Greetings Alfistos!
This is my first post on the forum, so please take it a little easy on me. I am new to Alfa's. But not new to high mileage European cars, or the forum communities that surround them.
Without further ado, here's a short story:
I bought this car and I love it:
It's a 1991 164S with 255k miles.
I found it locally on Craigslist and knew enough to know that it was cool and you don't see them very often. Once I visited the car I saw that it was sexy as hell, and that someone had taken very loving care of it for it to be in this nice of shape with that many miles.
So I bought it. Like they say: "I couldn't afford not to." It was just too nice, and too cheap.
After daily driving it for several weeks and performing some basic tune up tasks it was obvious to me that the engine was running on borrowed time. I replace the oil with 15W50 and still had to add a quart of "Honey" oil to quiet a fairly pronounced knock. The car also goes through a quart of oil every 500 miles or so.
It also has what I would call "flat spots" in the acceleration and possibly just the general running. I suspect this is not directly related to the engines age but is a engine management issue. It sort of stumbles on a cylinder every 1.5 seconds or so. If you floor it, you'll notice the jerky acceleration as the power comes on and off inconsistently. It's subtle, and a casual user probably wouldn't notice it. It almost feels like dips in the road if your holding steady speed at a moderate rev level.
Anyhow, all that for another time.
A month or so after I bought the car I found a real nice 1991 164L Automatic with 83k in a junk yard untouched in the next state over. So I drove down there and yanked the engine out of it:
This was probably overly enthusiastic. But again, it was all there in great shape and passing up the opportunity made me anxious. I'm pretty sure I could get my money back out of it if need be.
So here I stand with this engine, and plans to shine it up a little and revive my S.
I'm sure you guys have hundreds of pounds of knowledge to drop on me about how none of this is going to work how I've planned. And harsh words to scold me for being so cavalier. I've already discovered for myself some differences between the engines that might scrap the whole endeavor.
So fire away, but please be gentle. Do your best to give me a crash course on Alfa's because I need it.
Links to great threads are especially appreciated if you have them. That way I can build my knowledge from the same database as you've build yours.
Yes, I know how to use the search function and I have been using it extensively. But if you have the time to spell something important out for me, please do.
Thanks a million!!!
This is my first post on the forum, so please take it a little easy on me. I am new to Alfa's. But not new to high mileage European cars, or the forum communities that surround them.
Without further ado, here's a short story:
I bought this car and I love it:
It's a 1991 164S with 255k miles.
I found it locally on Craigslist and knew enough to know that it was cool and you don't see them very often. Once I visited the car I saw that it was sexy as hell, and that someone had taken very loving care of it for it to be in this nice of shape with that many miles.
So I bought it. Like they say: "I couldn't afford not to." It was just too nice, and too cheap.
After daily driving it for several weeks and performing some basic tune up tasks it was obvious to me that the engine was running on borrowed time. I replace the oil with 15W50 and still had to add a quart of "Honey" oil to quiet a fairly pronounced knock. The car also goes through a quart of oil every 500 miles or so.
It also has what I would call "flat spots" in the acceleration and possibly just the general running. I suspect this is not directly related to the engines age but is a engine management issue. It sort of stumbles on a cylinder every 1.5 seconds or so. If you floor it, you'll notice the jerky acceleration as the power comes on and off inconsistently. It's subtle, and a casual user probably wouldn't notice it. It almost feels like dips in the road if your holding steady speed at a moderate rev level.
Anyhow, all that for another time.
A month or so after I bought the car I found a real nice 1991 164L Automatic with 83k in a junk yard untouched in the next state over. So I drove down there and yanked the engine out of it:
This was probably overly enthusiastic. But again, it was all there in great shape and passing up the opportunity made me anxious. I'm pretty sure I could get my money back out of it if need be.
So here I stand with this engine, and plans to shine it up a little and revive my S.
I'm sure you guys have hundreds of pounds of knowledge to drop on me about how none of this is going to work how I've planned. And harsh words to scold me for being so cavalier. I've already discovered for myself some differences between the engines that might scrap the whole endeavor.
So fire away, but please be gentle. Do your best to give me a crash course on Alfa's because I need it.
Links to great threads are especially appreciated if you have them. That way I can build my knowledge from the same database as you've build yours.
Yes, I know how to use the search function and I have been using it extensively. But if you have the time to spell something important out for me, please do.
Thanks a million!!!