crosshatch finish is essential to enable piston ring break in and good lubrication.

        The deck top should be checked to see if its dead level, it may require a minute skim, this is important to ensure a good block>head seal. Also perhaps get them to check if the deck top is parallel to the crankshaft axis. A really good outfit can fix this for you by taking a minuscule wedge shaped skim off the deck top if there is any discrepancy.

The Oil Pump:

        Regardless of which Spitfire engine you use fit the alloy bodied 1500 oil pump, it is superior to earlier models (as well as a bit lighter!) It bolts straight on to all models.
Improve its performance as follows:

- Reduce end float to a minimum by carefully lapping the body on a bit of thick plate glass with 1000 grade emery paper.
- Check that the ends of the rotors are smooth and burr free to reduce the chances of them `picking up` some bits of end plate.
- Check that the new pump outlet lines up with the feed hole in the block, you never know with Triumphs!

The Sump:

        For fast road use Triumph Tune recommend baffling the sump with 2 vertical plates (with some holes drilled through them) welded to the bottom of the sump (inside it!) facing left to right. Also weld (or screw in) a horizontal plate with a hole in it just big enough to let the oil pump pickup through.
These mods eliminate (almost) the problems caused by oil surge. This is basically when you take a fast long corner the oil all slops to one side of the sump and starves the pump. The same thing happens if you brake or accelerate violently.

        For full competition use they also recommend increasing its capacity by cutting the bottom off the sump and welding in a 1" strip of metal all the way round. Be very careful if you do this!

If your welding isn't up to it you should be able to braze it successfully.

The Oil Filter:

        As standard the oil filter slowly drains back into the sump. Better ones with anti-drain flap valves are available. Expect to pay more for these but it is worth it. This is why most sensible engines have filters mounted vertically down, consequently they don't need anti-drain valves.

Dry Sump Lubrication:

Dry Sumps: £500>1500

        In a dry sump engine the oil is stored in a separate tank, there are usually three scavenge pumps that suck oil from a special sump pan. A separate external oil pump lubricates the engine. This is the ultimate way of avoiding oil surge and provides the best lubrication system.

Kits are available to suit any engine in existence if you must have it.

Don't even bother thinking about it unless your a totally mad racer or have too much money.

Choosing a Camshaft:

- What is a camshaft?

        The camshaft is a crank driven shaft upon which there are several small elliptical `cams`, through the rockers these push on the valves at various predetermined intervals. This lets air in and exhaust gas out, the exact timing of these operations is critical and any change in the valve timing has a profound effect upon the behaviour of the engine.

- Why do I need a new camshaft for race or even a fast road Spitfire engine?

        You don't need a new camshaft for tuning Stage 1 which will still provide you with about 15 Bhp more than standard.
Only when looking to surpass this is one required. The standard cam is well designed for providing a nice easy to drive all round engine that your Granny can still cope with (well maybe). If you are reading this you probably don't really care about 'nice all round' and would like perhaps a little more top end urge to the car.

        Camshaft changing is just a compromise game, there are NO super smart cams that provide 50% more top end power AND still the same low down Torque. They don't exist and anyone who says otherwise is either lying or a bit dim.
If you want more top end the cam will give but only by sacrificing the low end Torque, the secret to choosing the cam is being realistic about what you need the car for and not going nuts.
A more radical cam simply either keeps the valves open longer, opens them further or often both.

- OK here is my list of cams, what do all these daft looking numbers actually mean in the real world?

If you get some data from the manufacturer / distributor on their cams they should supply a list of figures on each one.
These will include valve Timing, valve Lift and should also include the Power Band in Rpm of each cam. Remember that the higher valve lifts reduce valve guide life once lift approaches about 0.29".

The figure 18-58 for example means that the inlet valve is open from 18 to 58 degrees of crankshaft rotation.

        For a 1500 my personal choice and recommendation is the Fast Road 83, for a 1300 you may like the Fast Road 89 providing you have Weber carburettors. These cams will provide up to around 120 Bhp in the case of the 89 cam while not turning the car into an undriveable monster.

        Below is the list of figures from the Triumph Tune list of camshafts in ascending order of top end output, I have included a short note on each for its best use. If you have an alternative camshaft supplier you can draw similar comparisons by getting similar specifications to the ones below.

        I think that Triumph Tune use KENT CAMS as their supplier. PIPER also make cams for the Spitfire.
KENT have a bigger selection as far as I know but PIPER cams should also be top class kit.

      I would like to bet you didn't go above 5000 Rpm and mostly stayed at about 3500 Rpm average. Be realistic, a race cam will be terrible to drive on the roads. Imagine having to rev up to 4000 Rpm EVERY time you leave the traffic lights etc.
Fuel economy will also suffer badly from a race cam, the 83 and 89 cams can still provide 30 Mpg with twin Webers if you drive carefully. If you like the extra power they provide and really hammer it fuel economy can drop to 20 Mpg.

As a point of interest a full race Spitfire engine driven on track can get to much less than 10 Mpg!

        Some manufacturers like KENT CAMS do cam `kits`. These include the cam followers and matched valve springs for the cam. This can be good as it ensures you get the right components to work together in harmony properly.

Engine Bearings:

Bearings are designed to be softer than the rest of the engine for two reasons.

1: To let them wear out first as they are cheaper to replace than a crank
2: To let metallic particles which are encountered be imbedded in the soft bearing and so not protrude to scratch the crankshaft.

        The high performance variety are harder than standard to cope with the higher stress, this makes them more susceptible to metallic particles. Lead copper ones are the best variety for this purpose and Vandervell make very good ones. Apparently these really good bearings are getting harder to find these days.

Again make sure that the oil supply holes in the bearing shells match up to the oil outlets in the bearing housings.

        Be absolutely sure when installing bearings to treat them with the sort of respect you would treat a one million dollar glass vase. No scratches, no dirt and absolute precision.

Non essential (but useful) operations:

-The main bearing housings can be line bored or line honed to make sure they are absolutely dead aligned and circular. The machine shop should be able to accurately measure it up to ascertain if this is needed or not.
- The block can be machined to accept camshaft bearings if it does not have them
- The block can have the centre main bearing bolt holes bottom tapped and longer bolts fitted.

        The longer bolts MUST be of the type designed for the purpose, even very high quality bolts will often not do. Grade 8 is the term often used for such bolts, I admit to being less than sure of exactly what Grade 8 means.

- Using a countersink drill, or large drill bit take the top couple of threads out of the main bearing cap bolt holes to place the stress deeper into the block.
- Use higher quality main bearing cap bolts (available from Rimmer Brothers UK)
- Polish and shot peen the main bearing caps, this will make it more difficult for cracks to start in them. To save money polish them yourself and have the shop shot peen them, a high mirror gleam is pointless as the peening will dull the finish anyway.
- If you really fancy being `super fly` you can if you are lucky persuade the shop to fit full circle thrust washers, hey presto double the bearing surface and half the wear rate. The bearings are softer than the crank so I wouldn't worry about crank wear.
- They can also `pin` the thrust washers in place to stop the old "falling out and wrecking the engine" routine.

The Crankshaft:

        As with the block its good quality and on the 1300 even to 9000 Rpm the standard crank can be used providing its properly prepared, the 1500 one is fine too but if you insist on having a 1500 and trying high revs a steel billet one made from 4340 Chrome Moly steel can be made.

The only minor problem with that is that it can cost £1500 for one.

Generally do the following to the standard one to ensure no expensive bangs at high revs.

- Have it ground and the journals micro polished
- Have it Nitrided or Tuftrided to improve hardness
- Take a small fine grinding stone to the oil outlet holes in the crank and chamfer them very slightly so that the outlet opens out a little and has no sharp edges. For goodness sake don't slip now, cover the journals up with masking tape to give a little protection should the worst happen.
- Remove all rough casting flash from it and smooth off (carefully) any sharp corners
- You can have it indexed which makes sure that the crankshaft throws are identical and correct for each small end journal.
- For outright race use having the main bearing journal oilways cross drilled will provide superior lubrication at high Rpm.
- Have it balanced AFTER you perform any of the above operations! If you don't its back to the balancing shop with your crank....

Harmonic Crankshaft Damper:

        I have never seen one of these made to fit a Spitfire but with a certain amount of ingenuity I'm sure one could be made to fit.

        What they are: They are an addition to the front engine pulley (sometimes they are one unit with the damper having a groove for the fan belt too), they contain a sort of high viscosity liquid which somehow absorbs vibration and makes the rotation of the crank smoother. These can extend bearing life very beneficially, most V8 engines have them as standard.

For example a new one for a Chevrolet V8 is about £80.

The Flywheel:

- The purpose of the flywheel is to provide a nice point to mount the clutch, put a starter ring on, and to smooth the engine at lower rpm. To disappoint you lightening the thing will not make the car any more powerful.

- Lightening is only to make the engine spin up faster. Useful for racing or with a medium amount taken off nice for a fast road car too. The 1500 flywheel can have more taken off than the 1300 ones which require fairly minimal work. About £60 for a lightening session. This is not work to be taken lightly (sorry I couldn't resist that one), an operator who is not very clever can fatally weaken the flywheel by taking material off the wrong bits. Obviously the greatest gains are made by removing metal as close to the edge of the flywheel as possible.

- Ultra light Steel or even Aluminium ones are available for the Spitfire, these will make an idle speed of less than 1500 Rpm horribly lumpy. Hence serious race cars only, expect to pay anything up to £500 for one of these.

- To fix a flywheel on (to avoid the scary steel Frisbee effect) use ARP bolts. These are about £15 a set.
If using the standard flywheel for race use then you can also have it and the crank machined to take additional dowel pins.
Along with ARP bolts (usually of at least 200,000 PSI strength) you can look forward to a race without any low flying car parts decapitating spectators.

The Clutch:

The standard clutch should be just fine for all but a race engine, uprated ones are available for around £120 each.

        Some racers have the flywheel altered to fit a Ford Escort clutch, Ford Escorts have the same gearbox input shaft spline pattern so its just a bolt on mod once the flywheel is altered. Like everything for Fords these are always dirt cheap.

        Have the clutch cover plate balanced along with the crank etc. It should have been finely balanced at the factory but remember the `golden rule`. There is no guarantee that the locating dowels on the old flywheel are perfect.

The Connecting Rods:

        These are fine for moderate fast road use with better con rod bolts, they are also fine for more extreme use provided you prepare them properly.

- Please don't use the standard bolts on a high output engine, it will break and better ones aren't really any more expensive.
- NEVER EVER use con rod bolts more than once, they are designed to stretch once torqued up and must be thrown out if disassembled afterwards.
- Have them checked for straightness, length between centres and ovality
- Polish lengthways the main arm (do NOT remove any more material than is necessary for a smooth finish).
- Do NOT alter in ANY way the small oil feed hole in the tip of the small end, its diameter is surprisingly critical for proper lubrication and any alterations may prove dangerous.
- Remove up to 20% from the small and big end caps
- Equalise them around the joint between big end cap and con rod.
- Have them shot peened
- Don't bother polishing any other areas of the rods
- Use UK Ford Sierra/Escort COSWORTH connecting rod bolts, they are good for 200 Bhp in their home engine so use with confidence. Also about 1/3 the price of ARP specialist hardware. Available from BURTON POWER UK @ £3.16 each.

- New forged steel ones are available from about £550 a set of four. They definitely won't snap but since the standard ones are fine for almost any application (providing they are suitably prepared) you should ask yourself why you need them.
As so often don't even entertain the thought unless you do serious racing.

        There is some talk in the Triumph Preparation manual about using oversize MGB bearings for the big ends, I have never heard or seen anyone attempt it so I wouldn't like to say if it is either beneficial or advisable. Jon Wolfe (1999 TSSC Champion Spit Racer) advises to be wary of much of the contents of the Official Prep. manual. Until reliable contradictory evidence becomes apparent I wouldn't personally try it. The idea was that MGB bearings are a little wider than standard ones. The crank small ends required a special non standard diameter grind so you can't even try it for a laugh at the weekend.

The Pistons:

- Good quality AE Hepolite standard pattern pistons: £130 a set

- Forged race quality pistons: £450>600 a set

- Hypereutectic pistons: £250 a set.

The poor pistons have a terrible time, forced to be thrown up and down at high speed then heated up to high temperatures and covered in carbon.

Standard (NOT ones with split skirts which are too weak) will be fine for road use.

        Forged ones are only for race use as they expand more on heating and so require bigger clearances to avoid seizure. This results in oil consumption that is just not acceptable for a road car.
        The very best non forged ones are called Hypereutectic. This is not a brand name but refers to their structure which is sort of a half way house between forged race pistons and road ones. They are also about half way between in price too. As before only really bother with anything other than good quality standard ones if racing.

    Have them balanced to within 1 gram of the lightest piston and carefully sand off any sharp edges on the crown, sharp edges heat up more easily and so can cause fuel pre-detonation.
        Pistons have offset gudgeon pin bores to cut down on piston slap, they MUST be fitted the right way round in their bores. Some performance pistons have centralised gudgeon pin bores and so obviously do not have any preference to fitting.

        In the BL preparation manual it states that if you bore the block out to +40 thou then standard TR6 pistons can be used. These pistons are strong and quite light too. The only problem with this is that you must have 20 thou taken off the top of each piston and have material milled off the top of the engine block. In the case of blocks with head gasket recesses this means getting the recess re-cut. I am quite dubious about this move and can't at present recommend you try it.

        After you have paid for this lot I'm not entirely sure of the benefits of such a move. There are different procedures for installing these pistons in Mk3/Mk4 and 1500 blocks. If you really want to do it buy the BL Preparation Manual.

Piston Rings

        Piston rings seal the gas and control oil loss, some people have suggested removing a ring to reduce friction on a race engine. I do not in any way recommend this even for such a purpose.

        You should also measure the end `gap` of the rings in the new bores before assembly as the correct gap will ensure optimum gas seal and oil control.

        To do this insert the plain ring into the top of the new bore and square it by pushing it in a little with an up side down piston. Measure the gap with feeler gauges and cut with a very fine file as appropriate. Be sure to remove any sharp edges after such an operation.

        Clever but very expensive piston rings are available called `Total Seal`, these claim to offer almost total seal of gas. I have no idea how good they are. I think it's about £100 for a full engine set of these rings, they claim a 5% power increase.

Camshaft Drive Gears & Chain:

        Camshaft drive (notably in performance engines) is critical and an incorrectly fitted or a failed timing chain can slam the pistons into the valves. When this happens at 7000 Rpm I leave the rest to your imagination.

        So fit a duplex timing chain, this just means it has two not one row of sprockets and needs a duplex set of gears too. You have two choices, fit the system from the TR6 engine which will be cheap (relatively) or fit a new system.

        The new system has a big advantage, it has a vernier scale adjuster which means you can alter the timing to exactly where it needs to be. You cannot do this with the standard or TR systems, it is essential for 100% potential power release. The bigger chain, gears and tensioner all fit happily and snug in the standard timing chain cover.

Modern Ultra High Tech Tweaks:

     Have the valve seats machined on a `Serdi` (or similar) machine, it is so incredibly and deviously accurate that no valve lapping is needed which increases useful valve seat life by up to 100%.

     Get the pistons, valves and exhaust ports ceramic coated. This keeps the heat where it should be and increases power by up to about 5>10%.

     Have the entire engine and gearbox cryogenically supercooled in a computer controlled liquid nitrogen freezer. It is an advanced form of treatment which has a very similar outcome to heat treating (except you don't get distortion). It increases material strength and wear resistance by a high level. Used by top NASCAR and F1 teams the technique was pioneered in WW2 in aero engines (wasn't it all?) but proved difficult as the accurate computer control of temperature drop and rise was not available. The liquid nitrogen does not actually contact the parts but just cools them slowly and at a set rate.
For the metallurgists it converts an Austenitic structure to a Martensitic structure which is considerably harder. I was concerned about this as a Martensitic structure is also more brittle than the more malleable Austenitic structure. I called company and after a long chat and the requested press clippings I was a believer. Beware that the components to be treated must be totally dismantled first.