1982 GTV renovation

[Victor Lee]

Just a thought:  Speak to Paul Rankin and ask the cost to fill in the existing exhaust hole and to mould a new centre hole.
I did it to mine a few years back...not exactly centre but close!

[Anth73]

Just a thought:  Speak to Paul Rankin and ask the cost to fill in the existing exhaust hole and to mould a new centre hole.
I did it to mine a few years back...not exactly centre but close!

Thanks for the tip Victor. Already have a CSC GTV6 stainless steel rear muffler waiting since mid 2020 to go on. 

[Victor Lee]

Nice looking exhaust!   At least you'll get a spare wheel well!   
I don't have one as my BIG rear muffler is where the spare wheel would have been.

Keep up the great work.

[Anth73]

We had a pretty ambitious set of goals to tick off this month and I'm glad to report that Hugh and Mick at Monza Motors did an excellent job despite several hurdles of getting them mostly done. We aimed to complete all the hoist related work, namely:

- installing the GTV6 fuel tank I treated with POR-15 plus all the bolt on components that arrived from the Netherlands....tick!
- fitting out the fuel lines...tick!
- fitting the GTV6 gear selector rod...tick!
- fitting the GTV6 bent LHS watts arm...tick!
- overhauling the watts linkage and repainting the rear de dion, springs and watts arms...tick!
- installing the factory underbody exhaust heat shield and then my stainless steel exhaust...no deal
- mounting my repainted Borbet wheels complete with 225/50r16 tyres ...no deal

Whilst the front engine pipes were able to snake beautifully down the bell housing and below the car, the middle section wasn't quite providing sufficient clearance near the crossbeam where the torsion bars mount and for the clutch fluid line, which is shorter and joins to a rubber hose with the Alfa 75 TS LSD transaxle compared to the GTV6 owing to the push versus pull clutch arrangement. Also, the rear section wouldn't line up correctly at the flanges with the middle section so the rear muffler ended up oriented too far towards the middle of the car. EB Spares assures me they've had no reported misalignment issues with this particular batch so we've decided to get a local exhaust shop to cut and reweld the flanges to try improve the alignment and clearance.

Whilst the front engine pipes were able to snake beautifully down the bell housing and below the car, the middle section wasn't quite providing sufficient clearance near the crossbeam where the torsion bars mount and for the clutch fluid line, which is shorter and joins to a rubber hose with the Alfa 75 TS LSD transaxle compared to the GTV6 owing to the push versus pull clutch arrangement. Also, the rear section wouldn't line up correctly at the flanges with the middle section so the rear muffler ended up oriented too far towards the middle of the car. EB Spares assures me they've had no reported misalignment issues with this particular batch so we've decided to get a local exhaust shop to cut and reweld the flanges to try improve the alignment and clearance.

The issue with the Borbets was of my own making. Based on various tyre size calculators I understand that the standard 15x6 ET45 195/60r15 wheel/tyre combo produce an overall diameter of 615mm. A few other GTV6 owners have reported being able to fit 17x8 ET35 225/45R17 wheel/tyre combo all round with an overall diameter of 635mm. Hence I thought my 16x7.5 ET30 225/50R16 wheel tyre combo with 632mm overall diameter should be able to squeeze on the front instead of the usual 205/50R16. Rears were no problem but the front...no chance! This is where rim widths, true tyre widths on the rim and offsets come into play. The online calculators predicted I should end up with my tyre in the same spot relative to the hub centreline as a 17x8 ET35 225/45R17 setup...obviously not unless I've missed something else related to setup or alignment.

So back I go to 205/50R16 all round as I prefer not to run a staggered setup and the other benefit is that 225/50R16's would not fit in the spare wheel well. Ideal fit would be 225/45R16 tyres however the are now only available in a couple of R-spec track tyres that are not that great for road use i.e. they're really slippery when cold and wet, and very noisy. This feedback comes from a good friend who has Yokohama R-spec tyres on his GTV6.

Overall I'm happy with the refurbished Borbet's. They're a matching set manufactured the 29th week of 1989 (I was in Year 11 at high school dreaming of GTV6s and 105s) that were in storage for 15 years by a local Alfisti and repainted by Neway Wheels. As an added bonus I managed to find a single Borbet wheel as my spare via a Facebook group. This was located also in the Netherlands and was manufactured the 9th week of 1991, around the time I started University and reading about the release of the SZ (aka Il Mostro) in Wheels magazine.

Photos below of my Borbet wheels, the oversized 225 tyres smacking hard against the front sideskirt plus the right-sized 205 replacements.

[Anth73]

Photos of the painted rear suspension, fuel lines after Monza Motors modified the floor pan to accommodate the banjo fittings and the fitted fuel tank.

[Anth73]

And the oh-so-sexy exhaust front engine pipes with factory heat shield also fitted.

[shiny_car]

Very nice!

I'm going to have the same issues with front tyre clearance (planning on 225/35R18), but plan to perform some surgery on the side sills/skirts to make them fit.

Just leave the exhaust like that, lol 

[Anth73]

Very nice!

I'm going to have the same issues with front tyre clearance (planning on 225/35R18), but plan to perform some surgery on the side sills/skirts to make them fit.

Just leave the exhaust like that, lol 

You should be fine as 225/35R18 gives the same overall diameter as a standard GTV6 wheel/tyre combo, not sure about the 75 though. As for the exhaust, I was thinking about some side exit pipes...not sure the neighbours would be happy with the noise levels though!

[GTVeloce]

Looking great!

I know there is less room on a standard 75 compared to a standard GTV6 with the wheel arches. I tried my Ronals with 205/55/15s (which fit easily on the GTV) but scrubbed terribly in the 75. However, both of you are using non-standard body-kits so you probably have even less room!

636mm seems huge. I'm currently running 205/50/15s and that equates to 585mm. Might explain my lack of ground clearance...

I'm also using Yoko R-spec and don't find them noisy but very slippery in the wet or when cold. Lovely and progressive though...

[Anth73]

I'm also using Yoko R-spec and don't find them noisy but very slippery in the wet or when cold. Lovely and progressive though...

Noise wasn't a problem when new but now with a couple of years use he finds them very noisy. To the point where he thought he had a dodgy wheel bearing but no, it's the tyres!

[aggie57]

And the oh-so-sexy exhaust front engine pipes with factory heat shield also fitted.

Gorgeous!

[ALFAAA]

Hi Anth73,
I fitted 225/50R15 and kept the the full wheel size as close to 615mm.
No issue.
My GTV had 17' rims and the overall wheel size was 635 before and they were too big fouling on the guard and inner panel
If you can you should get 15' rims.

[GTVeloce]

Those Simmons look very nice! As does that exhaust. I think I might use the same on my V6 conversion.

Any reason you don't want to run a staggered setup? I've held off doing this with the belief that this way I can rotate them but I think next time (providing I can get the tyres in the sizes I want) I intend to stagger them (205 front and 225 rear). The SZ had staggered tyres so it must be good! 

[Anth73]

Any reason you don't want to run a staggered setup? I've held off doing this with the belief that this way I can rotate them but I think next time (providing I can get the tyres in the sizes I want) I intend to stagger them (205 front and 225 rear). The SZ had staggered tyres so it must be good! 

Other than the usual discussion about staggered setups making the car more prone to understeer, which I don't know is the case or not, it was the ability to rotate the tyres and have a spare I can use front or back at all legal road speed limits.

Interestingly, the SZ had 205/55R16 fronts and 225/50R16 back. Both tyre sizes result in an overall diameter of 632mm. I never did try 205/55R16 on the front as I didn't want to buy another tyre that wouldn't fit. In 15" and 16" sizes there is SFA now available in 225 width and around 615mm OD to suit the GTV6 other than some low budget Chinese tyres or R-spec road/track tyres.

@ALFAA - I previously had 15" rims but they would not clear my new Tarox 298mm front brakes, hence the 16" rim.

There's quite a number of wheel and tyre requirements listed within the Vehicle Standards Bulletin 14 to also consider:

• The overall diameter of any tyre fitted to a passenger car or passenger car derivative must not be more than 15mm larger or 26mm smaller than that of any tyre designated by the vehicle manufacturer for that model.
• Because of the different handling characteristics, the aspect ratio of tyres fitted to the front axle must not vary by more than 10 from the aspect ratio of tyres fitted to the rear axle (e.g. 175 65 R14 front and 205 45 R14 rear, has an aspect ratio difference of 20 and is not recommended.
• All rims fitted to a front axle or a rear axle must be of the same diameter, offset, width and mounting configuration (except for spare wheels used in an emergency situation)
• Where a two-axle vehicle is fitted with different width single tyres, the narrower tyres must not be less than 70% of the width of the wider tyres.
• Tyres fitted to passenger cars or passenger car derivatives must not be more than 30% wider than vehicle manufacturer's widest optional tyre.
• The wheel track of passenger cars (or derivatives) must not be increased by more than 25mm beyond the maximum specified by the vehicle manufacturer for the particular model. This means that the rim offset must not be changed by more than 12.5mm.

From what I've read there is nothing that stops you from running 205/50R15 at the front and 225/50R16 at the rear if you did want a staggered setup and didn't mind the different size rim diameter front to rear. I may consider keeping two of my 225/50R16 tyres for possible fitment on the rear if I find the 205's just aren't coping with what should hopefully be around 200hp 

[Anth73]

Another milestone achieved with the fitting of the stainless steel exhaust system I purchased from EB Spares way back in April 2020! As I've come to expect nothing is straight forward, with the centre section needing some massaging to clear the clutch master cyllnder hose and the cross member supporting the torsion bars. The rear section also needed to be cut and reassembled to ensure the rear muffler landed in the correct spot and tailpipe lined up with the cutout in the Zender bumper.

It took the guys at Trackart Custom Fabrication a day to finesse it all, not helped by the unfortunate situation where the exhaust was built with metric tubing whilst we still use imperial tubing. Very happy with the result and looking forward to hearing it in action soon!

This now draws to a close all underbody work. Now to turn our attention to finalising the engine wiring loom, fitting the fuel injection and air intake, fitting the cooling fans and hitting the dyno!