32 Greater 8 Distributer

[Deleted User]

My 32 Greater 8 has dual points and a fixed ignition point. Did they at a later date put some form of vacum/cntrif. advance on the eight, and if so would it be possable to adapt one to my engine? I have hopes of driving this to the national this year.

Thanks

Blackie

Geoff

The 8's did not use vacuum advance until 1948. It may be possible to adapt a 1948-52 distributor to fit your car, but I doubt that you would be able to drill into the heat exchange unit to get the correct positioning for the vacuum point just underneath the throttle butterfly. Putting the vacuum straight into the take-off point for the vacuum tank would not work, as this would give you maximum advance at idle speed, which is the opposite of what you want. The principle of the vacuum unit is to advance the ignition at light load under cruising conditions, to give maximum economy.

Geoff.

[Deleted User]

Geoff, thank you for the reply. I didn't figure on using the vacum tank fitting for the distributer, I figured to make a dummy flange to go between the carburator and the intake manifold, drill and tap it and take the vacum from there. Another question, will any of the later manifolds fit on that engine? I wold really love to get rid of the old up-draught carb.

Thanks again

Blackie

Geoff

Blackie, the problem you have is that the throttle butterfly is in the body of the heat exchanger, so putting a flange in between the carb and the heat exchanger won't work either sorry. The problme is exacerbated by the fact that the Marvel carburettor has a flapper valve, which is also activated br air pressure (vacuum), and the chamber between the flapper and the throttle will have differing vacuum from the intake tube and the choke tube. The vacuum hole has to be precisely placed on the air side of the butterfly for it to work properly. On those cars equipped with the vacuum advance, the hole is quite small, and placed just above (in the case of down-draught carb) the butterfly, so that the vacuum is picked when the throttle opens slightly. Unfortunately i don;t have a '30 motor to play with, so can't answer your question about interchangebility of manifolds, but it could be that a later one would fit. If you wanted to go down-draught you would have to do some butchery to the exhaust manifold and fabricate an elbow to replace the up-draught hot box. Not impossible, but a bit of mucking about. Good luck,

Geoff

Spencer Yarrow

Blackie,The complete inlet exhaust manifold looks like it will fit but the exhaust exit is at the front of the engine above the dizzy so that could be a problem.

Spencer.