I have just finished a tune up and I must say that I am happy with it, and the car hasn't run so well in a long time. Out of curiosity, my freind was over and he had a compression tester, so we tested the compression. I had no reason to suspect anything, just did it for fun.
First about the car: it is a 1969 142 with a stock B20B and dual SU carbs. The odometer still works well and is now over 341,000 miles. I have no idea if the engine has ever been rebuilt, but it is still very clean and doesn't leak or burn a drop of oil (I've had it for the past year). Anyway, we did the compression test and every cylinder was exactly the same at 155. The book states that it should be between 170-200. I tried looking up how to determine the compression ratio on the net and found a few "calculators" but I need more info than I have like: cylinder head volume, and stock deck height. Does anybody have these numbers? What does the low compression mean for the future of the engine?
Thanks everybody,
Phil