1750 Berlina project

[Damo105]

Hi All

I'm in the early stages of a Berlina project car, so thought I may as well start a thread and share it with everyone.

I should start by saying I'm a total novice when it comes to restoring a car. I've got a '74 GTV that's a really nice driver, but all the hard stuff was already done when I bought it, I've only had to make some cosmetic improvements. So this is all new to me, especially the mechanical stuff. I'm definitely better at driving cars than fixing them!!

So anyway, I recently jumped in feet first and bought a '70 1750 Berlina sight unseen on ebay, and it turned out to be not too bad. The car has some rust, but nothing too nasty, and it's otherwise pretty straight. The interior isn't too bad either. The engine is tired, and so is the suspension.

I considered parting it out, but then made the decision to keep it. That decision was helped by the aquisition of a 2000 Berlina as a donor car, which I bought from a fellow alfabb'er, 'Shire_GTV'.

See this thread for details of the 2000:

http://www.alfabb.com/bb/forums/show...584#post279584

I tossed around a few ideas about what to do with the 1750, eg., total resto to original, track/race car, fast street car etc, and decided to build it as a nice driver, with a performance focus, while keeping it fairly original. There's so few 1750 Berlinas left that I don't want to b*stardise it. Any mods will be reversible, and I'm keeping all the original parts I don't use.

I'd love to restore them both, but funds don't permit that. And the 1750 has the better body so that's the one that's going back on the road.

So the rough plan for the car is to build a warm engine, add an LSD, lower the car about 1-1.5", paint it white (original colour), add red & green bonnet stripes, GTA replica rims (or superlites), and possibly remove the bumpers.

White is my least favourite colour, but in the interests of not straying too far from original I can live with the white if I add the bonnet stripes.

Here's a few pics of the car, sitting outside my mechanics workshop.

[Damo105]

As you can see above, the engine is out of the car, and I want to tackle the engine bay while the engine is getting built. Haven't yet decided whether to paint it myself, or ship it down the road to a panel shop for a quick paint job.

Deciding on exactly what engine to build has been difficult. Firstly because I'm a novice, and secondly because there's so many differing opinions. But Jim K's book has been a great help! My mechanic is an Italian specialist, he grew up outside Milan, has worked on, owned and raced Alfas, Fiats and Ferraris all his life, and has a piece of paper on his office wall that says he's a mechanical engineer, so I guess I have to trust him!

So after much debate, the basic plan for the engine is to use a warm cam, port the head, increase inlet valves to 46mm, keep the exhaust valves standard size, use the weber 40s off the 2000, high-comp AE pistons, shave 0.7mm from the head, shot-peen the rods, and balance the whole lot. Compression will run at about 11.5:1.

On the advice of others, I quizzed him about the compression, but he guarantees me the engine will idle and be very streetable. So if it's a pig on the street, then it falls back on him to fix it!

The cam grind is to his own specs, which are very close to the specs Jim K gives in his book as the ideal specs for a 2lt street performance engine. The mechanic said it'll pull well from 2500-3000 revs, and have heaps of torque right through the range.

The head will be ported to the same specs as another head he has done recently, which when tested gave a HP 'potential' of 196HP. He estimates my engine will produce about 150HP at the flywheel, and there will be plenty of scope to increase HP later with bigger carbies and improvements to air intake and exhaust.

I welcome all opinions at this point!!

[Alfajay]

Damo105:

Running high-compression pistons, and shaving .7mm off the head probably will raise the compression ratio to 11-1/2. That's awfully high, especially for a street engine that you'd like to last for more than a few laps.

The completed engine probably will idle OK. The issue is how long it will survive! Further, if you can't get sufficiently high octane gas to prevent detonation, you'll need to back off the ignition advance, which will "give back" some of the hp that the higher compression provided. I would either use the high compression pistons OR shave the head, but not both. But hey, your mechanic is from the old country, has probably done more rebuilds than I have, so ...

Bigger carbs don't provide bigger power. Your 40mms should be fine for anything less than a full race engine (e.g., high lift/duration cam, fully ported head, race exhaust, ...).

196 hp from a streetable Nord engine? Again, I am very skeptical. Perhaps at 7,000 rpm, but not at any range usable on the street.

I know that people on the BB seldom have opinions, and when they do are generally shy about expressing them, but comments will be welcome!

[PeterC]

Nice Fiat 124 coupe in the background ....

Peter

[py105]

Damo's mechanic is also my mechanic, and I would have to thoroughly support the notion that he knows what he's doing

Glad to see youre sticking with the 1750 engine though Damo...

[Damo105]

AlfaJay - I was sceptical about the compression too, but the mechanic assures me the engine will last. I've raised the issue of detonation and he said it won't be a problem. He has another customer with a 116 using the same compression for street, and he said 4 years on the engine is still sweet. He has built a lot of engines both for street and race, so I trust him that he knows what he's doing.

Over here in Oz we have 98 octane available everywhere, and Shell now has a 99 octane fuel called V-Power Racing. As the car isn't going to be a daily driver I don't mind the extra cost of adding an octane boost as well, so I should be able to run about 100-102 octane.

The 196HP figure was the 'potential' of the head, ie what it 'could' achieve if the rest of the engine was built accordingly (race pistons, rods, exhaust etc), but the engine he's building me he estimates will put out about 150HP at the flywheel.

PeterC - it is a nice 124, it belongs to the mechanic and is for sale for $8500AUD (about $6800usd).

py105 - I'm using the 2lt for the rebuild, and I'm going to store the 1750, which will be a pain in the butt, but at least if I ever sell the car it will have the original engine with it, albeit in need of a rebuild. Just on the off chance that Berlinas one day are worth good money, I want to make sure the car can easily be made original. Hence I'll keep all the original parts I'm not using.

Damien

[py105]

Damo:

VPower Racing is 100 octane, but its achieved by using Ethanol to keep the cost down. If it was actually refined pure petroleum to 100 RON no one would buy it. I have used VPR once but seeing as the effects of Ethanol are either undefined or negative (depending who you listen to) for old cars I wouldnt like to be relying on it.

I know Michael uses it himself but im not sure he's aware of the ethanol input.

[Damo105]

Pete - I asked him about the ethanol content and he said it's no problem at all, but I'll seek a few more opinions before I start using it. Though even if I stick with 98 RON, with an additive it'll still bring it up to 99 or 100 I guess.

[italiansedanman]

Just a quick note on the V Power 100 Octane stuff. When it first came on the market I asked a few knowledgeable people for recommendations regarding running it in the Alfa and in my BMW 2002. Nobody really had anything to say except that it might cause premature deterioration of the carburettor seals and gaskets if the car is used intermittently.

On my recent trip to Canberra and back in the 1750, I used two tank-fulls (or was it three?) and the rest of the time I used Caltex Vortex 98. I got significantly better mileage using the V Power, almost 50km more to a tank. So were talking 10% on highway cycle - that means that from 45 litres I was getting close to 550km. That's the best fuel consumption i've ever got from an Alfa.

Back on track, I also noticed that when I had V Power in the car, it did a better job of staying with the 2000 GTV I was travelling with on steep inclines at 110km/h.

I am planning to keep using the V Power when I can get it, as if I end up needing to rebuild the carbs I wont be too fussed and the car seems to run that little bit better on it.

As an aside, while I was in Canberra I filled up with V Power one morning and it was a typical clear, but cold Canberra morning. Running on that fuel and breathing that cold, dense air i've not yet felt the car feel so good! Its a damn shame you cant modify the air in your engine bay VERY much...

[py105]

Ben.. dont get confused between V-Power and V-Power Racing...

V-Power is just the standard 98 formulation and is available pretty much everywhere, where as V-Power Racing seems to be very sparsely distributed....

I hear you about the V-Power Racing though. Put 10L in one night a few weeks back and she went like a scalded cat.... Very very good fun.

My favourite 98 RON fuel is BP Ultimate... Just for the record.

[italiansedanman]

Whatever V Power I put in was 100 octane. And I think there is different legislation in the various states regarding what can be put in fuel and RON numbers blah, blah, blah.

I think this leads the petrol companies to vary the names of the fuels in different states.

I use Ultimate too, but only because the only Premium Octane fuel available in Byron Bay is Ultimate.

[Damo105]

All good info.....now back to the topic!

[Damo105]

A few people have asked where things are at with the Berlina.

The engine is still being built, but is nearly ready. The car is back home at my place, and I'm going to attempt to paint the engine bay. This will be my first time painting anything on a car, so will be a learning curve.

So not a lot of news to report.

I've pretty much decided on the Alfaholics fast road suspension Kit A. And I rang Max Banks the other day and ordered a set of the new 15" GTA replica rims for it! They should look sweet on it, especially once it's lowered.

I think I want this car to be 'in your face'. Fast, loud and obnoxious, something that my 'respectable' neighbours will hate.

[Shire_GTV]

Hi mate,
Glad to hear its progressing. Your've gotta use the front bumper with spot lights on it. I reckon they make the Berlina look that much more aggressive.

Cheers

[Damo105]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shire_GTV Hi mate, Glad to hear its progressing. Your've gotta use the front bumper with spot lights on it. I reckon they make the Berlina look that much more aggressive. Cheers