Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Morgan Three Wheeler & Super 3 Yet another regulator failure?

I am told by a third party, that was an internal dispute at the garage over pay and parts being damaged (accidentally or deliberately, I have no idea). I decided best not to get involved in matters over which I have no knowledge or control. The car is finally finished apart from the voltage regulator. If the garage was going to struggle over the job, they should never have taken it on in the first place. They assured me they were totally capable of doing the job and looking at some of their other work on historic race cars, I had no reason to doubt that.

I also suspect there is an element of mischief making by the German dealer. If he had heard this, he might have done the Morgan dealer network more of a service by keeping his mouth shut.

Wilson

Wilson when you say chassis comfort kit do you mean the NVH mounting for the bevel box? If you do you should not be charged for it as the replacement chassis comes with that whether you want it or not. Its been standard fit on new builds for well over a year now & replacement chassis are to the current spec.If you are talking of the steering comfort kit that would be chargeable.
I bought a Harley rectifier on ebay from US 2 years ago & seem. to think it was around £80 delivered.

Tim

Tim,

It was the steering comfort kit I was referring to. The one which alters the steering link coming from the rack and pinion to be nearer to parallel to the top wishbone angle. This is done by raising the attachment point of the steering link to the Ackerman arm and then bracing this from the top front upright ball joint. Where I live in France, tree root encroachment into the edges of the road is very common. This together with narrow roads and 8 wheel ballast/gravel truck drivers on piece work rates, made the excessive bump steer of my 2012 M3W, pretty hazardous. It was improved a lot by swapping from the cheap and nasty Avon sidecar tyres to the excellent Excelsior Competition H tyres (very similar to Blockleys but seemingly not quite as prone to flat spots) and hopefully the steering comfort kit will be another big improvement.

There seem to be various (Chinese?) makers of the Harley Rectifier/Regulator. I have opted to buy the one Amazon France sell, so that if it dies in short order, like the S&S ones often do, I can get it replaced free. The Chinese copy ones look to have neater wiring than the original Harley version, with a coiled flexy cable. The only thing I am a bit concerned over is that they mount at only two points. I am concerned that the regulator will wobble around a lot compared with 4 point fixing S&S model. I do have a bag of various metallastic mounting bobbins at my French house and I may change from the small ones used as standard, to some 3cm diameter slightly waisted bobbins I have, to make the mounting more stable. The alternative is to mount the Harley regulator rigidly on a metal plate and drill 4 holes in that, to use the original 4 mounting bobbins.

The chassis/bevel box needed a silentbloc bush kit for mounting. Unknown to the French dealer and their service agent, this kit is not supplied as standard with the replacement chassis (as it should be) and has to be ordered as an extra item. Even then the bush kit arrived without the new and required fixing bolts and these had to be ordered again, as a number of separate items. All seemingly designed to frustrate and slow down the chassis replacement. If it was still sold in France (it isn't), I would seriously consider selling the M3W and buying a Polaris Slingshot. A local friend in France has one and it is beautifully built compared with the M3W, albeit nothing like as pretty.

Wilson

I was concerned as well. The Cycle Electric unit died in the first 700 miles. I eventually mounted the H-D unit to the back plate of the rectifier mount and threw the floating front plate out. I only used the two bolt holes on the H-D unit and mounted it horizontally without any drilling, bushings or bobbins. Just tight and snug to the plate. If the motor moves it moves as a unit.

It is still there and functioning after over 30,000 miles. These are very robust units and they are mounted directly to the frames of H-D bikes just like this.

Michael,

That is very helpful - many thanks. I have passed this information on to forum member Raphy, who is the person who is likely to actually be mounting and connecting up the Harley unit. I have a feeling he may have a Harley unit on his much tweaked M3W.

Wilson

Harley Davidson dealers in LeMans fitted my unit using 2bolts directly onto the mounting plate welded to the chassis. This was back in 2014.

It has been faultless ever since.

My original CE rectifier was mounted at the front on bobbins. When it failed I fitted the HD unit in same position without bobbins. When my car came back from having a new chassis the HD was fitted in the new position turned 90deg on the side of the engine without bobbins. The HD unit also delivers a higher voltage at lower revs ie. its charging with lamps on just a bit above tickover.

Tim

I would assume the unit would be best fitted with the fins vertical (if it is face on to the direction of movement), so that it would cool better with convection, when the car is stationary and better airflow when moving. However if it is fitted at right angles to the direction of movement, it might be better mounted with the fins horizontal. I don't have the fan kit on my engine, as I am very rarely in heavy traffic, where the car lives in France. Before the chassis broke, I had never had it cut onto one cylinder mode from excess heat in traffic. Once I get the car back, I will keep an eye on how hot the regulator gets.

I did not have the car last summer, due to the chassis change, when it was extremely hot. The ceramic tiled floor in a passageway in my house exploded, as it could not take the thermal expansion. When the house was built, in the early 1970's, nobody thought of putting spaced lines of expansion mastic in tiled floors, in place of regular grouting, to accommodate thermal expansion. I did think at the time: "I wonder how the Morgan would have coped with these temperatures without a cooling fan".

Wilson

I know this has been said many times before but the Urban Cooling Kit does much more than just cool in heavy traffic. It isn't the most attractive thing but it does do quite a good job of keeping the temperatures within limits and getting some cooling air to the back of the engine when on the move. High temperatures and hot spots will kill your engine. You also get an ECU flash to operate the fan that has the benefit of a better fuel map, all for about £150.

I run a Garage 56 ECU (plus exhausts and air intake). The ECU was the one for no cooling kit and I don't know if that can be re-flashed. As the car never comes back to the UK, that would mean I would need to send it back to G56 to get it re-flashed, if it is possible. Given that mine is a 2012 car, it almost certainly does not have the wiring loom ready to hook up the fan and thermostat.

I really dislike the appearance of the urban cooling kit, which my brother has on his Mk.2 M3W. To try and keep the engine cool and wear free, I have put on high flow neoprene lined Aeroquip 150º oil lines and run expensive oil (Motul 300V Le Mans full synthetic 20W60). This oil is rated to 165ºC before any film break down occurs. I would doubt the back of the cylinders ever gets that hot.

I put a tyre temperature thermocouple gauge (left over from when I did European Hill Climb Championship in a Ralt F2 car) on the back of the barrels just under the head on the exhaust side, before and after fitting the G56 kit and after a long fast run. Pre G56, it was reading at the top of its scale at 148º and pinking like mad. Post G56, it was only reading 122º with no pinking. I only do around 1500km a year, so I am confident that the engine will easily last me for a long time. If you talk to people in the USA who have done big mileages in S&S powered bikes, where the rear sides of the cylinders don't get much air either (especially the rear cylinder), they have had no problems with wear.

Wilson