2nd 3.7 Litre 24 Valve Milano Project!

[junglejustice]

Finally making progress on my own 3.7 - even had time today to try out some wheel and tire selections...!

(Thanks Chris for that little "addition" )

Jonni was awesome - didn't mind getting under there with the Simple Green and the steam cleaner to get 18 years of gunk out of there!

Update: Thursday, October 26th 2006
OK, SO I managed to revive some past pics;
1) v 2.0
2) The original motor build at Glenwood Motors in South Africa (with an early mock-up of those awesome custom aluminium intakes designed by non other that Dawie de Villiers himself!)
3 & 4) The 6 individual throttle plates open and shut...
5) The first donour (a blue one just like Jes') was somehow misplaced/displaced/replaced under mysterious circumstances, but fear not - Version 2.0 rides to the rescue... (Pretty sad looking...)

Great story actually; a very nice gentleman by the name of David Fish in Portland calls me up one day and says: "...I heard what happened - I have another car for you - come and get it..." WOW! I can't tell you how that felt! Thanks David!

[junglejustice]

A few more!

The 24 valve is headed back to SA and should be back here by the end of January... (After seeing Jes end up with 300+ horses at the wheels, I decided that I would enjoy 350 at the wheels a bit more!) We’re going to go with a dry-sump, Pauter chrome molly forged steel rods, solid lifters and 12.0:1 compression on this one and probably end up somewhere around 425 at the crank…

Everybody knows that I am a bad driver, so I figured that I would substitute talent with horsepower...

Update: Thursday, October 26th 2006
...and here is;
1) The crazy Icelander that will be doing the welding.
2) Chris' little wheel-addition - those are gone now - this is not a demolition-derby car after all....
3 & 4) The only way to get this thing clean!
5) What came out of there - one head was complete frozen to the block... (Sad in-deed!)

[Greg Gordon]

Hey John, Two questions.
1. 12:1 compression! What fuel are you planning on using?
2. Are you bringing one of these to the big convention in Tulsa this year. I am starting to make plans to be there.

[AR4me]

Looks good JJ!
So, the tree hugger didn't come out to chase you away when he saw you pressure washing out front?
Nah, just got a little more weight to offset ;-)
Jes

[junglejustice]

Tree hugger was afraid of the noise from Jonni's "big nozzle"....

What extra weight!? The dry-sump pump…? Nah. I gain because you don’t want the GTV6 hood on there….

Greg, at that point, it becomes race-gas all of the way... I dunno - the 300+ bhp numbers were all done on pump gas though - nice...!

[Greg Gordon]

MMMM race gas! That thing should really fly. I don't quite understand the point of 12:1 compression. You can probably get away with 11:1 on pump gas and about 14:1 on race gas (they guys at Vick run about 14:1 on the race Fiats). Is the 12:1 ratio and race gas an effort to be on the super safe side. I am not criticizing, quite the opposite, that's exactly the way I would do it, it's just very unusual.

[junglejustice]

No-no – all good Greg – good point indeed!

Yeah, basically - I mean, we're running 10.7:1 right now wit great results - we tried it first with a 50/50 blend to be safe - but then after final tuning, we ran it on pump-gas. The dyno runs were done on a pump gas fill-up (basically just pump gas left at that point...)

Since the original premise (given the "street-able track-car versus a track-able-street car BS debate over on some other forum) drove the idea of a fast street car that can be enjoyed on the track too, we went with lower compression (a safe-lower number) to be able to run pump gas...

Since then, both Jes and I have both decided to go "dedicated track" on both projects. Jes' engine will remain the same for now and can run either grade fuel! Since I am in a position to go for more horses now, and given that this car will now only run closed events, I figured, what the heck...!

I get your point though - go all the way to "the dark side" or stay on the safe side (14:1 or 11:1...) The reason we go 12:1 is because we would probably still get away with running a 50/50 blend... Problem is, you can't hear pinging at 6-7-8-9 K rpm on these things with those 6 individual throttles wide-open (not even at 4K rpm...)

I still can't hear squat after standing up there for the dyno sessions on the Australian 425 hp motor

14:1 melted pistons and broke a 5K Pound Sterling gear-box... 12:1 is just a reliable number that has worked on this engine configuration with staggering results (346 at the wheels at sea-level on the one motor and 364 at the wheels on the other motor) with some differences in rods, sump pump and piston-shape, but both running 12:1... (Mine will be of the more advantageous variety naturally )

[Greg Gordon]

Makes sense to me! I hope you are bringing one of these to the big convention in Tulsa! We are planning to be there.

[junglejustice]

I'll be there with two 15" wide slicks on the left side of the car! (Heard that the autocross is an all right-hand turn run around one square downtown city block!!! )

Nah - We'll be there! With the 3.7...

[junglejustice]

Well, unplanned BBQs, various motor-swaps & chassis-changes, 8 wild trips to South Africa (and much waiting & patience aside), v 2.0 is finally underway again...

It sure feels great to have it finally sitting in the shop - on jack-stands - wheels blown off - all ready to go!

I figured that since this thread lost most of the pictures at some stage and given that the original thread on Jes' 3.7 build was decommissioned, I will attempt to post updates here and keep things rolling to show what goes in to this 425 horsepower 3.7 litre monster.

So, enjoy - whatever we call her - Version 2.0, The Sin Bin, 75 GTA 3.7, The South African Connection (I know that he doesn't look like much right now), but give it some time... I'm just glad that he's red...

...and then;
1) That gorgeous custom aluminium sump with some nice functional baffles inside...
2) Keep in mind that there are two of them originally built side-by-side!
3) Where it will go once it is all cleaned up, roll-cage built and painted...

The motor is back now. I dropped the dry-sump idea (too much to screw around with when trying to sort other aspects of the motor...) I have the dry-sump and I may add it later, but for now - this deep sump is more than good enough.

So as a part of the rebuild, we did go with the 2nd iteration of the aluminium alloy Ross Racing pistons and bumped compression to right at 12.0:1.

I went to Total Seal Gapless rings, we converted the cam-followers to solid lifters, I went with Pauter forged steel chrome molly rods and a great deal more cam (304 degrees of duration!)

Also, much bigger injectors and the t-stat housing on this 156 generation motor is now converted to the front of the motor for a little extra clearance at the back against the firewall...

FYI; similar spec motor in England in a 75 just turned 351 horsepower at the wheels and 433 Nm of torque at the wheels!!!

[junglejustice]

Feels good to move it forward... Had to say that again... Stay tuned for some intersting brake inprovements over what we have done to date on TA cars...

[genius]

JJ...do I spy some Pro-Race 1.2 wheels back there?

[AR4me]

Come on, post some pics. I need my Alfa-fix after working 16h days this week, and more to come this weekend
Jes

[junglejustice]

...good eye Mike - yes, Pro Race 1.2 - just had them refinished (powder-coated) in a matte black too - they look amazing!

These are 7.5 x 17s - for the monster 164 LS with the 6-speed GTA close-ratio gearbox and the 3.45 litre 24 valve from South Africa that we are about to finish-up and push in there! (Burgundy car w/the matte black wheels...?)

Group 2 has another set of Pro Race 1.2s for sale by the way - 5 x 98 on 17 x 7.5 with a 35mm off-set. Unfinished - 180 per wheel or 220 per wheel powder-coated any colour (well, almost - no pink for you Jes!)

They also have 1 set of Pro Race 1 in stock - 17 x 7 w/35mm off-set in Silver - 5 x 98. All of these are single-drilled sets - no double drilled re-drills... All brand new. I put a set of 17/235 100ESs on mine today - looks awesome - need shorter wheel-bolts to fit the 164 though!

Back to this car...

Looks good next to the 3.7 roler even - what do you guys think? Maybe a set of 8, 8.5s or even 9s with slicks for "Sin Bin" when he is all done...? The same matte black with the red car?

[junglejustice]

So, I "commissioned" these spacers/bolt-pattern converters down in South Africa (a few trips ago already, actually...)

Any way, the idea is that you put them on with longer studs through the existing 5 x 98 holes, ignore the 5 x 120 holes and now you simply have a 10mm spacer - nice!