An advertisement-free blog about motorcycling, Northern life, home improvement, power plants, submarines, nuclear stuff, and a few other off-beat subjects. Comments are welcome. (Image is the Selway Crags in Northern Idaho)
I purchased the final TR-6 shortly after selling the Yamaha XS650. I still owned the Corvette at the time, but I really missed having a little sports car. This little Triumph was red.
The top and interior weren't in great shape, so I just left the top down with the cover over it (like in the above photo), and let the San Diego dew soak the seats. It was under a carport, so nothing got *soaked*. I kept an old towel behind the seat to wipe things down before going anywhere.
It let me down only once, and that was when the transmission failed. If I recall correctly, something had been wrong with second gear. My roommate was driving when it gave up the ghost. Neither of us was very surprised. I found another transmission, and this one had an electric overdrive! That made everything even cooler.
TR-6 transmission with overdrive. The two overdrive sections bolt on to the standard 4-speed at the right.
The new transmission required a little extra work, but it was worth it. I installed the new transmission and built a little electric circuit with a toggle switch on the dash to engage the overdrive solenoid. That solenoid is a little black cylinder at the lower right side of this transmission.
There are two electrical switches on top of the gearbox. One is to turn on the back-up lights, and the other is to prevent the overdrive from engaging unless the car is in 3rd or 4th gear. I guess the torque of lower gears would damage the overdrive unit. Anyway, I was really happy with that car, and kept it for several years, until I decided to get my first 4x4, which I traded it in for.
After my first Navy technical school in San Diego, I was going to be sent to Great Lakes Naval Training Station, just north of Chicago, Illinois. This training would last for a couple of months.
Following the school in Chicago would come a six month school in Orlando, Florida. After I finished class in Orlando would come the final school, a six month class in upstate New York.
At that time, the only transportation I had was the unreliable but wickedly fast KH 500 motorcycle, which I was NOT going to ride on a long distance trip, ever again. Instead I had the bike shipped back to Idaho, which cost about as much as I paid for the motorcycle. A high school friend kept the bike for me as I flew from school to school.
In the Chicago area I didn't mind being without transportation; they a have wonderful commuter train system there. Things changed when I got to Orlando, however. There wasn't much opportunity to get out and explore places without a vehicle. Soon enough I began looking for sports cars in the newspaper. Eventually I found a 'decent' 1973 TR-6. It needed a bit of work.
It looked about like this, right down to the aftermarket wheels that I very much disliked.
I was very fortunate that Orlando (And later, San Diego Sub Base) had "Auto Hobby Shops". These were places where you could rent a stall on a daily or weekly basis, borrow tools, and repair or maintain your car - if you didn't happen to be out to sea. I don't know if the Navy still does this, but for me and my problematic vehicles, it was a Godsend.
The first problem with the new TR-6 was the front brake rotors. They were massively warped, so slowing the car down was pretty exciting (and I don't mean "fun" exciting). While braking, the steering wheel would start rapidly pulling one way and then the other, all the while the car was shimmying to a stop. I had the brake rotors turned for the price of a six pack of Budweiser, and the brakes were never an issue again.
Next was the ominous "clunk" whenever you got on the gas or let off the gas. I jacked the car up and found that the Independent Rear Suspension universal joints were sloppy. I ordered replacements, and as soon as they arrived I removed the old universal joints. A universal joint is supposed to look like the one below:
The TR6 being a Florida car had a fair bit of rust, but where I found the most rust was where the Needle Roller bearings once were. I found rust powder and a few loose rusty pins that looked like they might have once been needle bearings. Once I replaced the universal joints the car handled and ran pretty well... but it still had those god-awful magnesium wheels.
After a lot of scraping and saving, I replaced the awful smaller rims with stock rims and new Michelin radials. The car didn't corner as well, because it now sat slightly higher, but it looked and ran right, finally!
I drove this car from Orlando, Florida to upstate New York with no problem whatsoever. I drove it all over in both places. It was a great little car once I got all the problems ironed out. It didn't even have any electrical fires!
For reasons I can no longer recall, I decided to trade this car in on a brand new Ford Mustang GT...
... but this was not to be, because Ford Motor Credit wouldn't front me the money. Their loss on a car sale and on the interest they would have earned from making the loan.
Instead, General Motors was willing to make an auto loan to me, and so they got to sell a (slightly used) car. This one.
Possibly one of the coolest cars I ever owned was a Triumph TR-6. There was a lot to like about the Triumph. It had a 2500cc inline 6 cylinder pushrod engine that had a ton of torque, and developed 125 horsepower. The car had wonderful handling and was pretty reliable, in spite of the Lucas electrical system.
Part of the reason the little TR-6 handled so well was because it had independent rear suspension. Most rear-wheel drive cars have a solid rear axle and a differential. The solid axle means that whenever one of the rear wheels hits an irregularity in the road, part of that force is transmitted across the axle to the opposite rear wheel, and this does nothing for handling.
Below, a typical solid rear axle with differential. These are tough and strong, but they don't have great handling.
An independent rear suspension (IRS) has two half-axles, connected to the differential through a pair of universal joints. Each rear wheel can move up or down with the road surface, and not impact the other wheel's up/down motion. This reduces chassis roll whenever one wheel hits a bump or a dip, and contributes to a huge improvement in the vehicle's handling and road grip.
Below is a video of a guy driving his later TR-6 through his neighborhood (It has the fugly federally-mandated 5 MPH rubber bumper guards). At about the 5:25 mark he gets on the gas a little and the inline 6 makes that awesome sound.
My first TR-6 (I have owned three of them now) looked just like this. Notice the bumper doesn't have the goofy rubber things that you saw in the video.
The TR-6 has a nice open and simple engine bay. Front is right.
The car had some serious electrical issues, as British cars usually do. When I first bought it, I didn't notice that the ammeter constantly was showing a slightly negative current flow. After I had owned it for about a week, the car died suddenly, and I was clueless as to the reason. I got a buddy to bring me some gas. It started, but only ran for a little bit before dying when I turned on the headlights. That's when I figured out the charging system had an issue. After getting a spare charged battery, I was able to drive it home.
The charging system had two issues: A fried rectifier and a fried solid-state voltage regulator. A very knowledgeable friend helped me identify and then correct both issues without having to buy expensive parts. The rectifier we replaced three diodes on, and the voltage regulator we replaced with a Chrysler mechanical type that cost $3 at the junkyard.
The Chrysler regulator is simple and rugged. As the voltage gets too high, an electromagnet pulls a contact open, which de-energizes the alternator field winding. When system voltage drops back to normal, a spring pulls the contact closed, re-energizing the alternator. This happens several times per second, and you get a fairly constant output voltage. Tabs to adjust the spring tension adjusts the 12V output voltage.
With that fixed, I had many years of happy motoring in the TR-6. One thing it always did was pull to the right a little bit, and clunked when I turned hard right. I never understood why this was until after I had sold it. The guy who bought it came back and told me that the upper A-Arm mount was broken off from the frame. I honestly didn't know what he was talking about, because I didn't know anything about suspension at the time. Hopefully he got it welded for cheap.
Another time one night, I went to go somewhere in the TR-6. As soon as I turned the key in the ignition, massive amounts of smoke started pouring of the dash. I shut off the ignition and checked under the dash, but could still see wiring glowing red-hot under there. I quickly popped open the hood and disconnected the battery before the car could burn to the ground.
The following day I looked under the dash and found a few burned up wires, and wrapped them in elecrical tape, so they could not touch one another. Crossing my fingers, I re-connected the battery. Happily there was no further smoke, the car started fine, and everything electrical still worked. It was just a weird isolated electrical event.
Below is the international warning symbol that the TR-6 contains British electrical components.
One of the things I liked about this car was the cool fuel filler - the design was right out off the race track. It was spring-loaded had a quick-release lever, so that when you moved the lever with your thumb, the cap would pop open. Also, it was located in the middle of the rear deck of the car, so you could fuel from either side.
None of these pictures give you an idea how small and nimble these cars are, so here's a perspective shot. I'm not sure what's going on with this guy's hand - maybe it's slipping into another dimension...
I loved that little car. It had enough torque that if you were decelerating in first gear and then stomped on the gas, the car would squat down in back and chirp the rear tires. After I sold it, I missed it so much that after a couple of years I bought another one. And later on, I bought a third. I may get another one at some point.
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