7sRWild Posted December 6, 2012 Share Posted December 6, 2012 Well said wuv... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Verona Posted December 6, 2012 Share Posted December 6, 2012 Just to put Meakins experience in context. If you're going to rebuild a x-flow and buy parts on ebay I'm not surprised it failed. Burtons have all the quality parts you'll need. Yes, they may be more expensive but they will work to spec and not let you down. I've worked on and rebuilt x-flows for many years and find it one of the most reliable engine in 7s. Of course, as you increase power, and more to the point, use it, reliability will suffer. Even with that they can be extremely reliable. And I may as well get flamed so.... You need to know how to build a performance engine, it needs some education and a good engineering background. Of course many here rebuild their engines sucessfully and I'm sure they have learnt what to do. But many blame engine unreliability on poor builds. OK, said it - again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meakin Posted December 6, 2012 Share Posted December 6, 2012 Actually Norman that wasn't what I said. I pointed out that parts are either an "ebay gamble or expensive specialist" I never said that I bought mine from ebay. I went expensive specialist apart from parts which were waaaay out of price range (eg £500+ quid for a standard cylinder head - is a lot compared to cylinder head for zetec) and those were checked by a garage/"specialist". However you are taking a gamble that they might miss something which is what happened to me. The point I'm making is that you can't just pop down your local motor factors it has to be specialist stuff. Which can be expensive. The second point was in my experience is that the xflow is not very tolerant compared to a modern engine. 0.5bar diffrence is not that much but on a xflow its the difference between seized engine and non-seized engine. ie xflow hot idle is about 1bar and fine. Whereas a modern zetec is 1.5-2.0bar and dangerous is 0.5bar so you get more leyway/warning if something is wrong. Hope thats clarified what I was saying. Paul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ALLADDIN Posted December 6, 2012 Share Posted December 6, 2012 so to re-cap all the above. a x/f thats been rebuilt recently with new or reconditioned parts by an experienced engine builder , isnt too highly tuned and doesnt get thrashed to hard or go too far will indeed be reliable (probably). those not described above leak oil, blow exhaust flanges, overheat, breakdown and generally behave just as they did when first fitted to mk2 cortinas. dont let that put you off though Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenandmean Posted December 6, 2012 Share Posted December 6, 2012 Have to jump in to the rescue of the old x flow, mine has only let me down once (battery fault) in 3 years, 196 bhp red lined at 9250, never had any problems with exhaust gaskets (or any other for that matter) does not leak oil. It replaced another x flow engined car that I owned for over 19 years and sold earlier this year, that had a refresh (converted to run unleaded, new bearings and shells only) after 8 years of ownership, and 11 years later had never been touched with a spanner not even to adjust the tappets. This includes 6 years of speed series, if thats not reliable I apologise for this post. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alexander72 Posted December 6, 2012 Share Posted December 6, 2012 I love my x-flow and it makes a lovely noise lugging my bulk around Curborough... :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cjwood23 Posted December 9, 2012 Author Share Posted December 9, 2012 Thanks again for the replies guys. What about using unleaded in these? Have most had conversions or is it a case of finding lead additive? Thanks again Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geoff101 Posted December 9, 2012 Share Posted December 9, 2012 If it hasn't been converted then officially you need additive but my tuner told me that there's not much point as it will take tens of thousands of miles to do much damage by which time you'll probably have rebuilt it anyway. Too much additive is easily done with such a small tank and that fouls the plugs and gives running problems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Verona Posted December 10, 2012 Share Posted December 10, 2012 Paul, sorry, Iread it as parts sourced on Ebay. So, your unreliable engine was due to the engine builder "missing" something. (However you are taking a gamble that they might miss something which is what happened to me.) There are a few experienced engine builders who have experience of crossflows. They will not "miss" something and if they do, they will put it right. Unfortunately Roger King no longer rebuild engines. He was recognised as the man for crossflows, K series and VX. And of course BDs. I was well trained on BMC A series engines and, in particular, reshaping the heads, However I passed my BD to Roger as he has the required experience. Engine rebuilding and power increase is mainly about experience given a the builder has a high skill with engines. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Norman Verona Posted December 10, 2012 Share Posted December 10, 2012 Forgot to say that the main skill needed to rebuild an engine is - patience and lots of it. It is a slow methodical job where care is needed with every part of the assembly. A correctly assembled engine, with all parts and flanges aligned will produce more power than one just bolted together. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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