Beta Spider 2000 engine rebuild/refurb

[peteracs]

Hi Guy

Pretty sure the tool is easily sourced and Graham having built his engine should have one anyway?

As to shims, they should also be easily purchased in France as same as Fiat/Alfa from memory, so only a couple of days wait to get them. Main thing is the ability to know what size you need, so thin ones are a benefit here so you can get a gauge in the gap….

Peter

[mangocrazy]

I've got 'the tool' in France - in fact I have two. One is (I believe) an exact copy of the original Fiat/Lancia tool, the other is a poor copy. Most of the dimensions differ between the two. I also have spare head bolts I can butcher to make up Eric's guides (very reminiscent of Guy's gearbox mounting guides), a torque wrench, paper copies of both of Guy's books and an electronic copy of his first book. The engine had a new tensioner bearing less than 50 miles ago and I'll be bringing down a spare, new water pump (the very pump that the French garagiste fitted a few minutes before wrecking my original engine). Only had a couple of minutes use at most...

I'm sure there are plenty of other things, but that's for starters. Thanks for all the replies and help, chaps.

Is there any overriding reason why I shouldn't do the Aux drive shaft lobe removal while I'm in there? I could bring it back with me when I retrurn in a few week's time and have it circumcised and ready to re-fit when I return. It also means one less thing to worry about when re-fitting the cam belt.

[WestonE]

Hi Graham

You could do the Aux DS if you have prepared the part in advance being VERY careful to get all the swarf out of it from cutting it down and plugging it.

Eric

[mangocrazy]

Hi Graham

You could do the Aux DS if you have prepared the part in advance being VERY careful to get all the swarf out of it from cutting it down and plugging it.

Eric

That would be the plan. I'd remove it from the car and bring it back (along with the head etc.) with me in the van and do the work in the UK before returning to France with prepped head and Aux DS. And possibly even Nigel...

Graham

[mangocrazy]

Keep scrapped head gasket out of the oil feed and return drillings to avoid a blow up on the journey (take a collection of bungs you have tested on an old block). 

Eric

Just noticed this - what kind of bungs would you use and where would you source them from? Fully understand the logic of it - the last thing you want are pieces of old head gasket blocking oil and water ways...

Graham

[WestonE]

I have an assortment of plastic caps that used to seal new hoses. You can buy plug kits from Burton Power or Demon Thieves. Maybe Rally Design.

[mangocrazy]

So today I started the stripdown of my poorly Beta. Front wheels off, front of car on axle stands, radiator drained  but still waiting for neighbourly assistance to remove the bonnet to a safe place. In spite of having the bonnet in place I was able to remove a fair amount of ancillaries. There's a view from the nearside of the car looking across the engine bay, one from the offside looking down on the engine and the last is of a 100ml syringe with cobbled together hoses that enabled me to pretty much empty the cylinder head of coolant via the top water rail opening. I removed over 300ml of coolant using this little device alone.

Tomorrow I'll be focussing on the cam belt cover and pulleys. Thankfully I had the foresight to bring my mains impact gun and a set of impact bits down with me, as I know they'll be needed.

[Nigel]

Hi Graham,
I've never found a need to remove the bonnet to do anything.
Is there a specific reason that you found?

Nigel

[peteracs]

Hi Graham

Although not the most likely culprit, suggest you check the block face for out of true. I would expect either blown gasket or warped head would however be your issue given the cast block. Just want to make sure you do not waste a load of time all to be back at the start….

Peter

[mangocrazy]

Hi Graham,
I've never found a need to remove the bonnet to do anything.
Is there a specific reason that you found?

Nigel

Just ease of access, really, particularly when removing/fitting the head. But not essential, I agree.

[mangocrazy]

Hi Graham

Although not the most likely culprit, suggest you check the block face for out of true. I would expect either blown gasket or warped head would however be your issue given the cast block. Just want to make sure you do not waste a load of time all to be back at the start….

Peter

Yes, I've been caught enough times like this to make sure I check everything. At least if this head is warped I do have a known good spare sitting at home. If the block face is out of true all bets are off...

Graham

[mangocrazy]

So I've just encountered the first road block; I'd omitted to bring my 38mm impact socket with me. I'd brought my trusty mains windy gun with me, but not the socket to use on it. Ho hum. Everything is much more difficult if I can't get the crank pulley off. So it's off to the quincaillerie for me, and hope they have one in stock.

One other thing - how on earth do you get the water pump pulley bolts off with the engine in situ? I don't have my engine hoist with me so can't raise/lower the engine without extreme difficulty. I'm sure there's a knack, but I just can't see it right now. As soon as you touch the bolts the pulley rotates...

[SanRemo78]

Water pump pulley - two 10mm spanners - use them on two of the bolts, tighten one and loosen the other. Then repeat on the two remaining bolts and then use a screwdriver underneath the heads of the two loosened ones and the spanner on the third bolt. Job done.
guy

[mangocrazy]

Water pump pulley - two 10mm spanners - use them on two of the bolts, tighten one and loosen the other. Then repeat on the two remaining bolts and then use a screwdriver underneath the heads of the two loosened ones and the spanner on the third bolt. Job done.
guy

Nice one, Guy! Elegantly simple...

[SanRemo78]

Glad I could help. Have you remembered to take an adaptor plug for the windy gun?

[mangocrazy]

Glad I could help. Have you remembered to take an adaptor plug for the windy gun?

No, it's staying down here so has been fitted with a French plug. I bought a mains Aldi/Lidl windy gun for Sheffield and I'm very impressed with it. More power and lighter than the Clarke, and cost about £40 from memory.

[mangocrazy]

The 38mm impact socket arrived Friday afternoon and yesterday I set about removing the crank and water pump pulleys. After giving the crank nut some serious heat for 3 or 4 minutes it came off in a couple of seconds with the mains windy gun, so an early result. The water pump pulley bolts put up rather stiffer resistance...

Getting two of the three bolts loose was comparatively simple, it was the third one that proved troublesome. Eventually I managed to wedge a screwdriver against the two free bolts to give enough purchase to loosen off the third bolt. Even then the only way I could get the pulley out was to remove the square nylon plug that was blocking access. There really is no spare clearance (Clarence) at all in that part of the engine bay.

Thinking ahead to re-fitting, has anyone made up a tool to hold two bolts in place while tightening/undoing the third? I was thinking of a piece of flat bar with two 15mm holes at the correct spacing to locate over two 13mm head bolts. Alternatively I was toying with using a hole cutter of the appropriate size on the arc of the bolt heads to allow use of a long impact socket on the bolts. The hole could be plugged with a grommet in normal use.

Has anyone done either?

[SanRemo78]

Tightening the bolts on the water pump pulley...

Fit the three bolts as tight as you can by holding the rim of the pulley using a 10mm socket.
Put the bolt pattern at 10/2/6 o'clock and with a ring spanner on the 10 o'clock position move it so it's just to the left of 6 o'clock. Put the socket drive on the 6 o'clock bolt, brace the shaft of the ring spanner against the socket and tighten it. This should give you enough leverage to stop the rotation of the pulley. Once it's done, turn the pulley clockwise and repeat and repeat again.

Guy

[mangocrazy]

The cam boxes and head have now been removed from the block and are sitting on pieces of cardboard on the garage floor, however I'm not quite as pleased with myself as I might otherwise be. Why? Because I can see no evidence of head gasket failure and I'm now left scratching my head in puzzlement. One thing I can confirm however is that the cam belt comes off really easily once the auxiliary drive shaft pulley has been removed...

Anyway - photos of the block/head interface follow. As far as I can see only one dowel was present. but the other one may have detached itself and sought shelter in the engine bay.

I would have posted this yesterday but took the precaution of tipping fruit juice into my original keyboard and have only just found a replacement...

[peteracs]

Hi Graham

Cyl 1 looks decidedly different to the others in terms of carbon build up? So something is going on.

Peter