fume battle: undercoating next?

[roller]

i've been battling nasty exhaust fumes in my gtv since i've owned it.
i have sealed:
- trunk lid, brake lights
- hole under pedals
- firewall
- behind back seat
- floors
- gas tank, filler neck
- exhaust system (new) + turndown at tip

the only thing i think i haven't covered is undercoating.
my guess is some of the body panels aren't sealed, and i'm getting
exhaust in from under the car.

what's the best undercoating?

any wisdom welcome, john

[bryan]

I'm curious to see if someone out there has a gtv that doesn't have exhaust making it into the cabin. Mine, and everyone I've asked, does. Has someone out there figured out the problem?

[Andrew]

You done window and door seals too?

It may be your car is producing too many fumes; is it running rich, or excessively burning oil?

Andrew

[roller]

i'm going to look into determining if it's running rich or not.
my spica has a lot of miles on it, and i hear they get rich as they wear.
there is no smoke anyway.

i rented a sniffer a while ago and it showed massive amounts of carbon monoxide in the trunk and driver's compartment. this stuff is a serious health hazard.

i suggest that the various alfa clubs across the planet rent these things and have a day set aside so everyone can test their cars.

if the undercoating doesn't work, i'm going to start assuming that some laws of physics are being bent/broken.....

john

[Andrew]

My GTV burns a pretty fair amount of oil, but in normal driving it's not really visible. Oil burning has a particular eye-burning feel to it in addition to the smell, different from simple richness.

How do your plugs look? Do you know how to get the pump to a reasonably correct mixture? Or know how to go through a complete Spica setup?

Andrew

[smestas]

I found that a lot of the fumes coming into my cabin were coming from all the holes in my firewall. If everything in the rear is sealed up this might be worth a look.

[roller]

thanks guys.
my car is not burning any oil -- amazing.
i took a silicon sealant canister and dumped a ton of it around any opening i could find in the firewall. i'm pretty sure that's sealed.
i'll keep checking...

john

[gprocket]

My '73 has no fumes in the cab. It is not particularly well sealed either. It does have a brand new exhaust system and the engine runs very well with no oil burning or rich running SPICA.

My spider OTAH, would make my eyes water - with or without the top up. It burned oil and toward the end, I was running so rich I was getting way under 10 MPG. It's now being rebuilt...

[darth dino]

how are your door seals ? did you check the caulking seal around the floor of the trunk ?

sounds like you've tried everything else. so something in that list might be amiss :

the exhaust system may be new, but you still might have a leak under the car somewhere. could be a bad seam around a muffler, or a leaking coupling. i remember someone else here on the BB having this happen a while back.

are you sure the trunk seal and fuel tank seals are working properly ?

[spider4me]

John
I had a lot of interior vapors until I had the Spica adjusted. Made a huge difference. My wife spent 4 hours in the car last weekend at the wine tours and never once said anything about gas smell or any other noxious odors, other than me, during that whole time!
Well worth having Dan S at Veloce adjust your Spica. Esp since your wife is preggers, right?

[gmack]

Another place worth checking are the tail lights. If the gasket around the tail light housing is ill fitting, twisted or just not tight due to the gasket drying up over the years, this can be an opening for fumes.

I could see daylight from inside the trunk as I peered around the left side/driver side housing. This driver side tail light is directly above the tailpipe...

Worth a look.

GMack
74 GTV
69 Spider

[60sRacer]

My Duetto leaks fumes thru the shift tower. Even though there are several layers of rubber boots, there is plenty of room for exhaust leaks, especially if there is a leak in the center muffler or the slip joint nearby.

Another path is the hand brake. The old plastic boot usually has cracked pretty bad by now, and the leather or other replacements are NOT gas tight.

Robert

[CTALFA]

FWIW...
I recently replaced BOTH of the rubber boots beneath the outer shift boot (now this was my Spider, but I can't imagine that a GTV is set up any differently) and my fumes and odors went away entirely. Each of the rubber boots had good sized holes in them.

[emr5503]

FWIW my '71 GTV has no exhaust or other fumes. I would also check that the tail pipe is the same as original (length & direction).
Ed

[classicalfas]

The direction plays a huge part, it must be angled to the left side as original and not straight back.