We had a thoroughly enjoyable day at Stanford Hall in the '53 and it sailed back 140 miles up the motorway without missing a beat and was put away. Here we are 5 weeks later and today I went to get it out of the garage to give it a clean before a father's day event at Harewood House in Leeds tomorrow. It wouldn't start!

I started with the ignition system. I have a spark to earth at the coil HT lead when I disconnet it at the distributor, I have a spark at the HT leads when disconnected from the plugs and a nice spark at the plugs. The plugs are a good colour and the gaps are ok. I have fuel, and if I disconnect the fuel line from the carb and turn the engine over there is a good supply of fuel being pumped by the pump. I have had the carb off, blown down the jets with a bike pump, checked the needle valve and there is no fuel inside the float itself. The accelerator pump is working fine and the level in the float bowl looks about right.

For completeness I checked and adjusted the valve clearances and the ignition timing seems okay (see below).

After significant attempts at starting the plugs are still dry. I've had someone squirt a couple of pipettes-worth of fuel down the carb with the throttle open. This doesn't have an immediate effect but if left, about 5 minutes later the engine fires or runs for a very short time before stopping. I therefore thinking it's a fuel issue but where?

Any ideas what I might be missing please? Help!!!!:?

Thanks,
Martin

If it starts after manually squirting fuel down carb and then stops it must be fuel related. If the plugs are dry this would suggest the same. Is the bottom of the float bowl clean?

When you pump the carb can you see the fuel squirting down the carb?

Thanks for the reply. Yes the bottom of the fuel bowl is clean enough and I can see fuel squirting down the carb when I pump the throttle.

Cheers,
M

Clean points and check gap and static timing, pump the carb a few more times, if the engine isn't firing and fuel is going in the plugs should be damp after a few attempts.

sounds like the carb needs taken apart and cleaned out.

Jon had something similar with the '56.

It turned out that there was a split in the manifold and air was getting sucked in weakening the mixture.

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Thanks all. Well I finally sorted it, after seemingly exhausting every avenue including another known good carb, it turned out to be a loose screw/bad connection on terminal 51 of the voltage regulator. Looking at the wiring diagram for a '53 I still haven't quite figured out why this should make a difference though?