A few more thoughts and facts...
- Fuel consumption is somewhat too high, only about 7 km/l (16-17 mpg)
This is partly due to the fact that I do only/mostly short range city driving, fuel was leaking out of the carb with the o-ring broken, there seems to be a small leak around the accelerator pump, there may also be a very small leak on the fuel pump, idle jet has been set a bit too rich, and I tend to like the sound and acceleration when flooring the pedal around 3500 rpm
I will replace the fuel pump with an electric pump as soon as I find time to get me a 90 degrees drill head to make the holes in the engine compartment to fit it on (it will be fitted in the fuel tank side) - and to do the job of course
During January I'll take the carb out again to replace the accelerator pump membrane and to inspect the o-ring. Replacing the accelerator pump membrane can't be done in the car as the fuel in the float chamber will spill out when I remove the membrane. So it has to be dried out first.
- Running a fast-road Holbay cam as I do with the relatively large overlap of (I think I recall) about 90 degrees, means that there's a risk that at low rpm (especially cranking!), exhaust gasses are pushed back up into the inlet manifold. This is probably part of the explanation of the starting problems I had that day with the many explosions
This is not a problem in general, the engine runs very well even in low rpm once it's warmed up, but when it's really cold, it needs a well accelerated idle to avoid dying on me.
Roy is an advocate of this cam and with the experience I have with it so far, I agree with him as it really adds to the fun factor of the Murena. The performance of the cam probably depends a good deal on the exhaust side to create the necessary suction to get the actual performance and avoid exhaust being spit out into the inlet, whereas the inlet side is much less critical and may even benefit from the single carb setup that I have.
- I haven't had any starting problems sice that day, so I might just keep my spare coil in the trunk for now.
- Sunday when I fired well under the car on the motorway it acted odd when I turned off, as it was slightly reluctant to run and idle ended up being around 2000 rpm... carb ice! It cured away after a few minutes, but tells me that I should find a piece of aluminum tubing to take the inlet air from the exhaust area (the automatic switch in the inlet isn't connected).
But with black ice all over in our neighborhood this morning (!), I decided to take the Espace though, so Murena is standing still today