Having just completed 900 trouble free miles travelling to the Le Mans 24 hr race last weekend I gave the car a really good clean up today and thought I would take it for a quick run.
As I left the village speed limit I got on the throttle in third and ran it round to 5500 rpm, I saw around 10psi on the gauge and it felt great. upon lifting to shift into fourth I heard a god awful noise, a screechy harsh noise. I dipped the clutch and the motor died, I coasted to a halt. The blower pulley was very hot and the belt had been spinning leaving lots of rubber dust all over the Novi.
The belt was removed and the pulley found to be locked solid :(
I drove slowly home and removed the head unit, the impeller shows signs of ingesting something, all the fins are curled over and metal has been kind of welded to the volute. I removed the volute to investigate further, the blower will now rotate but feels very gritty.
Has anyone rebuilt one of these at home before? I am 5000 miles from Paxton and do not fancy sending it halfway across the world if I can help it! I shall call them on Monday and see how the land lies. I will also take and post some pictures on Monday as well.
My mass air meter is in the inner wing, it may have come away and allowed a small stone to get into the inlet, unfortunately it fell away as I was removing the blower and I cant be certain that wasd the cause. The only other possibility is worn bearings allowing the impeller to slam into the volute but as I say it has been running really well.
Just another drama to add to the rest of this years problems I guess, but it is getting tiresome.
Jeff
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