Hi all,

Im new to this forum so please be gentle!!!

Right heres my issues i am the proud owner of a mk 5 cortina crusader ive owned it for 3 years and am slowly restoring it whilst using it every day, its a standard 1.6 pinto running a sierra 5 speed gear box and a sierra 1.6 twin carb and straight through exhaust from back box out, in other words no back box just a pipe. and has been running on this for 2 years with out any problems.

she broke down recently and the garage said i needed a service kit for the carb which i got and have done, it wasnt difficult and i have also changed the dizzy cap, rotor arm, points and condenser and spark plugs.

The problems i am having is poor idling and using a lot of fuel for example i put in 30.00 of fuel and i did 120 miles and its all gone.She used to get around 35 miles to the gallon which wasnt bad at all but not any more.

Also the car has always had that horrible pinking noise until I discovered that the timing had to be retarded to allow for unleaded petrol, that has been done and that horrible pinking noise has vanished completely. Now according to data i could find the timing for the 1600 pinto should be set at 6 degrees and had to be retarded to 2 degress to allow for the unleaded petrol. Is this right?? The car goes amazingly well when you put your foot down she is very extremely quick, yet at the same time shes a bit hesitant when pulling away slowly. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

many thanks

Matt

according to haynes, petrol ron 85+ and above the timing should be 6 deg timed with vac pipe disconnected.

according to haynes, petrol ron 85+ and above the timing should be 6 deg timed with vac pipe disconnected.

Yep thanks i know that already my manual says the same but if you google it it says it must be an extra 4 degrees to compensate for the lead thats missing from the petrol.....this is what im trying to find out.....

done some more digging and yes retarding the timing to 2 deg will stop the pinking but by doing so will affect running, the pinto was never designed to run on unleaded fuel and a lead additive should be used or damage could occur, hardened valves could be fitted to avoid this.

If the valves are ok, it could be play in the distributor throwing the points gap out, the advance and !Removed! mechanism sticking on the dizzy or the HT leads need replacing.

Sounds like a great project, so please keep us up to date on how its going and post some piccies up.

If the valves are ok, it could be play in the distributor throwing the points gap out, the advance and !Removed! mechanism sticking on the dizzy or the HT leads need replacing.

Sounds like a great project, so please keep us up to date on how its going and post some piccies up.

advance and !Removed! mechanism is fully functioning and the ht leads are new.......a quick up date i discovered that this carb only has a stepper valve and no choke its been removed and the choke flap has been flapping about causing the poor running i think since ive cable tied the flap up it seems to be running as it should but the fuel is still disapearing, could the straight through exhaust cause the fuel consumption issue???

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Matt-Ians-1982-Ford-Cortina-Crusader/128628707197278

http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fmatt-ians-cortina80.webs.com%2F&h=cAQES-vWm

check these out this is my baby x

Shes looking good.

Shes looking good.

THANK YOU SHES GETTING THERE SHE WILL BE PERFECT ONE DAY X