RODS build........

[RODeo]

Apparently its classed as a new vehicle ,so no mot for 3 yrs....Apparently ! .My insurers asked for the msva cert and the mot. I explained it didnt need one as it was a Q plate,they were happy. I think if it had to have one ,my insurers would have known,because they seemed clued up on everything else.

[RODeo]

What a day!!
     Went out on trike for first time on the road..great!....until it broke down 1.5 miles from home!! Got recovered by AA,What a palaver!
 The points plastic cam had melted.There was a thread on here about this but cant find it! If I recall correctly from my A35 days,the coil should be 9v or if 12v should have a ballast resistor? Not sure which coil I have on there until I strip it down. I dont recall the Reliant I stripped having a ballast resistor.So whats the best way round this? Buy new coil with known voltage (9v)? New points and condensor? or go electronic? Your thoughts pls guys...........

[steve brock]

Interesting..do you have the sports coil and are your points still at the right gap could they of opened up? Mmm

[zakboy]

What a day!!
     Went out on trike for first time on the road..great!....until it broke down 1.5 miles from home!! Got recovered by AA,What a palaver!
 The points plastic cam had melted.There was a thread on here about this but cant find it! If I recall correctly from my A35 days,the coil should be 9v or if 12v should have a ballast resistor? Not sure which coil I have on there until I strip it down. I dont recall the Reliant I stripped having a ballast resistor.So whats the best way round this? Buy new coil with known voltage (9v)? New points and condensor? or go electronic? Your thoughts pls guys...........

Go electronic Rod

[one arm bandit]

whats a ballast resistor look like??? i wasnt sure on this so i robbed the coil from my mums rover metro as i asume it has a ballast already built in??( mums metro was going to the scrap yard,had her new plugs and leads aswell )

[zakboy]

 ballast resistor

[spanners]

whats a ballast resistor look like??? i wasnt sure on this so i robbed the coil from my mums rover metro as i asume it has a ballast already built in??( mums metro was going to the scrap yard,had her new plugs and leads aswell )

what year and engine was the metro ? maybe you should have had the distributor aswell,,,,

[one arm bandit]

95 m reg, was it a k series?? i cant think what it was now? the dizzy went in horizontal on the head if i remember right?

[terry t]

i think they only fitted ballast resisters to the reliant from 1981 onwards 

[fifer]

Reliant in their wisdom removed the separate ballast resistor and built it into the wiring harness , hence why you could not find it as it is just a wire .
Just fit a straight 12v coil with a live fused feed from the ignition circuit which is switched off when key removed  .

Use a Lucas DLB101 straight 12v coil or equivalent as per my article on Coil alternatives at

https://sites.google.com/site/fifersrelianthintsandtips/coils

Extract from above Link

Below is a list of Suppliers Part Numbers
.
SUPPLIER ............ PART NUMBER

Reliant ................ 17388

Lucas .................. DLB101
................................ 45058
................................ 45212
................................ 45213
................................ 45289
................................ CL1
................................ CL101
................................ CL15
................................ CL18
................................ CL2
................................ CL201
................................ CL21
................................ CL25
................................ CL31
................................ CL5
................................ CL61
................................ CL62
................................ CL63
................................ HA12
Beru ........................ .0 040 100 102
...............................  .0 040 100 106
...............................  ZS102
...............................  ZS106
Bosch ...................... .0 221 102 003
................................ .0 221 119 008
...............................  .0 221 119 018
................................ .0 221 119 027
...............................  .0 221 119 035
................................ .0 221 119 048
................................ .0 221 123 007
Bremi ....................... 11801
Commercial Ignition .. XIC8029
Delco ....................... 1115043
................................ 7992188
................................ CL3005
................................ CL3010
................................ DR505
Ducellier .................. 2526017
................................ 2526018
................................ 2526018A
................................ 2526020A
................................ 256017
................................ 2772
................................ 2790
................................ 2790000
................................ 520004
EPS .......................... 1.970.101D
Facet ....................... 9.6001
................................ 9.6001D
................................ 9.6037
................................ 9.6038
................................ 9.6075
................................ BS1
Halfords ................... Still to Find
Intermotor ............... 11040
KW .......................... 470 101D
............................... 470101
............................... 470137
............................... 470138
Motaquip ................. VCL200
Quinton Hazel .......... XIC8029 ; Refer to Commercial Ignition Part number above
Unipart .................... GCL 333

.
Try setting the ignition timing as per

https://sites.google.com/site/fifersrelianthintsandtips/ignition/ignition-timing
.
.
Or , if going down the electronic route , have a wee shufty at

https://sites.google.com/site/fifersrelianthintsandtips/electronic-conversions/how-to-fit-a-simonbbc-electronic-
kit
.
.

[RODeo]

Thanks for info all.Am going electronic as per fifers post elsewhere,(good step by step info by the way)Ordering tomorrow.
 I fitted electronic to my A35 years ago,best thing I ever done after years of messing around with points,shouldve done it from the outset on the Reliant TBH,but Ive learnt my lesson today! Standing around in the cold even for a short time as I did today aint good,still I suppose thats what biking is all about!. Sons came down to support and wait with me,nice warm car!

[RODeo]

On another note...The test ride...bearing in mind Ive never ever ridden a trike,and havent rode a bike in 40 years. ..........on my test ride today I didnt notice any steering shake at any speeds (max I got to was about 45mph with the dodgy points causing it to missfire)I started with tyre pressures at 20 rear and 21.5 front,too hard. Then tried 18 rear /16.5 front ,seems a bit better.will play around with pressures more when I get to drive it for longer distance. Had to brake hard on a local estate when some pillock came round a blind bend towards me on the wrong side of the road.Found the front end skidded first,is this about right? Also found steering quite heavy when turning corners (from main road to side road)at around 20 mph. A bit bouncy generally when driving in a straight line over potholes and road blemishes. One of the first roads I drove down on it was a road/lane that is notorious for bumps even in a car..bit of a shock that was!

[tbone]

That`s a shame mate, that you broke down, not that you`re going electronic.
I don`t mean to sound patronising, but, are you sure the heel melted and hasn`t just worn?
The reason i ask is that the heel on the points will wear very quickly if its not getting any lubrication.
Depending how old the distributor is, there will be 2 ways to lube the heel, either by oiling the felt pad on the points or by smearing a film of grease directly to the distributor cam.
If the heel is melted, and i`m not saying it isn`t, this means that the points have got extraordinarily hot.
This points (no pun) to a faulty condenser rather than a ballast resistor fault.
As has been said many times before, the ballast resistor reduces running voltage to the coil and has no direct relationship to the points, which merely switch the spark.

Anyhow, all thats irrelevant now as you are converting.  

[RODeo]

Well TBH T bone I put it down to the condensor,as the edges of contact area of the points were corroded and had 'fluffy' deposits on them ,which is a sign of condensor probs. I removed them at the roadside(dropped the screw in to the dizzy,so stripped out the base plate to retrieve ) cleaned them up best I could,but only a weak spark ,which I put down to battery,having had to crank it over so much to try to start it previous to that.The plastic had definitely melted round the  metal it was attached to. Im amazed it drove for the roughly 10 miles it did do!As you say ,all irelevant now as going electronic.

[fifer]

Originally posted by tbone  ;
The reason i ask is that the heel on the points will wear very quickly if its not getting any lubrication

.

There are some poor quality points among the ones on sale recently .

A month ago I had a set which only lasted a couple of weeks { I do around 2,000 plus miles per month } .
I could dig my fingernail into the material the Blue heel was made from as it was so soft  .
.
.