The dreaded Sludge Trap

[NickHaints]

I watched a buddy of mine get the sludge trap out of his motor yesterday.........talk about a process.

[camoback]

JB WELD fixes all!!!

[Torch]

JB WELD fixes all!!!

Wow Thanks man, i never thought of that, I'm on my way down to get a 5 gal drum of JB weld........
joke...

[Torch]

This just in...........We have sent the contents of a really baddly plugged sludge trap to a chemist for analization.
we have some quesses of our own, I'm thinking lead and zink, but we will see when we get the results back.......any of you college edumicated dudes care to make a guess?

[Gepetto]

Wait a second ass hole I said I thought it was zinc in the old type oil. You still owe me lunch at Scottie's when you are proven wrong.

[WolfHunter]

Hundred Thousand Dollar Question:

My 73 Tiger TR7V has 10,000 miles on it. (w regular oil changes)
At what point would a teardown to clean the sludge trap be recommended?

Are there any " signifiers" to determine a clogged sludge trap without doing a full tear down?

[Torch]

These questions are tough to answer,

In my opinion

1st- 10k miles is not an awful lot of miles,
2nd- oils changed in the 1970's, many of the oils manufactures went to detergent oils, these oils kept the dirt suspended in the oil and may not did not sludge up according to their commercials. (who knows if that works in the sludge trap).
3rd- regular oil changes do make a difference in the engine life.
and as for the outside indicators of a plugged sludge trap there is none that I am aware of. The oil pressure is measured before the sludge trap. when the trap is plugging up it turns the rods blue/black from heat but you won't see that unless you pull the jugs.

Usually the only indicator of a plugged sludge is the engine explodes.

[WolfHunter]

Thanx for the info Torch,
For a neophyte like myself, your knowledge is invaluable.

My plan then is to install an after market oil filter
because I regard the lack of one as a weak link in the design and engineering of the the Triumph motor.

[Torch]

Thanx for the info Torch.
For a neophyte like myself, your knowledge is invaluable.

My plan is to install an after market oil filter and an inline oil pressure gauge
(to determine what oil pressure i have -according to the Triumph Workshop Manual specs.)

Question: where is the best place to install the oil pressure gauge? I'm guessing somewhere before the rocker boxes?

The line going to the rockerboxes in part of the return oil system and does not have anything with the oil pressure to the internal parts of the engine. The best place for an oil pressure gauge is to "T" off the oil pressure indicator light switch on the cam cover, but beware the oil pressure often times goes to 80psi and above, that is more than normal over the counter oil gauges can handle. and the vibrations are killers of gauges too.
If you oil pressure indicator light on your headlight is working you are more likely see that.
and if you spend time looking down at a gauge you may miss the car doing and emergency stop in front of you .
I am not a big believer in oil pressure gauges or oil filters ether. the filters interfere with the oil return flow and cause too much pressure to go to the rocker feed line and that oil never sees the filter anyway.
in my opinion if you just do regular oil changes and you will be fine.

[Jethro]

I can not overemphasize the need to run an external oil filter in the RETURN line only. It will absolutely reduce the chance of sludge forming in the first place in the sludge trap and will not interfere at all in return flow if it is a motorcycle filter, and changed every 1-2000 miles.

..."Be sure that you plumb the filter into the oil line that returns engine oil back to the oil tank.
The Triumph oil pump cannot be counted on to create enough vacuum to suction highly
viscous motor oil through a very fine filter during cool temperatures. Trying to place the
filter on the oil line feeding the engine will quickly result in massive engine damage. It is
always better to have the oil pump pushing oil through the filter, and the only way to have
that is to use the return oil line. On all ”unit-construction” Triumph engines, the rear-most
oil port is the engine oil return."

Reprinted from RF WHATLEY at www.GABMA.us

[Torch]

I can not overemphasize the need to run an external oil filter in the RETURN line only. It will absolutely reduce the chance of sludge forming in the first place in the sludge trap and will not interfere at all in return flow if it is a motorcycle filter, and changed every 1-2000 miles.

..."Be sure that you plumb the filter into the oil line that returns engine oil back to the oil tank.
The Triumph oil pump cannot be counted on to create enough vacuum to suction highly
viscous motor oil through a very fine filter during cool temperatures. Trying to place the
filter on the oil line feeding the engine will quickly result in massive engine damage. It is
always better to have the oil pump pushing oil through the filter, and the only way to have
that is to use the return oil line. On all ”unit-construction” Triumph engines, the rear-most
oil port is the engine oil return."

Reprinted from RF WHATLEY at www.GABMA.us

We all have different opinions on what works well and what looks good , that's all good.
But I would rather split the cases and clean the trap every 2 months than hang an oil filter on my bike, and I hate to see Mikuni carbs on a Brit bike even worse.
That's just me.