TR6

TR6, the car, that is. Not TR6 the person. I know this is off topic and a little goofy, but I gotta brag to my 964 buddies on rennlist. My wife and I took our 1976 Triumph TR6 as well as our BMW M Coupe to a car show saturday and the TR6 won first place in the import category. It beat out, among others, a Ferrari 360, a 1969 911T, a 911 turbo, and other imports of varying vintages. To me, the cool part is that our TR6 is an unrestored survivor. Original paint, original interior, even original top. The car is far from perfect. Its got lots of little dings and chips on it from garage abuse. But I think its unmolested survivor state pulled a lot of attention at the show. It has 55K original miles. Note the proud smiles on my wife and I in the second photo.

I was sorry, though, that my RS America wasn't able to make it. Its still waiting for an engine rebuild...

ps. Just to add some Porsche content, I included a photo of the 1969 911T owned by my friend Bryan Dickson. He ran this car in the Great Race which was a 4000 mile coast to coast TSD rally. He said the only thing that broke on the car in 4000 miles was the odometer. How's that for reliability of an old 911? I also threw in a few other photos to show some examples of other cars there including my silver M Coupe. Lots of vettes, muscles cars, and street rods.

deep_uv

Ahhhh, it's all clear now. You were meant to be a Concours Weenie, not a drover.

Nice job, my friend.


Steve

TR6

That's right, homie. I'm the fastest draw in the west with the maguires detailer spray and a micro fiber towel.

garrett376

SU carbs on the TR6 - looks like my old 240Z! That car looks perfect!

donoman

Congrats!

Restoring/finding/maintaining something from decades past = love of cars

Steven C.

Way to go Greg! Was that the Denton show?

dfinnegan

Congrats! All original. Wow.

TR6

Yeah, on the courthouse square. It surprises me how big of a draw this show has become over the years. Cars were there from all over the place. Professional tow rigs were coming in at 6:30am with cars inside. I felt like an amateur just driving mine in.

Steven C.

Well, you are compared to some of these guys My Italian will be at the Grapevine show in two weekends in the race car group. There will be some pros there also.

TR6

Is that Sep 22? If so, I'll be at MSR that weekend. Too bad, I would like to go to see the Grapevine show. Somebody left me a flyer on that show at the Denton show.

SimonExtreme

I restored TR's for 3 years in the early 80's and I never saw a car with the SU carbs. I guess that was because I was in the UK. We did look after a race prepared car sunning on big webbers, as there was no way of getting the Lucas injection to manage the amount of fuel demanded by the state of tune of the engine.

Good looking car and pleased to hear it isn't being kept as a musium piece.

Scrooge

TR6:

Do you know the ownership history of your TR6? I knew of a '76 survivor car that looked exactly like yours, which was owned by a friend in Dayton, Ohio through the late 90s. Any chance it is the same car?

Feel free to PM me if you'd like.

cwrm4

TR6 - you have got to lose those Strombergs and stick on a pair of SU HS6 carbs. Then cap off all the primitive emissions crap and change the timing to 12BTDC (instead of 4 ATDC). It'll be a different car...I can drive mine now in August in Houston and the temp gauge never gets more than a hair over half. Even with rebuilt and rebushed Strombergs I could tell a noticeable difference when I first drove it with the SUs.

Here's a shot of my SUs. I have K&N pancake filters to go on them, which really makes for a great look.

(For those interested, all US spec TR6s came with Stromberg CD175 carbs, which were a pathetic attempt to meet emerging US emissions laws. UK-spec cars came with a Lucas "Petrol Injection" system...good for an extra 45 hp. However, the Triumph 2000 sedans, which had the same 2.5L six, used the SU HS6 set-up).

TR6

Thanks for the compliments everyone.
Actually, mine are the original Strombergs. Still have the original brass identification tags on them.
That's always the debate with these cars. To modify or not. I'm more interested in keeping this car original since it has survived this long without being modded up. It actually runs very sweet right now and the temp guage never goes above half on mine in the 100 degree Texas heat. I have pushed the timing somewhat more advanced than stock and I run 93 octane in it. But the head has never been off the car and it still has the pathetically low compression. It also still has every little bit of original emissions gear on it. That's what makes this car unique. I can't tell you how many people compliment the fact that none of that has been removed as it has on 95% of other TR6's. Same reason I leave the rubber overriders on the bumpers. I had a guy at the show telling me I should take them off. Why? I own an example from the last year of production of the TR6. They had overriders on them. To me, they are part of the character of an original late production TR6.

If I want to drive a faster car, I drive the RS America or my M Coupe. A TR6 will never be fast by today's standards, so why bother and where do you draw the line? I know guys that have put throttle body injection and a super charger in a TR6. They still aren't as fast as either of my German cars and if they were, they'd be unsafe with the ancient box frame that flexes, inadequate brakes, and marginal suspension. One thing I have done to my car is to upgrade the suspension (thanks to Richard Good's engineering) so it sits about an inch lower is much tighter than it was new. But even the best suspension upgrades out there for a TR6 barely get it to the handling level of a modern Honda Civic. I'd just get frustrated if I started trying to get more power out of it. Everytime I drove my RS America, I'd realize how futile it is.
Not the same car. I'm the third owner of mine. It was orginally purchased in California and he sold it to his buddy (second owner). Then its second owner moved to Texas with it. I bought it from him in 1990 to replace our first TR6 that an inattentive driver crashed into and totalled. The first TR6 that was crashed was my wife's that she bought when she graduated high school. So the TR6 is really her car. I just maintain it.

Steven C.

Yep, first weekend in 4 years we are not racing.