164 'Restoration'

[Joe Garra]

Any news?

[V AR 164]

Hey guys,

Yes I actually just got it started yesterday, However, it idled very high, around 2,500 rpm. It turned out to be a misadjusted throttle min/max switch (The one attached to the throttle body, the black sensor). I re-adjusted it again and it ran fine. This also seemed to solve all of my issues when the car would sometimes not run correctly prior to this incident.

The correct adjustment for the throttle switch is 1 degree of throttle, that is, when the throttle moves ever so slightly, the sensor should click on.

I took the car for a quick 2 min drive up and down the street and it seems to run perfectly fine. I think it was a combination of dirty contacts throughout the ignition system, a dirty distributor and a worn out coil which lead to the failure. Plus pulling out the ECU and letting it sit overnight seemed to do the trick, maybe it needed to reset itself?

Andrew.

[gtv6sv]

Hey Andrew,

In case you haven't already, I'd advise to replace the fuses, spark leads/plugs, dizzy cap and coil, I know it's simple, but highly effective.
Where possible, I'd highly advise to keep the electrical items new/fresh, these cars are great, but have a lot of electrical stuff that can go wrong, best to get on top of it all before it leaves you stranded again.
Alfissimo in America have quite a range of parts for the 164 range.
I'd highly recommend to speak to the boys down at Abruzzo Auto Electrical in Thomastown, they know these cars like the back of their hands!
They can tell you what to look out for and upgrade/help prevent common failures, be it electrical or mechanical.

Just my 2 cents worth from when I owned mine😊

Stefan.

[V AR 164]

Cheers Julian, slowly but surely I am replacing everything I can possibly replace.

Also finally got the Q registered on club plates last Friday. I can tell you one thing, my automatic 164 is sadly going to get little to no use anymore.





Also tomorrow I get to drive it to school 

Cheers, Andrew.

[Joe Garra]

Looking good!

[julianB]

Well done mate - good on you!

[poohbah]

Both cars are looking great Andrew. Quick question - what's the cost and compliance difference between club plates and normal rego?

Not sure I could ever be bothered with the hassle of keeping a log book.

[V AR 164]

Cheers guys, really enjoying the fleet right now hahaha.

Club permits are DEFINITELY worth it. Normal rego is around $750, club rego (for 45 driving days) is around $75. Massive difference.

Log books are not that bad, take around a minute to fill out and off you go. No need to record the distance travelled or anything like that.

I would highly recommend it on a 'weekend' car. You can also get special historic car insurance deals which more than halve the normal insurance costs too.

Cheers, Andrew

[Italian Supermodel]

Bravo Andrew..... you are living the dream matey!!
And yes, once you've driven a well sorted Q nothing else comes close in that class.
The Q was the pinnacle of modern Alfa ownership in the 90's and you get to experience it all now...and you're still a teenager!!
Can you believe your Q is 26 years old?
I'm stretched to think of a more sexy sedan with performance of the past 3 decades.

[gtv6sv]

Well done mate! Fantastic to see another young kid be this much into Alfas, and what a car to enjoy!!!

Have fun!

Stefan.

[poohbah]

I love the "stealth" badging on the rear of the Q Andrew - or was that standard?

[V AR 164]

Yeah that's standard. The Q's don't have the 3.0 or V6 badges, instead get a cloverleaf, which is pretty cool.

All I need now is a set of cloverleaf triangles for the front fenders, I reckon they look awesome.

Definately good for the younger generation to get into old Alfas, they just have so much character and make perfect first cars (IMO) 

Cheers, Andrew.

[VeeSix]

All the photos have gone from your great 164 project thread Andrew, is there any way you can reinstate them?

[V AR 164]

Yes I noticed that too.

Photo bucket decided it was a good idea to destroy years of work from tens of thousands of forums by removing the ability to host pictures on third party websites. The only way to get back all the pictures is to pay them $500 a year to enable third party hosting 

I think in the coming weeks I will transfer all my photos across to imgur and replace all my initial photo bucket links with the imgur links, as imgur is free to host on third party websites.

Andrew.

[V AR 164]

Hey guys!

GOT MY P's!!! (You can just about see it in the front window)  I have had them for about a month now but thought I'd let everyone know hahaha

Well I have updated the thread so hopefully the pictures are back up. I moved them over to Imgur and linked them to the thread by editing previous messages.

It does seem that some photobucket pictures still are visible, so could someone have a quick look through the pages to make sure that they are visible? Thanks!

Anyhow, did some more cosmetic stuff on the Q. Installed proper tyre lettering and painted my calipers (red of course!)

Turned out pretty good in my opinion 











Cheers, Andrew.