Fix It Again Tomorrow - Street Sleeper
Discussion
About 2 weeks after getting my Scooby I pulled up at the lights confident that i would be able to beat the battered blue Fiat Coupe in front and bugger off into the distance.
I could, until he finally got traction in 3rd and left me for dust.
Lesson learned and after that the Scoob was used for corners not drag races.
I could, until he finally got traction in 3rd and left me for dust.
Lesson learned and after that the Scoob was used for corners not drag races.
Wow! It didn't realise that the 16v Coupe was exactly the same engine as the Integrale (incidentally I'm a huge Lancia fan). Who do you work for OP? Working on Deltas must be a constant battle with tin worm, and I guess parts supply for trim/glass and the like... Sounds awesome though!
If you want good power from a turbo car you need a good sized exhaust, I found a half decent 3" system from some dodgy Coupe owner in Liverpool, he had some sizeable Wilwood calipers & brackets too so I bought the lot for a few quid, I modded the exhaust where it needed it and fitted it up, the dustbin hanging out of the rear was lopped off and replaced with a far more subtle piece of slash cut 3" tube.
I got some new Wilwood discs as the kit I bought was running on OE discs, then knocked up some bells:
I had them anodised and put some wheel spacers on, stopping is as important as going!
I noticed there wasn't much in the way of decent suspension for the Coupe and as we'd previously developed the set up for the integrale with BC Racing (and they are only about 10 miles away from us) I asked them if they were interested in doing the same for the Coupe.
They were.
There was a fair bit of work involved, testing it out was a gruelling task:
but someones gotta do it, a freebie set was the reward:
One of the reasons I like the BC stuff is that the ride height setting is completely independent of the spring tension setting - something that has annoyed me about your average system for years.
I got some new Wilwood discs as the kit I bought was running on OE discs, then knocked up some bells:
I had them anodised and put some wheel spacers on, stopping is as important as going!
I noticed there wasn't much in the way of decent suspension for the Coupe and as we'd previously developed the set up for the integrale with BC Racing (and they are only about 10 miles away from us) I asked them if they were interested in doing the same for the Coupe.
They were.
There was a fair bit of work involved, testing it out was a gruelling task:
but someones gotta do it, a freebie set was the reward:
One of the reasons I like the BC stuff is that the ride height setting is completely independent of the spring tension setting - something that has annoyed me about your average system for years.
So how to let plenty of air into that turbo cheaply, safely and without a lot of noise? Well as we had plenty of space and I had a spare air filter box I just plumbed two in with a Y piece, here's how she looked with the ex old manifold, you can just about see the two air boxes to the front right, I drilled a few extra holes in for extra airflow and (importantly) put some bell mouths around them.
The ECU was replaced with a Motec M4 so we could get it re-programmed. M4s are strong reliable, but old tech, but then so is the engine so they go hand in hand pretty well.
Fuelling was taken care of by a 340 litre per hour pump in the tank, I doubled up the fuel line supply so it could deliver more. This was done by taking the flow & return pipes and joining them together at either end - simple, but effective, a bit like me.
Return was then taken care of by a bigger diameter pipe which quite handily (with an adaptor I made up) fitted onto a port on the tank.
The ECU was replaced with a Motec M4 so we could get it re-programmed. M4s are strong reliable, but old tech, but then so is the engine so they go hand in hand pretty well.
Fuelling was taken care of by a 340 litre per hour pump in the tank, I doubled up the fuel line supply so it could deliver more. This was done by taking the flow & return pipes and joining them together at either end - simple, but effective, a bit like me.
Return was then taken care of by a bigger diameter pipe which quite handily (with an adaptor I made up) fitted onto a port on the tank.
When you put too much load through a gearbox any two gears which are acting on one another will want to push themselves apart, more load = further distance until the mesh is partially lost and the tips are doing the job of transmitting the load instead of the whole tooth which is obviously much stronger. It only takes one to let go then the whole lot jerks and every tooth gets ripped off in
There are two basic types of strengthening for this gearbox, an upper plate
Which goes on here:
And a steel lower spectacle plate which fits in this area of the box:
The upper plate stops the housing from deforming and the crown wheel from breaking away, the lower plate stops the two shafts (which you can see the two bearing housings for) from separating. It's made from a figure of 8 in steel and the casing is precision machined so it drops in. When any (and I mean any) gearbox from this family is taken apart those two bearing housings you can see have gone oval.
There are two basic types of strengthening for this gearbox, an upper plate
Which goes on here:
And a steel lower spectacle plate which fits in this area of the box:
The upper plate stops the housing from deforming and the crown wheel from breaking away, the lower plate stops the two shafts (which you can see the two bearing housings for) from separating. It's made from a figure of 8 in steel and the casing is precision machined so it drops in. When any (and I mean any) gearbox from this family is taken apart those two bearing housings you can see have gone oval.
The guys: said:
This is awesome. You have a very cool job.
My friend used to have a coupe the same colour as this stoked to (he said) 290bhp. We called it the red dragon and it was great in a straight line. I can't imagine how front wheel drive will cope with 500bhp!
Mmm i alway liked the coupe. it would be much better if it was a RWD car. it has the look.
Loving your work, keep us updated with every little detail
About 2 weeks after getting my Scooby I pulled up at the lights confident that i would be able to beat the battered blue Fiat Coupe in front and bugger off into the distance.
I could, until he finally got traction in 3rd and left me for dust.
Lesson learned and after that the Scoob was used for corners not drag races.
Wow! It didn't realise that the 16v Coupe was exactly the same engine as the Integrale (incidentally I'm a huge Lancia fan). Who do you work for OP? Working on Deltas must be a constant battle with tin worm, and I guess parts supply for trim/glass and the like... Sounds awesome though!
Was always a fan of the fiat coupe.
Wish i had the skills to rebuild an engine.
I can't say where I work as it would be advertising and probably against PH rules, i'm just writing for the enjoyment of it and hopefully some people will get something out of reading it. You're right, rust removal is a lot of what we do, we much prefer engines though and most of what we create goes out of the country these days.My friend used to have a coupe the same colour as this stoked to (he said) 290bhp. We called it the red dragon and it was great in a straight line. I can't imagine how front wheel drive will cope with 500bhp!
Mmm i alway liked the coupe. it would be much better if it was a RWD car. it has the look.
Loving your work, keep us updated with every little detail
About 2 weeks after getting my Scooby I pulled up at the lights confident that i would be able to beat the battered blue Fiat Coupe in front and bugger off into the distance.
I could, until he finally got traction in 3rd and left me for dust.
Lesson learned and after that the Scoob was used for corners not drag races.
Wow! It didn't realise that the 16v Coupe was exactly the same engine as the Integrale (incidentally I'm a huge Lancia fan). Who do you work for OP? Working on Deltas must be a constant battle with tin worm, and I guess parts supply for trim/glass and the like... Sounds awesome though!
Was always a fan of the fiat coupe.
Wish i had the skills to rebuild an engine.
I have two 2.2 ltr conversions on the go at the moment, the extra capacity coming mainly from an eight weight stroker crank:
One going to Central America and one to Finland, it takes years to gain the knowledge of just one engine like this and it's what most people overlook when they start their own builds - sadly a lot end in failure.
It's quite annoying when you offer to build someones engine who is buying parts from you and they refuse because they or some local garage/Uncle Bob is doing it and then you find out later it was a partial or total failure, much of what you sold is scrap and the engine never made its full potential.
A sale is not just a sale, you want your parts to go on and be successful or enjoyed for a long time.
We bent some rules with this one (our own build), but that's because we know which ones can be and still get away with it.
It's a bit like James Mays Manlab here, you might spend an alcohol fuelled Friday eve discovering, obsessing and researching something, then go in on Saturday to have a go at making it. Not everything goes to plan of course and you have better ideas later. That's where a lot of Project Sausages bits came from - they were unwanted bits and pieces swept up off the floor at the end of the day.
We've got up to all kinds of odd things from making our home-made aluminium melting pot and pouring some moulds to make body panels from to creating high flowing, but stock looking Saxo 8v heads which fooled the inspectors and blew away the competition, to blowing paint and then smoke (initially from an apprentice with three fags in his mouth, but then onto smoke bombs) through cylinder head ports on the flowbench in order to gain more of a visual insight to what is going on in a running engine:
That's the kind of trick you film last thing at night before you go home as it fills half the workshop up with smoke!
The Coupe shares the same floorpan as many other models in the Fiat/Lancia/Alfa range, these included 4wd versions so it is possible to make a 4 x 4 Coupe - the problem is the cars were never popular over here so a trip to Europe would usually be in order to pick up a suitable donor.
Ooops I've rambled on a bit, back to the story soon....
Edited by Evoluzione on Sunday 16th June 16:10
Edited by Evoluzione on Sunday 16th June 16:13
I had the car mapped live on the road, it seemed pretty lively so I drove it like that for a bit. The clock runs out of numbers at 160mph, but the needle goes well beyond that. The engine was just getting into it's stride at that point and pulling hard, I wasn't! I was all for pulling over and cleaning out my strides.
As I mentioned earlier, I picked up the Wilwood calipers cheap, they already had some hard compound pads in them so I used them as they were with the new Wilwood discs I bought.
In a few miles they looked like this;
I phoned up the sole UK supplier Rallydesign and explained the problem, they just fobbed me off - 'They're hard pads mate, they will wear the discs down'
"What 4mm in less than 100 road miles???"
'Yeah mate, nothing wrong with those'
They weren't budging so I had an idea. It was Autosport International show in a few weeks, I had tickets. Rallydesign had a big stand there.
I lugged a disc and two pads with me round the show, went up to their stand and dropped them on the counter in front of the main man and made my case clear.
He scuttled off for a conversation with (it turned out to be) 'Mr Wilwood' who was over from America, Mr Wilwood wasn't too keen on speaking to a 6'2" cross looking Yorkshireman with a brake disc, he just skulked in the background and sent the other guy back with the message to ring him on Monday and they would be sending me a new set of pads and discs.
This set faired a bit better, but I think their discs are a bit soft so will have the next ones Cryogenically treated as I've found in the past that it does work.
We then took it to Donington for a trackday, had a few teething issues but nothing too bad, well nothing we couldn't fix anyhow.
Including breaking the sound limit by several DBs. This was cured by bending a bit of an old paint tin over the exhaust and pointing it down to the track:
It melted the bumper a bit, but never mind, it adds to the character.
As I mentioned earlier, I picked up the Wilwood calipers cheap, they already had some hard compound pads in them so I used them as they were with the new Wilwood discs I bought.
In a few miles they looked like this;
I phoned up the sole UK supplier Rallydesign and explained the problem, they just fobbed me off - 'They're hard pads mate, they will wear the discs down'
"What 4mm in less than 100 road miles???"
'Yeah mate, nothing wrong with those'
They weren't budging so I had an idea. It was Autosport International show in a few weeks, I had tickets. Rallydesign had a big stand there.
I lugged a disc and two pads with me round the show, went up to their stand and dropped them on the counter in front of the main man and made my case clear.
He scuttled off for a conversation with (it turned out to be) 'Mr Wilwood' who was over from America, Mr Wilwood wasn't too keen on speaking to a 6'2" cross looking Yorkshireman with a brake disc, he just skulked in the background and sent the other guy back with the message to ring him on Monday and they would be sending me a new set of pads and discs.
This set faired a bit better, but I think their discs are a bit soft so will have the next ones Cryogenically treated as I've found in the past that it does work.
We then took it to Donington for a trackday, had a few teething issues but nothing too bad, well nothing we couldn't fix anyhow.
Including breaking the sound limit by several DBs. This was cured by bending a bit of an old paint tin over the exhaust and pointing it down to the track:
It melted the bumper a bit, but never mind, it adds to the character.
Some impressive work here! Wish I had those skills and a well kitted out workshop...
I know these engines reasonably well as I changed the worn-bored motor in my old HF 16v with an engine from a coupe; I managed to pick up a low-mileage FSH motor for £400! A buggered Integrale engine couldn't be bought for that... It was easy to swap everything over and it was in over a weekend (on the drive with a crane and without the use of a car lift I might add
)
I'll be keeping an eye on this one!
I know these engines reasonably well as I changed the worn-bored motor in my old HF 16v with an engine from a coupe; I managed to pick up a low-mileage FSH motor for £400! A buggered Integrale engine couldn't be bought for that... It was easy to swap everything over and it was in over a weekend (on the drive with a crane and without the use of a car lift I might add
)I'll be keeping an eye on this one!
SVX said:
I get that you can't say where you work - but would you however be Reading based?
Hypothetical question:
Do you think it would be possible to assemble the following:
Delta HF 4WD running gear, mated to an Thema 8.32 power plant, in an Alfa GTV body?
No, I can spell and don't have a sycophantic following. Hypothetical question:
Do you think it would be possible to assemble the following:
Delta HF 4WD running gear, mated to an Thema 8.32 power plant, in an Alfa GTV body?
I don't think it would go together due to the Ferrari based engine not being compatible with the 4wd transmission and that tranny won't fit the GTV either.
On the Lampredi TC engine the 4wd system is built around it and anchors to the block in various places. The Delta 4wd system isn't a direct bolt on fit to any other car or engine, but because they used that engine in the Dedra and Alfa 155 4x4s their transmissions are compatible with others like the Coupe etc which all have the same floorpan.
Problem is of course, finding a Q4 or Dedra integrale in this country as a donor. I'm currently doing a head for a chap who is racing a 156, he says the engine and box from a Coupe was a bolt on fit. The Alfa straight four is ok as standard, but not very reliable when modified or turbo'd, the Lampredi TC on the other hand is a gem and quite strong so the FWD racers in the 155 and 156 are using them to good effect.
Some guys are putting them in Puntos:
Edited by Evoluzione on Monday 24th June 20:58
Richair said:
Some impressive work here! Wish I had those skills and a well kitted out workshop...
I know these engines reasonably well as I changed the worn-bored motor in my old HF 16v with an engine from a coupe; I managed to pick up a low-mileage FSH motor for £400! A buggered Integrale engine couldn't be bought for that... It was easy to swap everything over and it was in over a weekend (on the drive with a crane and without the use of a car lift I might add )
I'll be keeping an eye on this one!
I wondered where you'd got to Rich. I know these engines reasonably well as I changed the worn-bored motor in my old HF 16v with an engine from a coupe; I managed to pick up a low-mileage FSH motor for £400! A buggered Integrale engine couldn't be bought for that... It was easy to swap everything over and it was in over a weekend (on the drive with a crane and without the use of a car lift I might add
)I'll be keeping an eye on this one!
Edited by Evoluzione on Sunday 23 June 21:56
I think I've covered everything in the build, today I got round to putting The Sausage on the Dyno at RS in Leeds, it's a very honest Rolling Road and often gives figures way below anyone elses, Dyno Dynamics are known as 'Heart breakers' in Coupe circles, I don't think it would have been cricket to visit somewhere to get an inflated figure.
The results at 1.55 bar boost on pump fuel weren't too bad:
Which you wouldn't expect from this:
This means it's the most powerful 2ltr 16vt in the UK by a comfortable margin (I think the closest is 437), a bit odd finding out now after driving it around for so long, but reassuring we're doing it right first time out of the box.
The figures are a bit 'to the right' so there must be some kind of delay on the rollers - probably on spool up. Things happen a lot sooner than that on the road - it's breaking traction at 3500 rpm for instance.
The day wasn't without it's problems, the dyno broke in the morning (software problem) which set the whole day back, then the cam phase sensor wire got bad electrical interference from the ignition leads and coils which sent it crazy at higher rpms, this meant we had to prematurely call it a day before the engine realised its full potential.
Hopefully we'll get to go back with some shielded cable as the fuelling needs tidying up a bit and we can lift the boost a bit to have a crack at 500.
Thanks for your comments, hope you enjoyed reading it, i'm now on the look out for a gear related boost controller....
The results at 1.55 bar boost on pump fuel weren't too bad:
Which you wouldn't expect from this:
This means it's the most powerful 2ltr 16vt in the UK by a comfortable margin (I think the closest is 437), a bit odd finding out now after driving it around for so long, but reassuring we're doing it right first time out of the box.
The figures are a bit 'to the right' so there must be some kind of delay on the rollers - probably on spool up. Things happen a lot sooner than that on the road - it's breaking traction at 3500 rpm for instance.
The day wasn't without it's problems, the dyno broke in the morning (software problem) which set the whole day back, then the cam phase sensor wire got bad electrical interference from the ignition leads and coils which sent it crazy at higher rpms, this meant we had to prematurely call it a day before the engine realised its full potential.
Hopefully we'll get to go back with some shielded cable as the fuelling needs tidying up a bit and we can lift the boost a bit to have a crack at 500.
Thanks for your comments, hope you enjoyed reading it, i'm now on the look out for a gear related boost controller....
Edited by Evoluzione on Wednesday 26th June 09:57
Edited by Evoluzione on Wednesday 26th June 10:05
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