Tom Rymes

[David Morris]

Hi, does anyone know a guy called Tom Rymes? He posted a YouTube clip the other day about his noisy Javelin engine. Search 'Javelin Engine' and you should find it.

From his accent, he sounded Aussie? He showed taking off the driver's side valve cover and discovering that one of the valves had about 4mm gap between the rocker face and the tip of the valve, when the valve should be closed. He mentioned the 0.006" and 0.003" clearances that there should be on the exhaust and inlet valves respectively, so knew what to aim for, but didn't know how to make the adjustment. No wonder his engine sounded a bit noisy!

He also had difficulty in recognising which were the exhaust and inlet valves, which seemed a touch surprising, seeing that the manifold was in clear sight? I would now recommend, with a warm engine, that checking that the push rods can just rotate smoothly when you are absolutely sure that the valve is closed, gives quite enough clearance.

Does anyone know Tom?

Best regards,

David

[ajackson]

viewtopic.php?t=6091

[trymes]

Hi there! I’m from New England, not Australia.

It turns out the engine has hydraulic tappets, which has only made the whole thing more difficult to troubleshoot. I’m thinking I am going to have to take them all out and perform the service/checking described in the manual to make sure that they are all serviceable.

As for which valve is which, I can see the manifolds, but either I was being obtuse, or the inlet/outlets in the head are centered between the valves, making it impossible to tell which is which. I’m happy to be pointed in the right direction.

Tom

[David Morris]

Hi Tom,

Good to hear from you and I do hope I wasn't being cheeky! The inlet valves are siamesed around the carburettor barrel, so these are the centre ones looking at the head from the valve rocker shaft, and the two exhaust valves are the outer ones. The early engines had hydraulic tappets and you are very lucky to have one that hasn't been converted to the solid tappets. Somewhere, I have an early instruction manual that describes how to set them up, although I have never had the need, as all my previous engines have had solid tappets.

I recollect that I think it involves making sure the hydraulic tappet is empty of oil and setting the valve gap to something like 0.070". Perhaps there is a mention on how to do this in the club's on-line archive?

Jowett's were very proud to be one of the first manufacturers to use these tappets in the UK and I think they imported them from the US. However, they were not in favour here and I think three factors encouraged Jowett's to revert to conventional solid tappets. These were cost, dirt in the oil and servicing mechanics not knowing how to set them up.

I hope you find the Club very friendly and we are always ready to try and help.

All the best and I hope this helps,

David

[Srenner]

Hello Tom:

Hope you got things figured out. A So Cal owner found your video on youtube and called me as he recognized the ex-Fairservice Javelin.

USA Jowett owners are pretty spread out, but please don't hesitate to contact me if you have questions. I stock some of the more common parts and have some spares as well.

Cheers,
Scott

[trymes]

Thank you, Scott! I have been tied up finishing a brake rebuild and axle/spring refurbishment on my MGA Twin Cam, so I haven’t looked into the Jowett at all. I might bring it to the fellow that rebuilt my Sheerline’s engine, as otherwise I may never get around to it.

The one thing I think I may need is a center bearing for the driveshaft, which I noted Robin had replaced already, but appears damaged again.

Tom