the Triumph tr7 V8 (TR8)

Here’s a story about a Triumph TR8 rally car I helped a friend to  build and competed in a few times, written by the owner.

The “TR8” (a 1976 Triumph TR7) was bought in the early 90’s already converted to a reasonable standard for road rallying by an old boy in Portishead who was a bit scared of it.
I had it resprayed from it’s original TR7 yellow (ugh) to white and added the inevitable tiger stripes, shark’s teeth and eyes! I slowly modified it over the years to get it up to mid-nineties RAC Bluebook standard and to try and get it reliable for use on tarmac special stage rallies.

Early problems with the Rover V8 rope oil seal drove us all mad (who knows what a Chinese finger is?) along with the original tubular steel exhaust manifolds which had been modified to fit around the steering column and caused localised overheating on certain cylinders and melted pistons. Gear boxes were always a bit ropey and the shortened selector mechanism sometimes played up - the gear lever once snapped off in my hand on a stage start.

The car was literally un-driveable until a Quaiffe slipper unit (from a Rover SD1 touring car) was fitted, but it did suffer from axle tramp, re-locating the radius arm mountings and tweeking the adjustable shock absorbers helped a bit.
many engine rebuilds were undertaken for various reasons (overheating, melted pistons etc.) and upgrading of the various components was done when they could be afforded.
A major triumph was the rear axle - a home modified set up to install the SD1 slipper unit and fit Ford Escort XR3i vented discs and calipers. The whole braking system worked really well with the standard master cylinder and hydraulic handbrake. We never got round to properly fitting a mechanical handbrake system (as required for MOT) but had cable attached to the calipers which looked like they did something but in fact it was the hydraulic system which operated the handbrake.
A full on big bore manifold system and exhaust was eventually fitted to replace the puny original set up. This required us to modify the chassis rails in the engine bay to allow fitment and to slightly adjust the steering geometry, which wasn’t noticeable apart from the steering wheel being slightly offset.

When going and not being repaired/modified the car covered many miles on the public road including emergency Christmas Eve trips up North when my 7 series broke down. Many fun trips were had including that great hobby of mine TVR Griffith baiting in the mid 90’s. Also drove to a number of tarmac rallies (usually one way!). The theoretical top speed was over 160mph, with a genuine 140mph clocked up on quite a few occasions but the front end would get very light at such speeds.
the car had a chequered tarmac stage rally career, taking part in events such as Down Ampney, Goodwood, Longcross, Salisbury Plain and Bovingdon. Unfortunately a finish was the best result we generally got, but tremendous fun was had by all. Navigators/co-drivers included my usual rally driver (Mk1 Escort on this site), my mum, my secretary, and a collection of brave mates. also did a “run what you brung” at Santa Pod which was good fun but saw the end of our home built diff!

One very memorable journey was a V8 trip to the 1997 Le Mans 24 hour race - a fantastic drive down, but marred by my un-related broken collar bone which stopped my driving and calmed us all down a bit, but didn’t stop some good back road adventures and a good showing at the now deceased “Houx Campsite Drag Races”.

Spurred on by trips to Santa Pod and the desire to embarrass the more expensive road cars, a 175bhp nitrous kit was purchased (yes, alcohol was involved in the decision!) but circumstances have led to it never having been fitted, but it’s still there in the box - one day.....
In the late 90’s our use of the car dwindled for a combination of reasons, knackered diff, blowing head gaskets, friends, family and money, and it was safely tucked away in location X a lock-up in North London where it remains, in reasonable order ready to rise again one day.

for the moment I still get my much needed speed and adrenalin fix from two wheels with a Japanese superbiketaking the place of the good old V8 grunt - but not forever.

The final specification of the car can be found here TR8 Specification