Pardon this post if there is some redundancy to prior ones. I’m no mechanic so I need some things clarified. I’ve got a '70 E Type OTS, and recently bought the triple SU conversion kit FZX3060 from SNG Barratt. I also purchased the round canister air filter assembly and breather pipe. The current breather housing has a fat rubber top off of which a narrow diameter tube goes to the Strombergs. First, I don’t understand what an oil breather tube has to do with carburetors…it’s purpose? So, the obvious question, do I need a different breather housing to accommodate the wider diameter breather tube I recently bought? I see many that has an arch coming off the breather housing which, in turn, is connected to the wider diameter tube going to the air filter assembly. Along those lines, in back of the place where the canister air filter is mounted, is a “nerf football” sized black tank of sorts. What is that and what purpose does it serve? Lastly, if I need a new breather housing, (specifically what do I get?) what do I do with the other narrow pipe running along the left side of the engine going to the carbon canister by the battery? Oh…and very lastly…regarding the manual choke cable. I currently have two cables, one going to each of the Strombergs. What modification, or replacement, is needed for the triple SU’s? I’d like to have all necessary components needed for this conversion so my mechanic isn’t waiting for other parts, etc. Thanks a bunch!
Gary, I’ll try to help, but I have a’69 that came with the big round air filter canister. I reused the 69 oil breather tube, shortened it by an inch or two.
Every piston engine has some blow by (gases that sneak by the piston rings and into the crankcase). So you need to vent the crankcase to prevent it from pressurizing. You don’t want to vent it to atmosphere as it contains unburned fuel and oil. So you vent it in to the intake system to burn it.
The black tank behind the air cleaner is an oblong vacuum canister that helps to provide vacuum assist for your brakes.
Can’t help with the carbon canister. I don’t seem to have one. Just a lot of brake plumbing near the battery.
On my 69 I also changed the timing advance by using a series 1 4.2 distributor. It’s worked well with the triple SUs to improve drivability.
Gary,
Unfortunately, things are never quite as simple as they might be with E-Types! There were so many changes made, particularly during the period of early Federal Emissions regulations, that no single “conversion kit” will be equipped to handle all the variations, and from what I can gather, the vendors don’t make much if any effort to provide instructions for the kit. As you have a late Series 2, your crankcase breather is designed to connect to the carbon canister (fuel fumes) and later air intake. Hopefully you are not the first person on this forum to have tried to install this kit, and as a result, they may be able to offer specific advice. It would not surprise me if most of them have disconnected the carbon canister and removed it, but I will let them speak for themselves. The breather covers for 4.2 S1s and early S2s come up quite frequently on eBay, so that may be an option. As for the choke control, I’m sure that someone can advise on that, as all variants of the conversion would be similar in that regard. Don’t forget to include ignition timing in your conversion, as your original distributor would have incorporated vacuum retard, which you definitely want to remove, as well as a timing curve that is far from optimal for the SU setup. Good luck!
-David
Here is the Service Bulletin that explains the vapor recovery system for the 1970 E-type. I have a 1969 so I don’t have this system on my car, but the info will be useful for your car.
http://www.xkebooks.com/images/1970%20Specs.PDF
I agree with David Langley that most people probably abandon the Carbon Canister when converting to triple SU’s.
Good luck,
Dan Holden
Great info. This answers many questions recently brought up on several topics like ballast resistor ,cams and steering wheel lock.
Gary,
I suggest that you download the SNG catalogue: https://cdn.sngbarratt.com/catalogues/new/2019/CATE6-Download2019.pdf
You can often find a picture of a part there and then figure out what it does by its name. The vacuum canister being an example.
I also suggest that you acquire one or other of the workshop manuals if you don’t already have one. Either the quite adequate purple Haynes one, or the full green original service manual (or both).