Query on port-heads

[Mike Costigan]

Jim, I'm sure you are correct, although I don't know about the carburettor details. In the late 1960s the Pre War Austin Seven Club organised a trip to the new Lotus works at Hethel, and afterwards we went round to one of the directors' homes where a number of Seven spares were offered to us. I brought home a four-branch steel exhaust manifold which incorporated a full-length mounting flange; the original siamesed inlet ports each incorporated a steel tongue which fitted into the block to effectively create four separate ports. I didn't bother with the matching inlet manifold, which was indeed for a double-choke carburettor, as I couldn't see how I was going to use it - there was no carburettor to go with it   I'm pretty sure this was Chapman's original manifold which got banned from 750 racing and had just been cast aside.