1974 Dolomite Sprint

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Hooli
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by Hooli »

I'm suspecting it just scrapes 60 in 2nd myself, so time lost changing gear.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by PhilA »

Hooli wrote: Tue Jan 05, 2021 2:31 pm I'm suspecting it just scrapes 60 in 2nd myself, so time lost changing gear.
Not quite, the Dolly Sprint can get to about 55 in 2nd before hitting the red. It's got quite a low ratio diff to make it feel a bit more sprightly.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by Hooli »

Fair enough, I've never driven a Dolly.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by PhilA »

Hooli wrote: Tue Jan 05, 2021 3:06 pm Fair enough, I've never driven a Dolly.
I went look up as many videos as possible of people driving them 0-60 as I could. It appears to be a popular pastime.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by SiC »

PhilA wrote: Tue Jan 05, 2021 2:53 pm
Hooli wrote: Tue Jan 05, 2021 2:31 pm I'm suspecting it just scrapes 60 in 2nd myself, so time lost changing gear.
Not quite, the Dolly Sprint can get to about 55 in 2nd before hitting the red. It's got quite a low ratio diff to make it feel a bit more sprightly.
^^ I've seen this mentioned elsewhere. Also that the 3rd gear pull is pretty strong.

Knowing BL, they probably went past the red for the 0-60 figures...

And probably a blueprinted engine too.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by SiC »

Of course the Overdrive inhibitor could be removed too and that would give a few fractions of a second quicker to 60mph as a 2nd gear overdrive.

To be honest, its unlikely I'll be hammering this engine too hard. I'll use the full rev range on occasion, but I'll be all to aware that its an Slant Triumph engine with around 130k on...
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by The Reverend Bluejeans »

Chop Chop, there's welding to be done and Wobbaz to entertain.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by PhilA »

Oh yeah, any cars used for road test will have been gone over carefully for sure.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by AutoshiteBoy »

They used to go through the bodyshop twice and the suspension was fettled to make sure they sat right.
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Re: 1974 Dolomite Sprint

Post by SiC »

I had hoped to have a whole day working on this but unfortunately sorting out tax and my tax return took most of it. Got the week off, so I want to make as much progress as possible.

However this evening I got on with making a replacement for this piece. I haven't fabricated for quite a while and always find it's very time consuming. I don't have any proper shrinker, dollies or wheels. So instead I make it up of smaller sections that can be bent into shape. This is a pretty simple piece so possible to do it like this without it looking messy.
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From this piece I made up some templates and transferred to metal.
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Some bending and then many clamps over the old and new piece later, I had everything in place.
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With this all in place, I turned my welder down right low. I wanted to tack things in place enough to hold without clamps, but I didn't want to attach to the old piece underneath!
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Thankfully no penetration into the old piece.
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Then welded up the seam and ground back for a nice finish. Got pretty darn close to the original. It's a bit bigger as I having to replace metal that's missing. Lumpy bit at the bottom actually shouldn't have been welded up, that was accidental. I'll have to cut that apart and then use the excess to bend into shape on the sill.
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Mostly fits into place. Still a bit more to do filling the side you can't see. A triangle piece needs to go in so it fits the sill properly. Also the pillar itself needs some more metal as it's double lined.
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