1981 GTV Front suspension work

[Nate Dog]

Hi Peeps
Been a little caught up with work of late, so not a lot being done to Alfa

Last night put it up on chocks and got around to,
Removing hubs, they're on the way to a mechanic to have the new bearing pressed in (couldn't quiet find where i'd put that 20 ton press i had lying around)
Replacing the top and bottom ball joints, as you can see in pics, somewhat perished, shocks already swapped out, and for those of you happy to roll on 30 year old break lines, check out the last pic, id say i caught that just in the nick of time, braided are here too, been lazy and had them lying around this last month, but while hubs are away, braided lines will come into play.

Also, just because it is an alfa, and almost 33\, rear clutch slave cylinder is now pissing clutch fluid everywhere, almost got me stuck, almost, nice try alfa, been topping it up every 3 days to keep it going these past 2 weeks, last night new part arrived, so either tonight or tomorrow night it too will be going on.

Will take pics of all the new shiny bits once they're on before screwing the car back together.

[Duk]

Nice work. Always good to get on top of the wear and tear of old(er) cars.

You can fit bearing races with a hammer and correctly sized dolly, but getting the old races out can be a PITA.

If your car is 33 years old, then she would be 1980 model. My old Giuli was 1980 model. Had much fun in that car and regretted parting with it almost straight away.

[Nate Dog]

Ive done a few hammer on flat head screw driver to remove and insert bearing back in my fix motorbike days

I'm done with that crap. I always managed to score the outer ring, and never confident i didn't inflict shock damage on the bearings themselves.
So, Mechanic will  hopefully charge about 100 to press them in place. Done once with the correct tools, and thats it.

Interestingly enough, i bought the ball joints (they looked a little perished) and the bearings because the front wheels felt a little wobbly, when removing them, the crown nuts, despite being held in place by split pins, were on loose, as in, 0 NM torque to remove them, that can't be right, had i known i would've simply re packed the bearing and tightened up, they weren't totally shot. Never mind, better to do now and know it'll never be an issue again.

[Cool Jesus]

I could be wrong here, haven't got my workshop manual with me, so I stand to be schooled here. I believe the front bearing nut is torqued on then loosened back a degree. I believe it's to allow for heat expansion. The front nut then is retightened in the future as a service item during the life of the car. But, I think your right. It shouldn't be that loose. If I'm right the front bearings haven't been looked at for a while, so they may be worn or could have just done with some repacking and tightening. Hopefully the spindle is ok. Certainly doesn't hurt having them replaced. No better way to know than to do it yourself. I'll check my manual and get back here with confirmation if there is no other input.

[Nate Dog]

Thanks Cool Jesus

You're my only hope.

Oh, and happy birthday, right around the corner bud, bet you're counting the days!
2017 years old!
hope when 2017 i reach, look as good i will.

[Cool Jesus]

2017! What gunja are you smoking I'll be 2014 thanks 

[Cool Jesus]

Or is it 2013? And all I got was a late visit from uncle Mel, Caspar and balti who gave me just a gold name bracelet some cheap Adidas aftershave and pot pouri stuff for mi Alfa? Cheap skates,  everyone else gets cool prezzies year in and year out!

[Cool Jesus]

Well even after more than 2000 years, my memory hasn't failed me just yet. Here's some clips from the manual, if they're not readable you tighten the retaining nut to 2 - 2.5 kgm, at the same time rotating the hub to help it bed down properly. You then release the nut and tighten again to 0.5-1.0 kgm. At this point you slecken the nut by 90 degrees (ie. a quarter turn) and fit the split pin, so maybe yes your retaining nut may have been OK? Can't say as I'm yet to rebuild my hubs, but I don't recall the nuts being as loose as you say when I took mine off.

[Cool Jesus]

The Haynes manual has the same instructions with these torque settings 20-25 Nm (15-18 lb ft), 6 - 10 Nm (4 - 7 lb ft). Havern't checked its correlation with the kgm, but worth adding if your torque tool doesn't have kgm settings.
They added to rotate the wheel in the direction of forward travel when spinning the hub and that in the absence of a torque wrench! the final adjustment of the nut is to finger tighten just until any hub endfloat disappears, then the quarter abck turn and split pin...

[shiny_car]

Good work.

The hub nut is the same process as the 75.

I figure the Alfetta also has a washer behind the castle nut. When it's torqued and loosened correctly, you should be able to move the washer easily (eg: use the tip of a small flat blade screw driver to push it side to side). With 4-7 lb ft torque, the washer is too tight to move; once slackened by about '90 degrees', it should be loose enough to move.

[Nate Dog]

Great great great

Thanks boys. Saturdays job just got easier. will post report on efforts.
Sweet baby cool jesus, by all accounts you were 4 years old on year zero.
Hence the 2017th birthday wishes.
Maybe should've been 2018.

I'll break out my slide rule and let you know.

[Nate Dog]

Hi lads,
Hope you've had good holidays

The Alfa work proceeds apace. So far...
Well, did the hubs, tie rods and tie rod ends, still have lash in the steering. Looks like the rack is knackered too Shame, was hoping i wouldn't have to replace it, on the passenger side, with tie rod removed, theres a fair bit of play, hence the need to swap.
If anyone on here has one for sale let me know, not having much luck on bum tree of flea bay.
Otherwise new clutch slave cylinder went in and works a treat. Same with braided break lines, can't feel much of a difference but the old ones were knackered so a good replacement anyway.
As to AC,
Well, that internal fan with the condenser inside blows with all the strength of an asthmatic flea, i'm going to try and get creative, maybe see if i can't build a mini loom and install something out of a 90's/00's camry. those things blow so hard they could suck a golf ball through a 30 foot hose

[Nate Dog]

Hello gang,
Last night i started working on the distributor cap, with the idea of renewing various parts on the rotor arm, points, etc,
So, long story short it looked like this inside the distributor..

Refer to pic bellow,

What i don't understand is, how the hell did the car run at all? Clearly earth and red would've been shorting out, yet the car was running, and not badly either, relatively speaking, burning a bucket load of fuel, but not idling that badly, and running ok.
Long story short, that ain't going in, ordering this from highwood alfa :
http://www.123ignition.com.au
as finding replacement parts wasn't going anywhere quickly today.
Will post pics of the shiny new one in place, if i can get it for around $400 ill be OK with it, expensive but ok.

[Fetta GTV]

I've got one of those in my GTV, car runs and starts perfectly now.
What curve are you going to run? Is your engine modified at all?
Have you thought about their programable version?

[Nate Dog]

Just what i was hoping to hear.
So, no, none, k&n air filter, and slightly bigger exhaust pipes, otherwise bog stock. Any and all advice welcome. Would like to tune it to run on 98 exclusively, so no idea what advance/retard i need to do on the timing. Hopefully will have the part mid next week.
As ever, any and all advice is always welcome. Well, i say any, advice re hygiene habits probably wouldn't go down too well, but anything else is fine.