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Main and Big End bearings


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Car not run for many years but journals round and well within .001 tolerance. Thrust washers measured at standard! Looking for comments from the wise on these bearings. Know they are fubar'ed and looks like I need County HD bearings. Any recommended suppliers? Thanks to all. R

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These are old Vanderwells, not availiable today.

Tried to get similar from Revington but was fooled with a horrible price.

They advertise high quality bearings made especially for them at a high price and

blamed the KING not to be that good. What did they send? KING! (At the high price)

So beware!

 

The only alternative are the KINGs, availiable maybe from Wittor at a good price.

They are stamped COUNTY but are different.

County and King is the same factory in Israel.

Richard Good blames them to be a little bit under size.

Details can be read on his pages.

I have them in use with no issues.

 

As the bearings are opened I would change them although I did see worse items.

These three metall bearings show the copper when they are gone.

The shells here lost their top surface but are not worn to the copper.

Smaller scratches are not that bad, they come from dirt and often can be watched.

If the main surface is okay some minor scratches can be tolerated.

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These are old Vanderwells, not availiable today.

Tried to get similar from Revington but was fooled with a horrible price.

They advertise high quality bearings made especially for them at a high price and

blamed the KING not to be that good. What did they send? KING! (At the high price)

So beware!

 

The only alternative are the KINGs, availiable maybe from Wittor at a good price.

They are stamped COUNTY but are different.

County and King is the same factory in Israel.

Richard Good blames them to be a little bit under size.

Details can be read on his pages.

I have them in use with no issues.

 

As the bearings are opened I would change them although I did see worse items.

These three metall bearings show the copper when they are gone.

The shells here lost their top surface but are not worn to the copper.

Smaller scratches are not that bad, they come from dirt and often can be watched.

If the main surface is okay some minor scratches can be tolerated.

Hi Andreas!

 

County Pistons, shell bearings & oil pumps are they all made in Israel?

 

Bruce.

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Hi Bruce,

I had a lot of trouble with the KINGs.

To solve that I contacted a lot of people.

One was KING directly and from that I got my knowledge.

 

Do not know about pistons and oil pumps, maybe Chris Wittor can help.

I took the oil pump and reworked that the inner parts move without play

but the toothed area has to be taken as it is and there sometimes is

more play than recommended.

My piston choice is the VW or MAZDA piston and from that can not say anything about Countys.

 

Not to cause confusion with the KINGs my problem was that I got a set small ends for

the Spitfire and four shells loose wrapped in paper.

There are crazy stamps on it make it difficult to devide between the County bi-metals

and the KING three-metals.

 

I had to learn that from stamp they can not be devided, only from look and shine of the surface.

The look and shine also changes over the time they are stored. Absolutely not acceptable in my view.

KING promised to change that nonsense but I do not know if they did.

Anyway the shells I used gave no reason to complain and they are used up to 7000 rpm.

 

As I did not rely on sellers promises I bought two sets and grinded some of them down

with a 400 grid until I could see copper. From that I developed a feeling what bearing is

two metal and what is three metal. -Quite expensive in the end-

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From my grey cells (and they have been wrong before) - Neil Revington traced back the original factory specifications and found a current company that still had the spec and facilities to produce OE spec bearings for the TR6, subject to a minimum order quantity (a relatively big number!)............

 

"Tri metal bearings made to the original VP2 (as in Vandervell Products) specification and wondered if this might be something NSF might be interested in?"

 

Neil approached the SDF for a loan such that the required minimum number of sets could be purchased, and this was duly done and the SDF loan has subsequently been repaid.

 

I don't believe these were "King" branded, (perhaps they were sent in error), but I suggest if you want OE spec bearings for your TR6, my suggestion is that you speak directly to Neil Revington, and this is his quote:-

 

"purchase bearings in the knowledge that they were genuine AE products boxed accordingly."

 

Other brands are available at various prices............

 

Regards

Ian

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Hi Ian,

I have a feeling it was Mahle that Neil went to as they have the VP rights (I'm treading on dodgy ground here).

 

And yes, the bearing are very very good.

 

Having said that If you are not a racing fiend and enjoy touring then County work very well.

 

Roger

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"Tri metal bearings made to the original VP2 (as in Vandervell Products) specification and wondered if this might be something NSF might be interested in?"

 

 

That is what I ordered and what I paid for.

 

KING is what I got without a comment!

 

Beware!

 

As this is the third time I was not happy with the parts I will no longer deal with them.

 

I claimed that I was fooled and asked for a refund because Wittor offered them much much cheaper.

The answer was that the KING tri-metal bearings he offered are not tri metal bearings but bi-metals and that was it.

I did not want to have more trouble and left the things as they are.....

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Hi Bruce,

I had a lot of trouble with the KINGs.

To solve that I contacted a lot of people.

One was KING directly and from that I got my knowledge.

 

Do not know about pistons and oil pumps, maybe Chris Wittor can help.

I took the oil pump and reworked that the inner parts move without play

but the toothed area has to be taken as it is and there sometimes is

more play than recommended.

My piston choice is the VW or MAZDA piston and from that can not say anything about Countys.

 

Not to cause confusion with the KINGs my problem was that I got a set small ends for

the Spitfire and four shells loose wrapped in paper.

There are crazy stamps on it make it difficult to devide between the County bi-metals

and the KING three-metals.

 

I had to learn that from stamp they can not be devided, only from look and shine of the surface.

The look and shine also changes over the time they are stored. Absolutely not acceptable in my view.

KING promised to change that nonsense but I do not know if they did.

Anyway the shells I used gave no reason to complain and they are used up to 7000 rpm.

 

As I did not rely on sellers promises I bought two sets and grinded some of them down

with a 400 grid until I could see copper. From that I developed a feeling what bearing is

two metal and what is three metal. -Quite expensive in the end-

When I rebuilt my engine I got totally confused regarding King & County Shells having read the stories on the Forum. The machine shop that I went to had some NOS ACL/Repco heavy duty in stock so I went for them as he said that he had never had a complaint from any customer and the sizing was spot on. Now whether they are dual metal or tri-metal I do not know but he preferred these to County as there had been problems on sizing. Now concerning County Pistons he had used 1000's of these and never had a come back! The only time he had seen problems was with incorrect boring cylinders and gapping of piston rings by others. He weights all his County pistons per engine because in the distant past County Pistons have been all over the place including their ring gaps?

 

Bruce.

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Worth checking on EBay for NOS VP2 Vandervells, they come up from time to time, never cheap but at least you get the real thing, also Basil Adams, college prof. in the States has most of the Worlds supply of NOS VP2 bearings!!, once again never cheap. .... If the MG boys can have proper VP2 bearings from Mahle Racing (they own Vandervell now) why can't we? (4 pot and 6 pot)

Cheers Rob

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Worth checking on EBay for NOS VP2 Vandervells, they come up from time to time, never cheap but at least you get the real thing, also Basil Adams, college prof. in the States has most of the Worlds supply of NOS VP2 bearings!!, once again never cheap. .... If the MG boys can have proper VP2 bearings from Mahle Racing (they own Vandervell now) why can't we? (4 pot and 6 pot)

Cheers Rob

Hi Rob!

 

In the same vain as your post AE Glacier were bought by Federal Mogul and are now sold under the name of Glyco who seem to cover a vast range of car models! Has any one used their shell bearings. I have also confirmed told that King do offer lead/copper types? There is also another problem that some of the manufactures are moving away from lead content as it is a heavy metal and the EU wants to ban its use.

 

Bruce.

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Hi Rob!

 

In the same vain as your post AE Glacier were bought by Federal Mogul and are now sold under the name of Glyco who seem to cover a vast range of car models! Has any one used their shell bearings. I have also confirmed told that King do offer lead/copper types? There is also another problem that some of the manufactures are moving away from lead content as it is a heavy metal and the EU wants to ban its use.

 

Bruce.

I think Racetorations are now using Glyco for their high power engines or so I heard from Darryl when I was looking for bearings for mine.

Stuart.

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I think Racetorations are now using Glyco for their high power engines or so I heard from Darryl when I was looking for bearings for mine.

Stuart.

Stuart,

 

Looking at their web site they seems to be all lead free types used on 10 million engines per annum and they do not seem to do the 3 layer types only 2 layer? Have they got the thumbs up or down from you? I know that they manufacture standard size for a TR6 but do they do the under sizes as well ?

 

Bruce.

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I recently found a posting (from 2014) via Google suggesting that Mahle Racing would produce a limited run of any bearing in their past catalog in VP2 material (that's :- steel backed, lead/copper substrate with an Lead/Indium overlay) provided it was for a single size and a minimum order of 50 sets with a suggestion of a reduction in price for more than 100 sets. So it would be a big commitment for any of our suppliers, but if they could all be persuaded to order together?!! ...Who knows?

If you have a look through The Roadsters Factory essay on Vandervell bearings you will read what Kas Kastner had to say about anything other than VP2 bearings. The 6 pot bearings fit lots of the Triumph family of engines so there is plenty of scope.

Cheers Rob

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Anyone had any luck ordering through the Federal Mogul site? I can add bearings to the 'basket' and that's as far as I can get. The basket and payment details are nowhere to be found!

I was considering getting 2 sets of mains and 2 sets of B/E shells, my engine is still on standard shells, replaced with Vandervell 2 years ago, and I also have a spare crankshaft that is standard size.

Might be prudent to get some before they're unobtainable!

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I ordered a full set of bearings from Revingtons when they where available ,manufactured by Federal Mogul.

Mark

Federal Mogul only manufacture & sell Glyco Shell Bearings which are lead free and they cover the full range of 1960-1970's Triumph car range in 3 sizes: Standard,-.010 & -.020. as per their on line catalogue. How good they are I do not know? Bearing in mind that they also produce stop start shell bearings by the million. The distributor that I spoke to is selling them for the TR range and had 2 TR Customers waiting for stock to come in, which normally comes in in 2 to 3 days !

 

Bruce.

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Glyco is not bad, its simply a bi-metal bearing for lower load on the bearing.

Often the low compression engines used that while sporty engines had tri-metal.

 

I do not know why the TR6 standard tri-metal from Vanderwell was sacrificed and

these bearings for lower load are now widely standard? Normal County is the same.

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Glyco is not bad, its simply a bi-metal bearing for lower load on the bearing.

Often the low compression engines used that while sporty engines had tri-metal.

 

I do not know why the TR6 standard tri-metal from Vanderwell was sacrificed and

these bearings for lower load are now widely standard? Normal County is the same.

Vandervell were very much involved with formula 1 racing in the 50s & 60s this is where their tri metal shells where developed and on our engine test beds for formula 1 fire rings which we produced for most racing teams. We also ran these types of bearings on ordinary ever day car engines for test purposes for them. But you have to remember that the oil of that day was not as good as it is today. The Cooper S also used these bearings as well as standard along with other BL Cars.

 

Bruce..

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Hello, I'm always keen to learn something:

I try to understand the advantage of a tri-metal bearing as opposed to the bi-metal versions now more available for our cars; do modern cars still use this design?

These bearings operate under full lubrication, not boundary lubriation, so what makes the tri-metal bearing so desireable?

Do modern oils (but with zddp) help in this respect?

Thanks,

Waldi

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I fear they all do not like bad or missing oil.

 

The bearing is "surfing" on a film of oil and does not care

what type of oil it is. To bring the film to that position and keep it there

under heat, pressure or bad environment is the problem.

 

That is the purpose of the better quality of modern oil and the

requirements are changed from time to time. Can be found by the

API posted on it. API SD is older than API SF but take care!

 

Also bad requirements (bad for us) came into the API.

To take care of the CATs modern oil must not carry too much zinc.

Modern engines are constructed not to need zinc but our engines requires it.

So it might be better not to take the oil with the highest API but to stay below API SD

to get still enough zinc in the oil and the rest is pretty much sufficient for our engines

anyway as Bruce said, the oil got much better trough the years.

 

If fim is too thin or missing due to oil quality the bearing will come

into contact with the crank and will suffer. First the bearing has

something like a film on board to sacrifice itself for not failing.

But that must not happen too often because a bit of bearing is lost.

If oil is not back quickly the parts will weld together and that is the end.

 

The advantage of the tri metal is to carry a higher load.

Do not know where is the limit and what TR will need it but

I do not see any disadvantage for me except the higher price.

 

One disadvantage is that the "working" layer of a tri metal is very thin.

It can not compensate if something is wrong, especially when the rods

are some degree, what means nor degree but minutes, out of the rectangular

position. The aluminium layer of the bi-metal can wear at that position and

although that is not the perfect working condition it can continue to work.

So an old engine with some unrepaired unprecise details might benefit from bi-metals.

 

My personal opinion is to make it perfect, harden and straighten the crank and make the

rods rectangular, better use new Maxspeedings, and fit all in the best way and than

tri-metalls are the best choice although a smooth carb engine will be pleased with the Glycos.

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Danke Andreas.

I understand the dry-running/boundary lubrication conditions, basically every time you start the engine.

Mis-alignment of the components like you indicate can make it worse.

Maybe it is false economy to save 100 euros on bearings, given all the other costs and effort for an engine rebuild.

Problem for the average TR owner, which I am, is how to distinguish "required" from "nice to have" from "expensive but working counteractive".

Items like pistons, timing chain, tappets, camshaft, oil pumps, fuel lines, etc are returning topics from disappointed fellow enthusiasts.

Is there a one-stop shop for engine parts for Mr. Average (me), where I can order all parts for an engine rebuilt of a CP engine?

I will not race it, but like many of us i do like some spirited driving.

I would not mind paying more for quality.

Your votes (experiences) please.

Regards,

Waldi

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Waldi first you have to make a choice wether you want to stay somewhat original

or you are willing to put any modern part into the engine that is availiable.

 

I went for 2.7 litre and electronic fuel injection and many, many things inside the

engine are not original. More or less the engine does the same and has the same

feel and look like original but has more power and less fuel consumption.

 

The required parts are more or less from modern cars and are very good quality.

If you aim for original a lot of scrap is in the market and you need an expert to

prevent you from fitting the bad parts into your engine.

 

Second you need a reliable builder that doesn't charge you for 100 Euro better

quality with 200 Euros or more. On the other hand these exchange engines for

2500 Euros can not do what is promised to do. When I built an engine for a friend

he collected all the bills and we ended just for the parts in that range. So the worst

is to spend money and get an engine that can not satisfy.

 

I heard good things from http://www.racinggreen.de/

That is where I buy my IWIS timing chains.

Maybe they can recommend a good engine builder.

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