Early GTV6

[four90s]

Hi John,

Great story and resto.

I have an inertia switch kicking around, but I'm not sure what it's out of. I'll find it on the weekend and pm you some photos to see if it's any use.

Cheers
Steve
Adelaide.

[MD]

Nice work GG105. Not all idiosyncrasies of these iconic cars bother people in the same way and hence their popularity over time has not deminished. Many current owners are chosing to forego the authentic true to original approach and instead elect to eliminate those negative aspects that can be readily done so and develop these cars to their full potential. When that process is complete and done with conviction, the magic of an Alfa transaxle is incomparable. The beauty of the form is simply icing on the cake.

A lot of chat has revolved around the spit dashboard in the early series without actually addressing its qualities and so I would like to ad just a few.

In the main motorsport enthusiasts prefer to use a smaller steering wheel than the bus size units that come as original equipment. With the later dashboards that present the instrument cluster in front of the driver, it is often the case that there is a visual impediment to fully reading all of the instruments. I have this very problem now in a 75 series where I can only see half the oil pressure, half the tacho and the temp gauge and all of them the wrong half.

With a split dashboard none of this is a problem because all of the instrumentation is in full view all the time.

This mindset was in place with some of the 105 series cars where the small binnacle cluster was carefully located in the "centre" of the steering wheel whilst the support instrumentation was beautifully clustered above the transmission tunnel as part of the console.

So for my money, the split dashboard ticks all the boxes for ergonomic reasons.

I am looking forward to see how you solved the location of the  tacho transfer in the driver's binnacle. All the instruments that I have researched to do this are of the mechanical type and none that I know of were made using the Veglia Electronic versions.

Just one pic. to illustrate my point

[LukeC]

Just remembered something from the past....

When I ran the workshop in Brisbane about 1992, one of the local car yards (from Moorooka's Magic Mile of Motors) brought a GTV6 in that had been traded with a blown gearbox. I fixed it for them (can still remember the gear was about $350). I sorted it and sent it on its way.

One of the salesmen bought it back a while later asking if I knew anyone who may be interested in it. They had plenty of people drive it and love it, but would not buy it. He said there was something funny about the compliance plate and it was an early car brought in for racing and therefore did not have air conditioning (could have been salesman BS). For most people in QLD, this was a show stopper.

These cars were built before the Motor Vehicle Standards Act 1989, and therefore compliance was not controlled by the federal government.

I have also worked on one of those English cars with the odd workaround dash. Was a rustbucket.

[GG105]

After nearly two and a half years the GTV6 is nearly finished with some detail stuff to recrify. Wheels have been refinished and the correct profile tyres installed.

Here she is looking nearly (rub strip aside) as it would have in 1982. I'll complete the story when it is fully sorted. I'm very happy.



John

[GG105]

Unlike other occupants of the shed the GTV6 is progressing well. Its off having two small rust areas attended to, drivers door and spare tyre well. We're removing a couple of dents, welding up some unseemly holes on the drivers side inner guard where there looks to have been an alarm fitted and lastly shooting some colour inside the front and rear wheel arches. The non standard black molds have been removed, she should be ready in a week or so.

I still have a few mechanical teething issues to sort out and a little trim to restitch. More pics soon.

John

[Scott Farquharson]

Hi Scott - was the car also raced in NZ over one summer in ANZ colours?  Certainly it was a Gulson car; I have a photo somewhere back in Melbourne.

This one?

Hi Sheldon,

This is the first time I've seen that footage.  Awesome, and the first I've seen (and known) it lost a cnr in that race.  Ray never mentioned it.
Thanks!

Absolutely thats the Dulux car.  That was acrylic paint that washed off.  You can still see the red around the doors.  It went to the current colour scheme after the NZ race and prior to bathurst.

[Scott Farquharson]

My previous post is incorrect, I believe that the Dulux car is the 269th RHD car built in 1981, hence the 1269 chassis no. My car was built in February 82 and is the 26th RHD built in 82.

All are to UK specs, hence the lack of Australian compliance. How ARA managed to register them all as 2 litre cars is a mystery.

John

Thanks John!

[GG105]

Good afternoon everyone. The external detailing of the GTV6 is almost complete. I have to replace the early grille badge and put a new one on the tailgate. I also need a couple of front blinker lenses. We have removed the aftermarket rub strips, the drivers door rust, some dents and painted inside all of the wheel arches in body colour. I had some unsightly old alarm holes welded up on the drivers inner guard I have an engine bay decal kit, that's the next job. Some tidying up inside is now required including new window switches which I now have.

I have a lead on a South African 3 Litre GTV6, we'll see how that goes.







John

[pasey25]

Looks great John. Have enjoyed your updates. have fun with the car!

[GG105]

Chassis No 2024 has surfaced in NSW, two before my car, also red, no sunroof, but with a tan leather interior, we don't know if it was factory. No compliance date, as usual, however, the build date says March 82.

Out of sequence builds are nothing unusual in car manufacturing. This seems supports the theory that all the split dashs were built as a batch?

Come on guys, how about some more chassis numbers?

John

[GG105]

The GTV6 has been to the trimmers to rectify the passenger seat stitching and sun visors. Steve replaced the seat webbing, repaired the sunvisors, made a dash cover to protect the uncracked dash and did an amazing job cleaning the boot matt. So good, that the rest of the boot lining looks terrible.

I realised with hindsight I should have rebuilt both front seats as the passengers side now looks much better than the drivers. Steve has also offered to work his magic on the rest of the boot trim, he won't  tell me exactly how he does it.....

When completed the car had two mechanical issues, the first was a driveline vibration at all speeds, which we knew wasn't the driveshaft, the second was a scary wander at 100+ks.
The second was easy, it was the big panhard rod bush, its amazing how much this affected the car.

The first was harder. We initially were concerned the flywheel had been changed, a problem as the engines are balanced with it on. On further checking, the vibration was coming from the clutch which we didn't replace as it had plenty of meat on it. When we put the car on the road I found that it was taking up very high. We have located an OEM Sachs clutch kit and this is being fitted.

We also need to somehow chnage the accelerator pedal angle so that my right knee isn't twisted and under the armrest.

Nearly there.

[GG105]

I can't believe its coming up two years since I bought the split dash GTV6. In the intervening period I bought a very original low mileage Giulia Super, to go with my long time 1300TI, and have nearly finished the restoration of my Giulia Spider Veloce.

The GTV6 has its new clutch which has fixed the vibration and the wander at speed has been fixed with a new Panhard rod bush. We've fitted the new window switches and modified the accelerator pedal to lower and move it further away. This has moved it about 2.5cm, which makes a difference. I have added the engine decal kit and now need an original inertia switch and the junction box covers on the firewall. We spent a lot of time adjusting the airflow meter back to factory settings as it was running too rich. As with everything else on this car it had been buggered about with.

I still need to modify the passenger side mirror so that I can actually see out of it and we're going to investigate a larger a/c condenser to see if we can improve the system. It has a rotary compressor. These and fixing a few other minor trim issues should see the car done.

Merry Christmas everyone and all the best for 2016. May your Alfas multiply and your problems reduce.

John

[MD]

.....and we're going to investigate a larger a/c condenser to see if we can improve the system....

It's not a well understood fact that the Alfetta GTV air-conditioning system is a completely wrong design for Australian heat and humidity loads. The size and nature of the evaporator unit and the totally inadequate fan volume in not able to deal with the massive heat load acquired by the very large glasshouse cabin.

Yes you can get some cooling but it will never be anything like air conditioning in contemporary cars.

Remember that the eyeball vents only distribute fresh air and are not part of the refrigerated air circuit. Chilled air is only delivered from the evaporator outlets which is very localised and delivers poor circulation hence the frozen knee cap with a sweaty shirt collar.

Improvements can be made by:-

1 Replacing the condenser with a more efficient cross flow unit and a fan INFRONT of it.
2 Installing heater supply AND return shut off stainless ball valves in the engine bay as the factory cable valve does not fully shut off the hot water circulation and puts a continual heat load into the evaporator.
3 Install a clear air curtain behind the front seats to partition the cabin in half to reduce the heat load.

Some lessons have been learned and applied in the following transaxles such as the 90 and the 75 series which are much better and do an adequate if not a brilliant job.

[carlo rossi]

Great work looks great
could you post a photo of the panhard bush please that you replaced insitu
as mine has a similiar issue that has illuded us
I did not realised they had a panhard

[MD]

Watts links 2
Panhard nil.