G'day all, Returning to the fold

[Ricky Ricardo]

,well as a driver anyway.  I've never been alfaless but will be driving one again soon.
I'm in my mid 40's now and still have the two 1974 "green meanie" suds from my teens but don't get excited about them    there nothing but rust buckets now, I could get one started still I think because I recond the motor a year before I stopped driving it.
I also have as parts cars a 76" sud a 83" clover leaf Ti sud and my main parts car a 83" veloce sprint. On this car I got Recaro seats a Momo steering wheel and Bilstien front, Koni rear adjustable shocks and many great mechanicals and trim parts.
"Oh" I forgot the 84" Guiletta I bought with around 20,000km in the early ninties but now sold, loved that car!
To the car I'll be driving soon, it's a 84 Sprint I've had under cover in the shed for 15 years. Finally ready to fix it she done only 60,000km and in mint condition apart from a slight bingle at the front and two very minor rust spots.
The plan is to fix the damage "at the panel shop now" and refresh basically every gasket and seal in the car. I better stop here describing this car and whats happening with it coz it'll end up a longer rant than I've already had, basically it's not a resto "doesn't need it"  but fix 15 years of sitting around and get it on the road again reliable. I might start a thread to show some pic's later 
You can check my email for my real name but ricky ricardo is always my forum name. If you rode Ricardo bicycles in the 80's you'll know the joke, yes I'm a fan of those too I own the last best and rarest one they made.
It would be nice to cruze though the Adelaide hills with other alfa's some time or even see some at a track day, I'm really itching to do some of those.
That's my alfa rant for now.    

[colcol]

Welcome to the forum Ricky, the Alfa Sprint was one of Guigaro's finest pieces of style, the Sprint is a good fun car to drive, is your Sprint a Alfasud based Sprint, with inboard front brakes and disc brakes at the back or a 33 based Sprint with outboard discs at the front and drum brakes at the back?, may not be a need to put new seals and gaskets on it, just drive it and see how it goes, a few pictures?, Colin.

[Ricky Ricardo]

Thanks for replying Col, yes it's a sud sprint with inboard six bolt disc's. I love the 80's GTV6 as my all time favorite but the sprint is a lot more affordable, though some of the prices I've seen lately suggests there value might be going up!
I was going to convert to out board and I forgot to say I have a 86" sprint as parts to do so but decided I've got enough work on my hands and I'm to far down the road to change my mind now.
The motor & gearbox are finished minus the brakes. I've got RDA disc's, Green Stuff pads and braided lines on there way. I also bought a caliper rebuild kit from Italy for only $16 "bargain".

I'll show some pic's now "not hard to twist my arm was it" but start a thread when the cars back from the panel shop. All there doing is straightening it out and I'm painting it myself. I have all the gear and can spray, that way I know the metal is clean and treated against rust properly.

Here's the engine stock with no sign of wear internally. I replaced every gasket, seal and welsh plug on it. There's a new water pump timing gear and clutch slave, I even totally dismanteled the starter motor and alternator to clean and do the bearings. I think the clutch and thrust bearing were replaced just before it went off the road, also the pic doesn't show a rigid 74" tail section on the gearbox and the rear mounting rubber is a solid NOS item. This should take all the slop out of the gear lever. 



She's pretty good isn't she, these pic's are only an hour after digging it out the shed where it sat for 15 years. 


It's going to look more like a track car when finished, lots of work to do and likely plenty questions along the way.

[Sheldon McIntosh]

Are those Lancia wheels on the back?   And more pics of the tractors in the background please. 

[Ricky Ricardo]

Sure are! They work on this car but not on the out board disc model, they jam against the caliper. I don't plan to use them.
I don't have pic's handy of the tractors. 2x 1948 kero Fordson's and 1935 Farmall. The Farmall was running before it was left sitting to long and got water in it. That thing was scary fast     

[colcol]

The inboard to outboard front disc conversion is possible but there is a lot of work involved, the 33 and sud have different hubs, so you need different control arms and ball joints etc, it just goes on forever, and the Sud - 33 control arms look the same but are different lengths and the suspension pickup points are different, Colin.

[Evan Bottcher]

The inboard to outboard front disc conversion is possible but there is a lot of work involved...

It wasn't *that* hard, Colin.  Need the whole front end out of an outboard disc car - crossmember, four arms, two uprights and hubs, two struts, two driveshafts, and it all pretty much bolts up.  Half our parts came from a wrecked 1.7 twin carb Sprint (?) and half from a wrecked 33 16 valve.  You need a spacer for each driveshaft, and to re-route the brake lines of course.  You end up with a bit more castor than original on the Sud, and you don't have a handbrake any more.  Best single thing we ever did on our car (although I changed springs and dampers at the same time).

[colcol]

We tried to do the conversion about 20 years ago when there was no internet or information, and the 16 valvers were still worth serious money and there were none in wrecking yards, getting rid of that non functioning handbrake, putting the brakes out in the cooling air, taking a heat source away from the gearbox and stopping the oil boiling in the gearbox, never having to connect or diconnect that handbrake cable,, disconnecting the inboard brakelines to remove the motor and gearbox, all good things to get rid of, Colin.

[Ricky Ricardo]

Yes I don't see a huge difficulty doing the conversion, I have all the parts and may do it later. I also read on the english forum how one person fitted front inboard calipers to the rear! I wonder if the 33 handbrake mec's can be fitted to these at the rear.
My sud sprint also has all the mounting holes in the trans tunnel for the rear handbrake, thats half the battle won.
Picked up some 15x7 v4 simmons wheels today, been trying to find some for a while. We weren't sure about the offset but after trial fitting them to another sprint the way they fit I'm sure there +25 "perfect" So I'm pretty happy right now.   
 

[colcol]

One of the many problems with the German made ATE calipers is that the handbrake never worked, you would adjust the pad clearance to 0,1 mm and the handbrake would work good for about a day and then once the pads wore and the gap went out to 0,2, then you would have no handbrake, we put a hydraulic handbrake to work on the back wheels of our Sud, which was illegal, as handbrakes have to be mechanical, as the hydraulics could leak causing the car to run down the street on its own......as opposed to running down the street with a legal hopeless German made handbrake, i wonder how the new electronic handbrakes work on the new cars?, Colin.