Spyder restoration - long time coming

[WestonE]

With Guy on the C clip.

[peteracs]

Hi Guy/Eric

Good point and as I have enough to fit for the HPE will use them.

Peter

[Nigel]

Good point made by Guy. I hadn't considered
that aspect.

Nigel

[peteracs]

Hi

Back on the AFR system. I tidied up the wiring for the power to the box by adding some crimps and covers and stowed the excess wire so there was no rats nest. It is now semi permanent, but as the box is in the engine bay and not full weather proof, the box and sensor are going to be removed when I am not going to use them.I also really wanted to revisit the idle as it has never been good, even the MOT guy said it was running lean on idle, thankfully not anywhere else. Reading the thread from capriblu in the carb section I saw his 2l responded well to an increase in the primary idle jet, so I checked on the AFR and no matter what I did to adjust the idle mixture screw, it was still very lean. I then swapped the primary (50) and secondary (80) idle jets over as per capriblu as they are the only ones I have currently and retested. Result was I could adjust the idle mixture from lean to very rich and if I set it to around 13:1 the engine idled quite sweetly at 800 rpm which it had never been able to do before.

So next job was to order some jets (60, 65 and 70). Given this is a 1600 I surmised that 70 may be too much and going for as low a value as will give a decent ratio would be preferable especially as the idle jet also affects the main jet according to what I have read. Hopefully jets will be here next week.

Peter

[WestonE]

I wonder if this need for a re-jet is due to the very different petrol we have today. I do not mean just the ethanol. Fuel now looses its octane explosive rating fast for example.

[peteracs]

Hi Eric

I would guess there is every possibility, though I find it odd that apart from idle the AFR readings are as I think you would expect, though I have no experience of tuning, just what I have read.

Anyway new jets arrived (Eurocarb recommended) tried .60 and adjustment at idle you had to wind out the adjuster all the way to get a decent rich reading, so installed .65 and this seemed to give good adjustment both rich and weak. Went for a quick blast and AFR readings on running appear to be richer than with .5 which was expected, but engine response was excellent, subjectively felt more responsive, but may just be me hoping! On return took one plug out and it had nice brown colour, so definitely not running rich. Will be parking my playing for now and get back on the HPE…..

[peteracs]

Hi

To wrap up the work done, I went for a 1 hour test run on the local lanes and main roads. Whilst it is all subjective, the car is great fun to drive and having the idle around 750 rpm rather than just over the 1000 and being reasonable smooth compared to the previous hunting, also coupled  with the lack of blowing exhaust made it more enjoyable than I remember it from last year when I spent a reasonable time driving it. All in all very pleased with the outcome, just needs a good wash after sitting outside during this hot dry weather before I put it back in its storage home. Hopefully we will get some rain to help the situation over the next couple of weeks.

Peter

[peteracs]

I am posting here so there is a link to the current issue posted in the engine section.

https://lanciabeta.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=5823.0

Problem was knocking noise between 1500 and 2500 rpm. End conclusion was piston slap which reduces significantly when engine warm. There probably was this noise for a while, but is somewhat louder now on cold start than before. At this time I am not going to do anything about it as time is limited and the HPE build is more important. The car does appear to drive quite well despite the problem. One positive is that the weeping of the sump gasket should now be sorted.

Peter

[betabuoy]

Apologies if I missed this in an earlier post, but how many miles has this engine covered? And BTW, I do admire the composure you appear to have retained throughout despite the recent engine knocking diagnostics. Impressive!

[lancialulu]

While I said perhaps piston slap, in my experience this is also noticeable at tickover.

[peteracs]

Hi Tim

Having read up about it, and just run the car from cold through hot, I am pretty sure that is what it is, the noise significantly reduces when hot albeit does not disappear altogether. It tends to be most noticeable when accelerating around the 2000-3000 rpm range.

Peter

[peteracs]

Apologies if I missed this in an earlier post, but how many miles has this engine covered? And BTW, I do admire the composure you appear to have retained throughout despite the recent engine knocking diagnostics. Impressive!

Hi Chris

In theory the car has done 30k miles, BUT there was a photo I found in the glovebox which shows an engine with the head off, which suggests there was a problem with the original engine, though I have no other history.

Peter

[peteracs]

After being outside on our driveway for the last 2 months with the dry weather, it was time to put the car back under cover before the weather breaks, so off to a local farm barn which is dry and very secure.

Peter

[deks]

After being outside on our driveway for the last 2 months with the dry weather, it was time to put the car back under cover before the weather breaks, so off to a local farm barn which is dry and very secure.

Peter

I am guessing you got that back under just in time.  My garage floor is a little wet this lunchtime but thats due to run off from the path under the door not the roof leaking.

[peteracs]

Hi Steve

Went back Tuesday evening, was a little concerned as forecast for Wednesday was not good, but no rain as it happened and the barns at the farm had the main circuit board burn out the previous week. The power to the shutter doors was only restored Tuesday afternoon.

Peter