Alfa Romeo 156 2.5 V6

Alfa Romeo 156 2.5 V6

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MX6

5,983 posts

212 months

Tuesday 24th April 2018
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Lovely car, top work on this project. Great to see a successful rebuild/resurection given what happened to your original.

I have a soft spot for Alfa's, really enjoyed the 156 2.0 TS I had some years ago. I've a 159 1.9 jtdm as a daily now and while it's a stylish machine the 156 was definitely the better drive. The V6's are sure be be classics, seeing threads like this is making want one...

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Thursday 26th April 2018
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Thanks, I had a 159 too as a daily, but just sold it and missing it already although it never got under my skin like the 156. I really wanted a Giulia but didnt want to pay out or lease one for the asking price, I looked at some Giuliettas but they seemed like a big downgrade from a 159, Ive now got a 3 year old Golf GTI as a stop gap until the Giulias are 3 years old and hopefully half the price.

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Friday 8th June 2018
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I finally sorted out the alarm, it just needed connecting up and it all came back to life. I removed the original TS one as it was a big heavy old thing.


Spent today in the Peak district, decided to take the Alfa rather than my daily and it didnt miss a single beat. It would be rude not to drive the the full Snake Pass, so did this...both ways. I also sampled some of the roads off it, the highlights that Id recommend is Mortimer Rd to Wigwizzle, and the small section of Lodge Ln near Hallasham Golf club on the Sheffield side, both included some great drivers roads. I also got a thumbs up from a cyclist, he must have appreciated the Busso sound blast.

Im now confident the car is reliable and ready for going on a trip abroad ;-)




Paul S4

1,181 posts

209 months

Saturday 9th June 2018
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Great to see another 156 V6 on the road... the 156 is a brilliant car.

I am on my second, the first one looked just like yours but was a 1.8 TS with the Teledials. I now have a 2005 156JTDM 150 with a remap and it is my daily car. It had 65,000 on when I bought it ( low for a diesel which is why I got it ) and it now has 155,000. I have done two track days at Croft circuit, and also taken it to Monaco a couple of years ago.

I replaced the OEM Alfa GT 17 finned alloys with the 16 Teledials from my 1.8 TS before I sold that one, so it looks like a Tourismo 156...but it has 190 BHP and the Veloce suspension etc. Definitely a bit of a 'sleeper' but I get about 42mpg doing about 350 miles a week.

I toyed with the idea of selling it a couple of years ago, but then I could not really find a car that would do as much as the 156.

They are a future classic I am sure...but then I would say that !

Keep up the good work.

waynedear

2,157 posts

166 months

Sunday 17th June 2018
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Inspired by this thread I am picking up a silver, blue leather 156 2.5 tomorrow, 18 Alfa’s and I have never had or driven a 156

Paul S4

1,181 posts

209 months

Monday 18th June 2018
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Quite rare to see a sunroof on a 156...in fact yours is the first one I have seen ! I am assuming it is a factory one.

waynedear

2,157 posts

166 months

Monday 18th June 2018
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waynedear said:
Inspired by this thread I am picking up a silver, blue leather 156 2.5 tomorrow, 18 Alfa’s and I have never had or driven a 156
230 mile drive home from a farm in Scotland, drove beautifully with no issues.

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Monday 18th June 2018
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^Looks like a nice find that, have you got any plans for it? Youll have to get a pic of the blue interior.

Paul S4 said:
Quite rare to see a sunroof on a 156...in fact yours is the first one I have seen ! I am assuming it is a factory one.
Yeah they are quite rare, its a ex Alfa press car according to previous owner so perhaps it had all the options ticked. The sunroof is fully electric tilt/fully slide in type. I think its made by Webasto, Ive seen very similar designs on other cars. Its just right for the car and you hear the Busso engine sound more with it open.

Zombie

1,587 posts

194 months

Monday 18th June 2018
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davebem said:
^Looks like a nice find that, have you got any plans for it? Youll have to get a pic of the blue interior.
We rebuilt one (T reg 2.0t/spark) a while ago with a blue leather interior, out of over 40, it's the only one we've seen. It's a pants pic but you get the idea;

waynedear

2,157 posts

166 months

Tuesday 19th June 2018
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[quote=davebem]^Looks like a nice find that, have you got any plans for it? Youll have to get a pic of the blue interior.

For now she will get a good check over and under then I will just drive about in her, all I am doing for now is the intake pipes and I will probably loose an exhaust box.



Edited by waynedear on Tuesday 19th June 20:55

JBT

118 posts

145 months

Tuesday 19th June 2018
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Car looking good Dave. Never seen a sunroofed version either, I assume it has the std. aircon too?

Cheers again by the way for the rev counter via the PM on alfaowner, it works a treat.

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Tuesday 19th June 2018
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JBT said:
Car looking good Dave. Never seen a sunroofed version either, I assume it has the std. aircon too?

Cheers again by the way for the rev counter via the PM on alfaowner, it works a treat.
No worries, yeah it has climate/air con, all the electrics etc although havnt re-gassed it since the rebuild. Another nice feature is the cd changer and 8X Alpine speakers.



Ive also got these wheels spare, same fitment, but not sure they are right for a 156, sometimes putting newer wheels on older cars work, but older style wheels on a newer style car?


Oh and love the blue interiors, reminds me of my old clio 172.

helix402

7,832 posts

181 months

Tuesday 19th June 2018
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That looks like a 164 Green Cloverleaf alloy.

Zombie

1,587 posts

194 months

Tuesday 19th June 2018
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davebem said:
Ive also got these wheels spare, same fitment, but not sure they are right for a 156, sometimes putting newer wheels on older cars work, but older style wheels on a newer style car?


Oh and love the blue interiors, reminds me of my old clio 172.
Ooooo do it! Never seen them on a 156!

Zombie

1,587 posts

194 months

Tuesday 19th June 2018
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Or maybe some split rim tele dials? - There's a company near me that made a set;

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Alfa-Romeo-Speedline-17...

https://www.facebook.com/Wild-Wheels-Custom-232696...



They're a tad expensive though!

Paul S4

1,181 posts

209 months

Wednesday 20th June 2018
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Not sure about those split rim Teledials....they just don't 'look right' to me somehow, and I am a fan of Alfa Teledials ( I have a set of refurbished 16s on my 2005 156 JTDM 150 as I much prefer them over the 17 GT finned alloys that the car came with )

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Monday 2nd July 2018
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I'd allocated all Saturday to do the brake discs/pads on my Golf but the parts never turned up. I instead decided to finish the underseal and tidy up the rear end on the Alfa which was one of the last jobs on the todo list.

The spare wheel well still needed doing, someone had just painted waxoil over, but it was still starting to rust on the underneath, after checking with a scraper luckily it was just surface rust and there were no holes (wonky pic).


So i spent some time sanding/linishing off all the waxoil and original flaky underseal, a very messy job as the waxoil gums up the linishing pads ranting
Then once it was bare metal it had the same treatment as the floorpans: criss cross coat of bilthamber chemical rust converter, then left to dry overnight, and then Dinitrol grey underseal. I didnt make as much mess this time with the spray gun, although I was wearning t-shirt and shorts and as I write this, am still picking it out of my hair and arms and legs!


Its important to make sure you rust protect the rear lip near the bumper, some of the bracketry and near the tow hook bracket, to make this easier I removed the bumper and arch linings. While it was all off, almost 20 years of mud was cleaned off. There was a lot of loose chippings and stones stuck behind the bumper now all removed.


Once cleaned up the wheel arches turned out to be in good condition, the factory managed to get the underseal all into the arches and at the top where the strut mounts are. The underseal was not loose and there was just some mud left behind the struts (which Id originally cleaned during the rebuild but decided wasnt worth removing them to do again). I rust proofed and painted the rear disc shields. I also checked that water could not leak into the rear and inside of the sills, replaced one of the bungs with a spare and unblocked the rear sunroof drains.




The rear discs dont look too great, other than that, 2 things left to make perfect: New exhaust needed and Im sure its still on its original 6 sparkplugs..

Edited by davebem on Monday 2nd July 11:38

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Saturday 27th July 2019
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Havnt updated this thread for a while with progress! Back in the spring before MOT I noticed that one of the inner driveshaft gaitors had split, and was starting to splatter grease over the subframe, lesson learned I should have done the inners at the same time as the outers a couple of years ago... Online car parts and local motor factors kept giving me a TS spec gaitor which is listed for the 2.5, but is too small. For future reference the 2.5 has a hybrid shaft with the same beefed up inner CV as the 3.2 GTA and outer CV as the diesel models. I also ordered some spark plugs and some clear side repeaters (genuine alfa pair on ebay for £11).



I managed to remove the driveshaft quite easily without damaging the ball joints. Replacing the gaitor just involved removing the circlip holding the cv to the shaft, remove and replace and repack with grease.



After flying through the MOT with no issues i took the top plenum off and changed the spark plugs. I also took the opportunity to clean and tidyup the engine even further and fitted some stainless hex bolts.


I also replaced the small fuel line that connects the 2 injector rails for peace of mind removing all of the brittle plastic dorman clips.

V6todayEVmanana

759 posts

143 months

Saturday 27th July 2019
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Wow, a classy and beautiful engine bay, makes my feel quite lazy letting mine get mucky.

Thanks for sharing

davebem

Original Poster:

746 posts

176 months

Tuesday 8th October 2019
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I have a mystery issue with the remote boot lock, I cant get it to work. The solonoid works ok on its own but when unlocking the boot with the key it doesnt release.. It might be due to a mystery missing relay in the boot. Does anyone with a CF3 156 have a relay in this brown connector? The manual mentions a fuse for the boot release, but in the fusebox the location doesnt exist!



The twin 10" cooling fans were getting ropey and the shroud was rusting on the inside. The twin fans must have been borrowed from the Alfa parts bin as they dont perfectly align flush with the radiator and the fan motors are huge and heavy, that combined with the metal shroud the whole thing seems a bit over engineered and weighs too much for being in the nose of the car.

I had kept the single 15" fan from the twinspark car but this doesnt fit due to clearence issues with the larger engine, but the GTA radiator did have the mounting holes for it, the motor in this is also huge and weighs 3.8kg. So I ordered the biggest slimmest fan that would fit which was a mishimoto 16" slimline fan, then modified and carved out the larger plastic twinspark shroud to bolt and seal the new larger fan to it. I re-used the higher ohm resister from the twin spark for the slow speed air con. Hopefully it might be a little more efficient as the shroud and fan area covered of the rad is much larger than before..The new setup now weighs 2.5kg compared to 6kg of the original.





I also did a roadtrip covering the Evo triange, and snowdonia. driving