Posted By : Chris Taylor,
04-Jan-2005, 06:50pm
Do you really want to do this? A lot of work, when bigger Triumph engines are available and with known solutions to these problems, as well as
proven tuning options. (You could always buy a Vitesse?!!) Also, although it can be done, there is an insurance company to persuade that the
car is OK in it's reengined form. With a lighter engine, front spring rates, or at least ride height would need changing, and arguably braking
balance, although I'm not sure how much the rear brakes on a Herald actually do........
All that said, I can heartily recommend the Rover K series engine. I drove a bog standard 8 valve 1.4 litre K in a Rover Metro and LOVED it.
Still DIY able as it had an SU carb. Adequately powerful (76bhp?), smooth, free revving, economical, and responsive with NO flat spots even
when cold. The 1100 is reputed to be even smoother, but with only 60bhp is there any point over a standard 13/60 engine?
But make sure the K series is in good nick (but they all have some piston slap when cold) because I've heard horror stories about knackered
ones that have been abused, like warped heads, snapped main block bolts (which are the very heart of the engine), and rebuilding is in a
different league from our familiar Triumph engines. According to Rover, each crankshaft bearing shell is an individual fit to the respective
journal, and you buy a new crank rather than regrind it!!
I did muse over whether this engine would fit in a Herald as it appeared to me to be rather like creating a modern day Brabham Climax Herald
(all alloy SOHC engine). And as mentioned, the "sandwich" construction of the engine has similarities to the Sabrina engines, although not with
such suggestive curves (!) and apparently it was a (Yamaha?) bike engine that was the inspiration for the K series.
The 16 valve K series has a lot more power (1.4l at least 90bhp) and capacity options (up to 1800cc and 160bhp with all the VVC trickery etc)
but you'd need to get all the fuel injection equipment and wiring etc. and such things, while reliable, are much less easy to sort if they DO
go wrong, and problems would be more difficult to track down when no longer in the original set up.
Any crossflow engine (ie virtually anything modern enough to be worth doing a conversion with) will have either inlet or exhaust manifolds on
the wrong side, but there should be enough space in a Herald bay to cobble together control linkages (bowden cable basically) and an exhaust
system, as well as coolant pipes and fuel supply.