Many thanks again for the replys, much apprecitated.
Seen the vid on you-tube giuliettaevo, class. Tried the
same thing with a diff a long while back, nearly killed
ourselves, good sideways fun though. Managed to complete
the wiring today and hit the start button, unfortunately it
won't run yet. After a while checking everything we think
we might have found the problem. After cranking for a good
while and checking various things we found the plugs were
still bone dry while we fully expected them to be flooded at
this stage. The engine cranks over and will fire up for a
second before dying again. We checked the injector electrical
feeds with a noid and they all flashed out ok, so then we
checked the fuel supply and it to appears ok, so now we're
beginning to think that either the injectors are seized or blocked
up due to the engine lying up for a few years. So we've pulled
them out and have left them in to be ultrasonically cleaned in
the hopes that this will clear them, or at the very least find out
if this is the problem. Hopefully we'll have them back tomorrow
and it'll be ready for another try.
The story of how we got to this stage is..................
Part 1 (coppied and pasted form another forum)
Startin to make some progress now. First up was to trial fit the engine and see what "issues" laid ahead. As you can see below unless the american drag car look is what your after the inlet plenum sticking 5 inches above the bonnet line could definitely be called an issue.
Problem was the V6's sump was hitting the e30's crossmember and preventing it from sitting down as far as we wanted.
So we started work on a custom sump. First thing to check was where the V6's oil pick up pipe was located, as if this was directly above the subframe we could be in trouble.
As you can see from the above it turns out it's located towards the front of the engine which is helpfull. So next step was to figure out the measurements for the new sump and still have it hold the same amount of oil. After a few arguments about how many centimeters squared are in a litre and which of us was thicker than the other :roll:
we came up with the figures that let us start on the following.
Hope to get it finished welded tomorrow and refit it to the engine. Found a secondhand flywheel from a 164 in a parts supplier in London, and had it delivered over last week. So should be able to start mounting the gearbox to the engine next, as soon as we figure out what bolts to use to connect the flywheel, old flywheels bolts are to long with not enough thread and 164's flywheel bolts are just the right length but a different thread than the holes for them in the crank. Don't you just love Italian engineering.
Part 2
Evening all,
Been a while since I've been in as we haven't done much to the engine since, as we were waiting to get
some parts together. While we were waiting we decided to crack on and make and fit the cage.
By the time the cage was done we had the parts to continue with the V6.
First up was to bolt on the second hand 164 flywheel which accepts a clutch as opposed to the Alfa 75 one which doesn't (gearbox and clutch down the back of the car). One thing that wasn't too straight forward about this is that the original flywheel bolts were now to long for the new skinnier flywheel so we had to track down some others. The circle of 8 bolts that hold on the flywheel is fairly small radius meaning that special bolts are required with smaller than normal heads so they fit. Main dealer provided a choice of 2 types of bolts fine thread and coarse. Our engine had an earlier crank with the coarse threads, later engines I believe have the fine thread.
That sorted we were able to offer up the gearbox to the engine and found out that the BMW box just wasn't going to work out, the input shaft was too short to reach the flywheel. So.........., with an article in mind from an old PPC magazine we headed of to the local scrapyard and bought an old Ford type 9 gearbox from a seirra. The advantage here is the bellhousing bolts off and you can make your own custom one to bolt it to the engine of your choice. We then fitted the splined centre from a ford clutch disc (to mate up with the ford gearbox's input shaft) to an Alfa 164 v6 disc ( to fit against the V6's flywheel).
Next detail to sort out was a spigot bearing or bush. As the V6 engine was fitted to a front wheel drive car the gearbox input shaft doesn't need to be supported at the flywheel side, hence the V6 engine doesn't have a bearing in the centre of the flywheel. However the ford type gearbox's input shaft does need to be supported at the flywheel so the need for a bearing to sit in the flywheel end of the crank. As it turns out the hole in the end of the crank is an odd size and we couldn't find a bearing to fit, so we had a local machine shop make us up a brass bushing to do instead. All of which looks like this......
That sorted we could crack on with the bellhousing. Plan here was a large piece of 10mm sheet steel with a whole cut in it the size of the flywheel, drilled and bolted on to the end of the engine which looks like this..........
And with the centre piece that was cut out of this sheet we cut an inch off the diameter and drilled and bolted it up to the gearbox.......
With this sorted it was time to prop the gearbox up behind the engine, align everything up perfectly square, and start joining the two plates with some flat metal.
Before we finnished enclosing it we had to make a pivot point for the clutch fork, so a 10mm bolt was welded in to the right place. And with all the rest of the pieces of flat fitted and welded we could trim of the excess from the large plate as there was no further worries of the welding heat distorting things. Which left it looking like this.........
Plan is to take the mini grinder to the outside of it in the next few days and smooth it all out. Next to sort out is the clutch slave cylinder to push against the clutch fork and we're going to try and use the original bmw slave cylinder more of which next time.
Before we started on the gearbox we had a chance to refit the engine to the car to see if it would fit with the new sump, which, thankfully, it does............ just!
And when I say just I mean JUST, you wouldn't get a ciggie paper between the top of the engine and the underneath of the bonnet!
Next up is to get the whole lot fitted back in the car and make up some mounts and a pair of exhaust manifolds, bloody V engines. :roll:
Part 3
Evening all,
We made a little progress again since last post.
First on the list was to get the clutch finished and this meant sorting the
clutch fork and operating mechanism. The fork mounts on one side of the
bellhousing on top of the welded in m12 bolt as so.......
and then we drilled and mounted the bmw's slave cylinder on the other
side of the bellhousing to push the fork.......
Been able to use the bm's slave cylinder has meant the there's no need touch any
of the fluid pipes as everything reaches as is, the only other thing that needed
making up was a longer rod to go between the slave cylinder and the fork as the
bm one was to short......
With that sorted it meant we could bolt engine and box back together and
get it back into the car and start mounts. The engine mounts came out like this.........
and the bm's standard rear gearbox mount looks like it's going to fit back
too once we find a ford gearbox mount rubber to sit on top of it.
With the engine now in it's final resting place we started figuring out where
to mount the alternator. The alternator on this v6 when fitted in the
Alfa 75 used a large bracket which bolted to the block and sump and as
we had dumped the sump for our own we decided to make a new mount.
First up was clean the threads in these holes on the side of the block........
then cut and drill a plate to bolt on there..........
and weld an m12 bolt on to sit the alternator on. Alfa's top adjuster then
holds the top mounting point.........
Next up was a radiator, we decided to use the v6's own rad as it
manages to cool the engine in the Alfa 75 and all the engines original
hose pipes would line up again. The rad fits in nice in front of the engine
and all that was needed was a pair of bottom mounts made up and weld
in for it............
and a top mount/steady bracket.........
And thats where the need for beer took over and as such progress halts here for now.
We hope to try and make a start on the exhaust manifolds
next weekend and try and get the powersteering sorted. And thats our
next problem, as you can probably see from the photos the cars a left
hand drive and was fitted with manual steering and we aren't having
much luck finding a left hand power steering rack in the scrap yards aroung here,
so if you have or know of someone selling a left-hand power
steering rack from either a e30 or e36 and would be willing to post it to
Dublin (expences paid by us) please post.
Cheers. :wink:
Part 4
Evenin all,
Made some progress again the last couple of weeks, some straight
forward, some not so. A few more parts arrived in the post among which
were the fuel tank and swirl pot which allowed us to start on the rear fuel
cell. As this car has to be able to compete in some motorsport events, the
rules of which decree that the fuel tank, pumps etc must be seperated from
the driver by a sealed metal bulkhead, we decided to mount them all in the
now redundant spare wheel well. Which looks like this..................
the plan is to have a hingeable sealed alloy door to allow access to refuel
and work on the pumps, just about finished this..................
when the covers finished we'll move on to fitting the 2 fuel pumps and filters in
there aswell, somewhere!
The other item that arrived back was the modified driveshaft. We decided
to keep the shaft a 2 piece item retaining the centre bearing as opposed
to a single piece prop for 1 reason, if the shaft was 1 piece we couldn't fit
it without removing the rear axle or engine first! When the driveshaft was
fitted to the standard 318 this wasn't an issue as you first slid the shaft
through the hole in the back axle and bolted it up to the diff and then just
lifted it up to bolt onto the gearbox flange, but now with the ford box fitted
you have a whole different end on the shaft up the front which needs to be
slid on to a splined shaft coming out the back of the ford gearbox. With
a one piece shaft you could only slide it on to one end, whereas with the 2
piece shaft it can bend enough in the middle to slide in both ends. It's a
nice feeling when you narrowly avoid a **** up.
gearbox on the left centre bearing on the right
Next up was the not so straight forward bit, the exhaust manifolds. There
was a nice bit of room on the passenger side of the engine bay to run the
3 branches for that cylinder head, but space on the other side was in short supply
with the engine mount and steering collum proving quite
stubborn...............
Tackled the easy side first and with six 90 degree bend pipes from the
local motorfactors and 6 flanges cut and filed down from 6mm sheet steel
(f**kin elbow still aches from the fileing) we set about running the pipes.
not being able to avoid it any longer we then started or the other side
which I believe is referred to in engineering terms as "a complete b**tard".
with everything tacked into place we could remove both manifolds and
fully weld them up at the bench. One thing we did find handy was when
welding the manifolds in the vice the heat would warp the bends ever so
slightly but enough to make them ackward to refit again, so we bolted the
old cast iron manifolds to the new manifolds during welding to keep them
from moving................
and then refited everything.............
we're away rallying this weekend but if we arrive back alive we hope
to finish the rest of the exhaust system next week and move one large
step towards hearing it run for the first time.
Part 5
Evenin all,
A little step closer to hearing some noise,
With the engine removed again to tidy up some loose ends
before it can be started we had to first sort out a working dipstick.
The old dipstick could no longer be used as it was sticking down
into a place where we had shortened the sump, so as luck would
have it, beside the hole in the block where the dipstick tube threaded
in was another hole for an oil temp sender.
so out came sender, in went shortened dipstick tube, and with the
sender cut down and welded up as a bung, it went back in to fill the
old empty distick hole.
the reason we had to cut down the original dipstick tube in height
was that the new hole for it had it right under one of the manifold
branches. So chop, chop, bend, bend and screw, screw has it left like
this...................
next up was the sump. As it was only loosely bolted up first time to
check it would clear the crossmember it was now time to bolt it up oil
tight. First up was a lick of paint...............
then get a gasket cut up and bonded down to the block...............
then fit el sumpo..............
actually just before the engine was lifted out this time we got the
gearbox mount made up. We used most of the bm mount and just made
a cradle to bolt to the box which then sat on the original mount.
with the engine removed it also gave us a chance to cut the gearbox
tunnel. The new engine and box has the gearlever 40mm more forward
of the original hole, so, half a new hole had to be cut and half the old
refilled. Which came out looking like this from underneath
and this from above.................
a ford gearlever booth then keeps the elements out in the cabin
also sorted was the rest of the exhaust system. With the 2
manifolds made we now needed a collector to run from them
into the rest of the system. There now should follow pictures of
beautifully formed pipes made on a no expence spared state of
the art computerised pipe bender. But the lotto numbers haven't
come up yet so what you get is a selection of bends robbed from
the local fast fit's waste skip, which look like this................
and a bridge piece welded in to secure this section to the gearbox
next up was the fuel pipes. The originals ran to the bm fuel tank
under the rear seat and as this was now gone and replaced with a small
fuel tank in the boot we decided to run some new pipes.
Starting in the engine bay..............
down the floor pan.................
squiggle, squiggle.................
and as we didn't want to try and follow the complex bends of
the hole where the old tank used to be we weld in some flat to take
the pipe on a straighter route...............
over the axle and into the spare wheel well....................
and plumbed into the rest of the fuel cell which is nearly complete
the trip to the scrap had also turned up a new header tank with
the right size outlets in the right places................
which has allowed us to start finishing off the water plumbing...........
we also managed to get the accelerator cable sorted. We used the
original Alfa cable with the pedal end chopped off and fitted a cross
drilled headed bolt to the bm's accelerator pedal to retain the inner cable.
The bolt isn't run up tight so as when the pedal/arm moves the cable pull
always remains straight.
Engine bays starting to look a little fuller now, hopefully smoke (of the
right sort) ain't that far away..............
Part 6
Evening all,
This weeks progress is as follows.
First up was to sort the ducting for the airflow meter to the throttle buterfly.
As previously mentioned we appear to be missing a few bits of the jigsaw
here, namely the elbow to connect the flexi-pipe to the throttle housing, and
as this elbow would appear to have allowed a few other pipes to tee into it,
we decided it was probably a good thing to have it present.
So..........
2 bits of tubing tacked together at the appropriate angle, one of which has
a tee off welded into it .......
cardboard template of the metal needed to fill the gap between........
template transfered to metal and tacked and bent into shape.........
and after severe arc eye, sunburn, 3 burnt finger tips, and much
colorful language later, a complete elbow.........
those with a keen eye might have spotted that the tee off on the
elbow might appear to be facing the wrong way to link in with the pipe
on the right of it, but we've decided the in the final engine "blinging"
session that we're going to move the little cold start valve on top of
the rocker cover back to the side of the head to tidy up the pipework
and clean up the engine appearance. There was to be another pipe that
should tee into the elbow aswell, the engine breather pipe, but we've
decided to run this into a catch tank instead rather than recirculate
the oily fumes.
With this sorted and the rubber flex pipe attached to the elbow we
could now see where the airflow meter wanted to sit, and where the
mounting bracket for it would have to be.
As you can see the mouth of the airflow meter is square and this
needed to be adapted to take a round cone air filter. So...........
bit of tubing tacked to square.............
some fillers applied and shaped to fill the gaps............
a quick coat of satin black and bolt it up.........
and bung the filter on..........
Next up was to get some oil in, change the plugs and set the
tappet clearances............
One of the items we also got from the scrap yard a while back but
only now got around to fitting was the electric fan. The said item is from a
Citreon Sara and fits just nice in front of the rad...........
We also managed to get the water plumbing finished off and the
system filled, love to say that there was no leaks but you'd all know that
was a lie
Some of the pipe runs were a little on the long side so we
decided to use copper tubeing and fittings as it's easier to secure than
flexible hose pipeing. (sorry for pic quality)
The other slight mod in the cooling system was due to the way
the V6 is plumbed, the outlet from the back of the block is the feed to the
heater rad and because in the Alfa 75 you could turn of the feed to the
rad it would need a bypass route to continue on it's way circulating. We
decided to just plumb in and out of the bm heater rad and remove the
tap so doing away with the need for a complicated bypass route.
Which brings us up to where we are now, we've just laid in the
engine loom and connected it up to all the sensors and injectors and all
things going according to plan will either finish wireing up the loom this
week or set fire to the car trying
