After many years developing Rolls-Royce Meteor engine with twin turbos, firstly with Merlin Stromberg carburettor then to Motec electronic ignition and injection and management system running on avgas fuel.
This was an enormous step without big money to throw at it. I was lucky to have Motec’s amazing staff, Mark McCoy and Steve Toth. They explained we would require knowledge and experience of Bill Croft – Unicap QLD. He is renowned for sorting out anything that is different! Our local best mechanic Woody was just like a fox terrier who wouldn’t give up till perfect. My brother Ray worked alongside me through the whole modification. John Wellwood, with his wealth of Merlin experienced helped me enormously. Thanks to Peter Taylor – supplier of those valuable parts. These people made it possible to modify an amazing old engine to perform with current technology.
This current engine has been built to eliminate some of the problems we found with original engine with extensive improvements to induction system, exhaust manifold and quad cams driven from the rear of engine. We changed the fuel from Avgas to Methanol.
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Credits:
Top video: Mandy Bonat
Bottom Video : The Carlective
Music Jade Hurley
Down in the Riverina By Jade Hurley
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Crankshaft has bob weights. We are running Henk Pastoor conrods – beautifully designed and constructed – a credit to him. We now direct oil supply to the main bearings and we fitted cylinder block strengthening bars.
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The original front accessory drive was replaced with gear drive for fuel pumps, water pump and electronic sensor pickups.
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Quad Cams are now driven from rear of the engine.
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Rocker covers are now mounted on extensions from cylinder head to timing case.
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The cam drive gears have an adjustable Idler gear to set gear backlash if cylinder head height is changed.
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Cam Drive housing is separated from cylinder head to allow for heat expansion.
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We machined camshafts and valve bucket housing. These quad cam assemblies were mounted on original cylinder heads requiring minimal modification to head.
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Our past experience with installing electronic injection we found the Siamese induction port in cylinder heads caused fuel robbing.
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We installed a 10 mm plate to cover this large Siamese port and the cavity behind this plate was filled with resin. A “D” port to each valve head was constructed.
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All threaded valve inserts were machined out and new inserts were fitted. Inlet and exhaust valves were replaced with Chev valves. Double valve springs were also fitted to increase seat pressure. All head porting was carried out by Tony Knight Engines in South Australia.
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Inlet manifold sections were cast and machined to suit “D” port in cylinder head.
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Plenum was built to house twelve trumpets to manifold sections.
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Twelve atomiser injectors are mounted midway in trumpets. Inlet temp is logged by sensor in plenum and below injector in manifold.
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Mounting plate was machined to suit exhaust port in cylinder head and manifold tubing. “6 Boost” in Brisbane designed and built both beautiful manifolds.
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We built a flywheel and bell housing with the transmission brake.
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Five plate centrifugal clutch was constructed and fitted.
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Quick change gearbox was built firstly twin shaft and secondly counter shaft was constructed.
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With this current engine I had an enormous learning curve. This engine now is my third build and probably been three years of recuperating. After the last blow up I was going to scrap the whole project but a friend, Glenn Simpson from SA had a seized tank engine and donated this engine to me and made my last build possible.
When I said blow-ups, I mean broken conrod destroying crankcase, cylinder blocks, pistons and sometimes the crankshaft.
I believe failures were due to lean fuel mixture and ignition timing. To solve fuelling problems I found it necessary to install larger injectors. This require changing the management control from Motec M800 to M150. We can now, with sequential injection and 12 EGT sensors alter fuel delivery to each cylinder.
Thanks to Springy Motors Springvale for installation and Simon Phillips Ballarat for his tuning experience.
We are getting encouraging logging data but still require further development.
I have so many to thank for their assistance with the Riverina Screamer –that valuable (can’t do it without them) transporting and pit crew. The amazing people I’ve met and friends I have made over the years and I thank them for their interest and encouragement.
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