Replying to diesel dan’s post regarding oil and rocker arms.Don’t like quoting posts longer than a few lines.Sorry 
My departed Uncle was the main dealer TS3 man round here,and I still remember him saying about Shell Rotella ,but I’m sure it was Rotella T.As to the rocker arms-he was doing a few ‘foreigners’ and an old boy with a 4 wheel tipper had a problem.Engine been noisy for a while,now a bit reluctant to start,but still did a day’s work.When it was stripped down,those rocker arm bearing holes were totally egg shaped.It was amazing that the thing kept going really.
hi steve, i think you missunderstood me ,i fitted a ts3 starter to a perkins 6.354 engine, so when the fitter tried to start it it turned backwards .i know that the early ts3 could run backwards, but i seem to recall that something was fitted to the pump or drive to prevent this on later engines. as for the noise of them, on a still night we could hear one of the night trunkers coming from about five miles away lol
cheers diesel
Ever hear one running without a silencer? I remember getting called out by my brother, he’d been heading into London from the A1 late evening with a well loaded Commer, the silencer fell off and got squashed. He decided to try and make it to Rootes in north Kensington, but was stopped by plod within minutes and told not to go any further. He 'phoned Rootes and was told there’d be a long wait before anybody could get out to him , so I went out in a car with “refreshments”. After a while he got fed up waiting and decided to set off again. When he started it, I could see from the reflections of the street lights, all the windows in the houses and flats around were vibrating, I had to put my hands over my ears as he pulled away. Still, he made it to the garage without getting pulled again and got it fixed.
Bernard
diesel dan:
hi steve, i think you missunderstood me
Dan,
Your not wrong mate !!!
I just re-read your post and yes i failed to notice you were refering to the Perky.
Still, it made me get off my arse and put another posting on, so some good came of it…
Oh, and TS3’s did not make a noise, music is the word one should use !!!
Steve.
Looking for some help getting a TS3 engine running, last run a few years ago, don’t know if anybody is interested?
mersey:
Looking for some help getting a TS3 engine running, last run a few years ago, don’t know if anybody is interested?
I can remember a tale told to me from a car delivery driver who drove a Commer artic,he used to place a tin of Heinz beans on the exhaust manifold and stop on the M6 services[forget which]open the can and eat the beans!!
If you looked carefully,you could see the manifold glowing red hot from the engine 'ole at the rear of the cab as they used to scream past you at night,once seen never forgotten!
David 
mersey:
Looking for some help getting a TS3 engine running, last run a few years ago, don’t know if anybody is interested?
Hello Mersey, is your engine in a vehicle or loose on the floor, either way just check the air intake to the blower, if its been stood some time you don’t want any foriegn bodies to get drawn in, just connect a fuel line & a return then put 12volts through the starter, if the engine is any good it should start straight away. Don’t be tempted to turn the fan to check if the engine is free as this can damage the Metalastik coupling on the fan drive shaft. I have one of these in a 1970 tipper lorry and it doesn’t matter how long it stands for, I can go to it, turn the key and if there is enough life in the battery it will start first time every time. When a TS3 wont start like that it’s time for a new set of rings and they are quite expensive now, ( no you can’t have my spare set ) hope you get it running soon. You can see pictures of my Commer on my website www.wakefieldsoflongford.co.uk
with regard to the oil for the Ts3 the oil with the same spec as the Shell Rotella is now made by Texaco it is Rubia CF 240 the last time i ordered some you could only get it in a 40 gallon drum ( begining of 2012 ) it was available in 25 ltr drums at one time. I ordered a drum and then a couple of mates who run commers to rallys ect both had 50ltrs apiece ( if you get stuck give me a shout). One of my mates ( brian) worked for Rootes and was for many years engaged with development ect of the Ts3 his knowledge and experience is priceless in his 70s now he still runs two Commers to rallys ect and in his time has restored many others.
Thanks guys.
It is sitting on the floor uninstalled.
It has a CAV NL injector pump, not a DPA like some of them, so I guess I’ll need to bleed it on the pump and injectors after connecting up a fuel/return line? Not sure where the bleed screws are on a CAV NL.
I’ll check the air intake for no crud.
It doesn’t have a fan, as it’s actually the marine version (Rootes Lister-Blackstone TS3), it’s a 3D-215 model, the main difference being instead of a radiator it has marine kit on it, to cool it via raw seawater cooling a closed water circuit. I was going to try turning the engine by hand first, but if that’s not a good idea I won’t.
It doesn’t have a bellhousing, gearbox or starter on it, but I have a CAV CA45 starter with the right number of teeth. But following on from some of the earlier posts, I’m not sure which way the engine (and then starter) should turn. If I’m looking at the flywheel should it turn clockwise or anticlockwise?
If I put the starter on without a bellhousing will the bendix throw out be wrong? I can make up a plate to get to the right distance if need be, don’t know what the distance normally would be though.
If anyone has a spare bellhousing, I’d be very interested, but I understand it’s a standard SAE size, so I guess I can get an off the shelf one that will fit a marine gearbox, and then just adapt so it takes the starter too. Anyone know which SAE size ?
lemonmouth:
Is there any Fitters, Ex fitters or Drivers that worked on the TS3 2 stroke engine ? Were they reliable in service ? and were there any major problems with them ? were they easy to service ?..Hopefully someone will remember themTrev.
I’ve been looking through some of my Dads photos and I come across these
My Dad used to tell me stories about the "2 stroke de coking themselves especially when being driven hard
He said he’s seen grass verges and central reservations been set on fire especially in the summer time
main problems ,rocker arms and injector pump drive shaft breaking.use the correct oil and change every 5000 miles with a new filter. 
Massive thread dig but yes I worked on 2-stroke Commers when I was a youngster.
I could fit a set of rings after school, they were so easy to replace pistons/rings if you had the correct ring compressor.
Worst part was making the huge rocker cover gasket, a lot of material wasted. Today I guess it would just be sealant.
The photo shows one of dad’s (early model engine) and they grossed 28t.
Very popular in Australia but usually only as a tipper, body load or at the most a close bogey trailer.
We had no trouble with flogged out rocker arm bearings, I haven’t heard of that one.
We used Castrol 2-stroke oil and never needed de-carboning after changing to that oil, the ports would have a nice oily coating when I did inspections, no baked on coke and those engines worked HARD. The Shell Rotella was hopeless for carbon build up.
I do remember once doing a de-coke, seats out, floor up, manifold off and scraping tools in use. Then pull out the engine stop and give her a short crank to expose the next cylinder.
But I got it wrong and she started…………Soot and oil everywhere, not to mention the noise.
We screwed off blower shafts as our Commers still had the twin oil bath air cleaners mounted down in the dust near the left wheel. You had to keep and eye on those old air cleaners.
I had one strip the right rear rocker shaft stud and that rocker shaft moved out and so the piston came out too far, the rings popped out then next stroke she pushed the sleeve right out the other side.
They blew a lot of oil out the breather, front axle would be awash after a day’s work.
They had absolute rubbish Lucas electrics (in Aus) and the puny generator couldn’t keep up with all the trailer lights.
Starter motor pinion would climb over the ring gear and then stay engaged, pull mega RPM and destroy itself.
Air compressor was a joke, more of an oil compressor as they filled the system with engine oil. Later models had a very long skirt on the compressor piston but it was still too small capacity for full air brakes. NZ truckers fitted 3-compressors in a row down the left rocker cover.
All it need was a decent twin cylinder compressor mounted on the timing case.
Our first Commers had an aluminium exhaust manifold. It was total rubbish, got hot, sagged and fell to bits. We’d strip it off, fill it with sand and try to weld it back together but it was useless. Then a cast iron manifold became available and problem solved.
The flex exhaust tubing tended to rust into a solid pipe and the two huge swinging mufflers soon tore the flex apart. They made a hell of a racket with the flex tube blowing.
Dad made up 3" tubular ball joints from old torque tube shaft drives and a pair of them became our flex exhaust system.
Yes our early engines had the timing chain, (triplex from memory) and it just stretched from day one so we were continually advancing the injector pump to keep up. When we ran out of adjustment we’d replace the timing chain.
Later engines had timing gears and ran a bit more supercharger pressure.
Still later models again had the DPA pump and an ever-so-slightly larger diameter bore.
The much talked about 4-cylinder engine or even a turbo’d 3-cylinder never made it, more’s the pity.
TS3 Blower Shafts… My god I remember fitting these on the side of the A1 many times… I served my apprenticeship on Commers… Wonderful, noisy 16 tonners.
Ah yes, the “oil compressor” for the brakes. That’s why, if we didn’t drain the tank often enough, it’d ■■■■ and spray black oil on the adjoining vehicle at the lights!
Bernard
The last ones they made about 71-72 had a rear mounted compressor driven by a toothed belt, the compressor was a lot better than the little one mounted on the crankcase but they were a swine for snapping belts. The drivers used to carry a spare belt in the cab and knew how to change them !
Hi the TS3 engines would run backwards a common problem on tippers if they stalled on a tip and rolled backwards letting the clutch out it would start backwards and fill the cab with exhaust fumes but there was no oil pressure !!
Only ever had to decode one ts3 it was a coal wagon and running local I worked for Kirby’s Liverpool rooters main agents
They had a works tool looked like a half round fork and you just dug in took forever…I used to win bets! Telling drivers the engine came out through the passenger side door of which they didn’t believe …so when it came out the door the money was mine
Disconnect air filters, let exhaust fall off.
Now THAT’S what I call a noisy 2-stroke!
Hi Trev I must be one of the few people who worked on ts3 engine commers at a rootes dealer in Nottingham, from the mid sixties man and boy.In answer to your question ,provided the correct oil was used [shell rotela T ] the engine gave little trouble, since there was no valve gear, after 100 k we would do a re -ring and de coke. This for a good fitter could be done in a day,due to the complex wet liners it was impossible to re bore, so we would re ring the same engine several times, the large cast iron pistons never seemed to wear.Other common problems were broken blower shafts,leaking oil coolers, and engine side covers.IN the case of the blower shaft, if it broke at the extreme end of the engine , out would come the gear box, flywheel, bellhousing, just to remove a drive pinion and its shaft A favourite trick to play on you work mates was wait till a tracktor unit was towed in .To do this the two huge frontal silencers woud be removed,then lie in wait for some hapless sole to walk by and start the engine. The noise was like a dozen shotguns going off, not for the faint hearted. As usual rootes did not invest in development and by the seventies the engine was underpowered,and needed the extra cylinders they built ,and discarded. This engine was far better than four stroke in line diesels of the time, owners and drivers loved them ,more for the noise they made than anything ,they were happy days. Fjstraw.
I used to work with someone who had been a machinist for Tilling Stevens in the toolroom at the factory in St Peters Street Maidstone. They were really proud of their engine.
I’d forgotten about those heavy pistons.
But if it took a day to do a set of rings and a de-coke, he’d be looking for another job.
They were dead simple to re-ring and when running on correct 2-stroke diesel oil, the bores just didn’t wear.
Early engine pistons had a removable piston crown, attached via a centre nut which I’ve had come undone and destroy the engine.
Later engines had the one piece piston.
The engine “shouldn’t” have run backwards as there was a ratchet style one-way-drive on the injector pump but mechanical items can fail.
Of course it was possible to force it to turn the wrong way if she stalled in the manner as described in the earlier post.
When I think of all the tinkering by the Rootes Group on the TS3, instead of just getting into it and pushing the 4-cylinder engine.
What a waste.