Lead replacement additives for Ford V6 in 1966 Landie - help please!

I use a 1966 Landie with a Ford Essex V6 engine conversion (lovely old
thing!) to do local trips towing a powerboat, carrying canoes and
windsurfers etc. The last garage selling LRP locally is ceasing to do so
shortly, leaving me with a problem.

I suspect that unleaded would damage this engine in time, which leaves some
form of additive as the only practicable option. Driving any distance to get
LRP elsewhere - even if available - isn't that practical at 13 mpg....

When I looked at this some years ago, there were a number of additives
available of presumably variable quality and effect (and cost!) and I guess
that time and experience has shown which work, and which don't.

Any guidance on what to use, where it can be bought, and at what cost would
be much appreciated.

Thank you!


Ed. Hughes


(Perhaps I should add that I am aware that having the heads removed and
hardened valve seats fitted is an option, but I guess that this would cost
in the hundreds to have done, as it is outside my skill remit. As the
vehicle only covers around 1500 miles a year, the cost/reward relationship
for this isn't great).

On or around Fri, 27 May 2005 11:53:52 +0100, "Ed Hughes"
<[email protected]> enlightened us thusly:

>I use a 1966 Landie with a Ford Essex V6 engine conversion (lovely old
>thing!) to do local trips towing a powerboat, carrying canoes and
>windsurfers etc. The last garage selling LRP locally is ceasing to do so
>shortly, leaving me with a problem.
>
>I suspect that unleaded would damage this engine in time, which leaves some
>form of additive as the only practicable option. Driving any distance to get
>LRP elsewhere - even if available - isn't that practical at 13 mpg....
>

I ran a 2.8 cologne "non-unleaded" on LPG for about 5000 miles and it didn't
do any good to a couple of exhaust valve seats, requiring new (hard) seats.
However, the previous owner ran it for quite a lot of miles on unleaded with
no obvious ill-effects.

Some colognes had valve seats fitted, but this wasn't one of 'em.

I guess your best bet is "suck it and see" to be honest. That sort of
mileage, especially if you're not thrashing it flat out, it might well last
for years. The V6 degrades quite gracefully, you'll notice a lumpy idle
first and a slight lack of power; eventually, it'll start to miss on one or
more pots. At which point, you can have the heads off and take them to have
valve seats fitted. That's what I did, and it wasn't that expensive, really
- probably no more so than keep on buying additive.


LRP is increasingly difficult to find. Thanks very much, bloody oilcos, "oh
no, you'll be all right with your classic motors, we're going to make LRP
instead of leaded". 4 years down the line, they're all bloody stopping
doing it.


--
Austin Shackles. www.ddol-las.fsnet.co.uk my opinions are just that
"For millions of years, mankind lived just like the animals. Then
something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination -
we learned to talk." Pink Floyd (1994)

so Austin Shackles was, like...

> I guess your best bet is "suck it and see" to be honest. That sort of
> mileage, especially if you're not thrashing it flat out, it might
> well last for years. The V6 degrades quite gracefully, you'll notice
> a lumpy idle first and a slight lack of power; eventually, it'll
> start to miss on one or more pots. At which point, you can have the
> heads off and take them to have valve seats fitted. That's what I
> did, and it wasn't that expensive, really - probably no more so than
> keep on buying additive.

I use Castrol Valvemaster in the Series 2, but I'm thinking of stopping it.
It's 7-8 quid a pop, and I've heard that with gentle use the thing may well
go for years until it becomes unusable, at which point new valve seats are
in order. As you correctly say, you've probably saved the cost of the work
in not buying the additive. However, I do hear a Turner stage 1 head
calling my name...

--
Rich
==============================
Disco 300 Tdi auto
S2a 88" SW
Tiggrr (V8 trialler)

If you live in the South Bucks Area,

Platts Garage in Marlow still advertise as having either leaded, or LRp,
not
sure which, give them a try if you are local

Giles Ayling
"Richard Brookman" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> so Austin Shackles was, like...
>
> > I guess your best bet is "suck it and see" to be honest. That sort of
> > mileage, especially if you're not thrashing it flat out, it might
> > well last for years. The V6 degrades quite gracefully, you'll notice
> > a lumpy idle first and a slight lack of power; eventually, it'll
> > start to miss on one or more pots. At which point, you can have the
> > heads off and take them to have valve seats fitted. That's what I
> > did, and it wasn't that expensive, really - probably no more so than
> > keep on buying additive.
>
> I use Castrol Valvemaster in the Series 2, but I'm thinking of stopping
it.
> It's 7-8 quid a pop, and I've heard that with gentle use the thing may
well
> go for years until it becomes unusable, at which point new valve seats
are
> in order. As you correctly say, you've probably saved the cost of the
work
> in not buying the additive. However, I do hear a Turner stage 1 head
> calling my name...
>
> --
> Rich
> ==============================
> Disco 300 Tdi auto
> S2a 88" SW
> Tiggrr (V8 trialler)
>
>


--
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i had a 1962 landie with a 3.1 v6 essex in it , with 310 degs burton
cam and ported heads , it ran on unleaded perfectly ok .

i did use a piper magnum distributor previously but this made 38degs of
advance at 2800rpm and just did not like unleaded, after this i changed
the distributor back to a standard ford unit and also altered the
springs in the advance unit by swapping to ones from a std chevy 350cu
in small block distributor , in fact you can buy vacuum advance spring
kits for chevy distributors which you can play around with to vary the
advance curves , see the SUMMIT RACING of ohio website .

you may like to back off youre static ignition timing by about 2-3degs
with a strobe light .

if you want to use an octane booster try something like PROBOOST which
is for motocross racing , or you can buy real lead octance booster from
some companies off internet within the uk .

the v6 essex with 10-1 powermax pistons does not like unleaded, i
melted 3 pistons on one occasion and went back to std 9-1 pistons .

the one most important thing when running these on unleaded is to ease
off the high revs and hard pulling , especially uphill and on motorway
..

the achilles heel of the essex engine is the lack of head bolts per
cylinder , they are more likely to blow head gaskets than anything else
, even the rheinz head gaskets are not much good .

i used a std inlet manifold with an ali plate welded to it and a holley
390cfm 4 barrel carb fitted, i think i still have the manifold and carb
in shed somewhere .

if you want to hammer the engine on unleaded fuel do what they do when
fitting a supercharger to a v6 essex and turn 0.100" off top of pistons
to reduce compression ratio to 7-1 .

the other option is to mix some AVGAS 100LL in the tank when you fill
up , this costs about 1.06 pounds per litre at present ., you can
obtain it if you know where to go .

easiest option is to do search of internet for octane booster and buy
some , add this to tank fills and you wont have any probs.
hope info is of some use .

"Ed Hughes" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> I use a 1966 Landie with a Ford Essex V6 engine conversion (lovely old
> thing!) to do local trips towing a powerboat, carrying canoes and
> windsurfers etc. The last garage selling LRP locally is ceasing to do so
> shortly, leaving me with a problem.
>
> I suspect that unleaded would damage this engine in time, which leaves
some
> form of additive as the only practicable option. Driving any distance to
get
> LRP elsewhere - even if available - isn't that practical at 13 mpg....
>
> When I looked at this some years ago, there were a number of additives
> available of presumably variable quality and effect (and cost!) and I
guess
> that time and experience has shown which work, and which don't.
>
> Any guidance on what to use, where it can be bought, and at what cost
would
> be much appreciated.
>
> Thank you!
>
>
> Ed. Hughes
>
>
> (Perhaps I should add that I am aware that having the heads removed and
> hardened valve seats fitted is an option, but I guess that this would cost
> in the hundreds to have done, as it is outside my skill remit. As the
> vehicle only covers around 1500 miles a year, the cost/reward relationship
> for this isn't great).
>
> Valve master works out at about 3 pence a litre as the dosage rate is very
low. I was looking at an MG B head yesterday the owner was told when he
bought it that " of course its been converted to unleaded" so never bothered
with an additive. After he had re set the tappets a few time the screws
couldnt be undone any more and so the head had to come off. the valves are
recessed about 1or 2 mm below the surface of the head , not a pretty
sight. Now the guy has no alternative but to have inserts fitted. There are
a few products that work and are endorsed by the FHVC each uses a different
chemical additive , one is sodium based another pottasium etc so its
probably best to stick with one product. I chose valve master because I know
it works and has been used in NZ /Aus since the early nineties when leaded
was banned out there.
However, I've now fitted a "flashlube " kit to my flathead and this also
seems to work great , with the advantage of only having to fill the bottle
once every six months or so. Works on manifold vacuum to draw a drip feed
amount thru a metering valve and into the manifold. its good kit was about
£40 , find it on the web. I think FES autogas sell it as its used on LPG
systems as no lead there either.
Steve the grease
steve the grease