Zeddophile

Not often we catch Lurch being wrong Not that I went much better!

Looks by eye like the top one has longer stroke than the bottom one, and going off the larger flywheel boss and massive nose of it where the balancer bolts on, I'd say the top one is an LD28 crank, against one of the L6 series petrol crankshafts? The bigger thrust bearing journal in the centre and the chunkier counterweights also suggest diesel crank to me....

You really ARE just as sick in the head as I am - making your own panels AND installing Megasquirt! I AM NOT ALONE!

The one on Ebay wasn't a 1980 model was it? If it was, it was an import, but also probably worth quite a bit due to being such an early car. The first ones landed in Australia in 1983, with the early GTV 4cyl style dash (speedo in front of driver, tacho and other instruments in the centre of the car) and seats. In 84 they changed to the one piece style dash with speedo, tacho, and CLOCK in front on the driver. Very Italian that one, the only reason I can see for a clock as big as your tacho and speedo is to time yourself up the mountain! The one piece dash GTV6s also had recaro seats, much nicer car inside. Not last time I checked.... Just tend to start writing, and keep thinking things I want to add along the way, in the end finishing up with a long rambling and incoherent post that was probably utterly pointless!

I've found on the racecars I test drive that the R's really don't perform that well in the wet compared to a good normal road tyre, but maybe they're better with some temperature in them, as I only go round the block in them.... Might stick my "new" R's on once I get them on my second set of rims and see... Can't agree more with you that the best insurance is good tyres. Contrary to what my previous post may suggest, I've never and will never put cheap tyres on my car, no matter what it is (the VN as I said wasn't mine, and did have fairly cheap tyres on it). Those incidents were all on Pirelli tyres, the last being on near new P6000s. Not to mention I have a habit of replacing them when they're only halfway to the wear indicators. After all its the only thing holding you to the road at the end of the day, why cut corners on it? Currently running Bridgestone Potenza RE001 on my Alfa, and I have to say these are the best tyres I have ever had in the wet. Admittedly they seem to be in the "Really high performance" category instead of the "high performance" that I used to buy from when it was a four cylinder, and I now have an LSD, but holy crap. I have not yet managed to get wheelspin out of them on a wet day, with over 200hp at the back wheels, and I've given it a fair try. Sure, they'll spin if I dump the clutch in first, but I can put the foot flat to the floor mid corner in second on a wet day, and it takes off like it was dry. I've managed to get a tiny squirm out of them on really poor surface, but no wheelspin and/or back end slide. Kind of boring really, I was expecting this car when built to be a constant battle of opposite lock on a wet day, but all you do by giving it a violent throttle stab is break the speed limit. Safe, but not as much fun as I could have with the little 4 cyl and an open diff. All that praise of the RE001's aside, I can think of 3 backstreet intersections straight away which I will guarantee to reward anything more than light acceleration with extreme wheelspin, due to buses turning at low speed through them and dumping diesel fumes. And ultimately that was (not highlighted at all) one of my points in the previous post - regardless of tyres, driving experience, power of your car, road conditions can and will catch you off guard at some stage or another. Whether you're going a bit fast, and its gravel on the road combined with trail braking, whether you're driving sedately on wet bitumen with a nice coat of coolant/diesel/etc on it, somewhere sometime, you will find yourself not going quite the way you expected. Whether you end up with damage, a lose, or just a quick flick to recover, it will happen, and the more torque and power you have, the easier and faster its going to happen, especially as an inexperienced P-plater.

If you want sequential, you usually need both a crank trigger and a cam trigger. Reason for that is that each cylinder requires fuel once every SECOND crankshaft revolution, so the ECU doesn't know which of the two possible cylinders to fire at the given point in the engine revolution if its only seeing crankshaft revolutions. If your ECU permits (no idea if any do or not), it could theoretically be possible to run off just a cam sensor, as long the software is able to be told that its rpm signal is coming in at half actual engine speed. Much more accurate to run both sensors though. Speaking of accurate, while a modified dizzy is a pretty easy way to do it, on some cars you can get a bit of signal jitter due to slack in the drivegear/chain etc that actually runs the dizzy. Can't remember how a zed dizzy is driven, so don't know how much of an issue it is with them, but its usually not a real big problem. However, if its possible to pick up a signal directly off the camshaft (weld a small block on one end, or even perhaps onto the camgear itself?), that is the ideal world solution. In this situation you'd usually only need one tooth on the cam, simply as a reference pointer to the ecu to say "number 1 cylinder hits top dead center x degrees of rotation after this signal." As far as crankshaft triggers go, you can buy various amount of teeth wheels from many suppliers, just make sure that the number of teeth is usuable with your computer (some won't handle certain tooth combinations with x number of cylinders), and that the sensor you get to read it will be able to a) read the wheel properly without losing teeth due to the spacing, and b) will send a signal that your ECU can handle. Another option depending on your balancer may be to actually machine teeth into that.

Yeah sorry about that.... Concise version basically is get yourself something cheap and low powered with rear wheel drive to use on your P-plates while you take your time building up a nice project Z. To be honest, now I've done the V6 conversion and everything else on my Alfa, I'm thinking I should buy something like that... You just can't thrash the Alfa anymore, second gear will lose your licence in most areas, and 3rd will probably lose the car as well, so I drive around in 5th at 2000rpm the whole time. Can tip it in to any corner at ludicrous speeds, and it just sticks. Fantastic handling, awesome power, just not so much FUN as a daily. Girlfriends peugeot 306 is more fun in some ways, probably cause it bodyrolls like crazy and you can reach its limits without reaching the speed limit, yet it still actually handles very well.

As far as tracks go, the Alfa club in victoria runs two sprints at year at each of these tracks: Philip Island, Winton and Sandown. They also do a driver training/race craft day usually in march, the day before the first Winton sprint. Pretty cost effective at approx $200 a meet, $90 for the CAMS licence for the year, and whatever CAMS affiliated club membership you get. As far as a Zed for a first car? I'd get a Zed as a project while having a cheap, low powered rear wheel drive car (RWD part is important!). I wanted an Alfa GTV6 to have on my P-plates, budget didn't allow and I ended up with a 4 cylinder GTV. Now a GTV sticks to the road much better than many other cars, is very forgiving in a slide, and the 4 cylinder only has about 130hp (dynoed mine at 55kw at the wheels on a trade school dyno, carbies were a bit crook). I still lost it three times. Once in the wet about a month after I got it, turned down warrigal road off riversdale heading down the hill there, the back stepped out and I for some weird reason tried to drive out of it. Doesn't work well going downhill in the wet if you are inexperienced, the wheels with no traction naturally gravitate to the lowest point. I had a flat rear quarter on one side for a couple of years, and on that occasion I missed the back of a landcruiser coming the other way by about 2 feet, as I was going backwards across the oncoming lanes. Once out the back of south morang, came into (another!) downhill corner on the brakes, and hit gravel on the road. I was doing 80km/h at the time, and the road in question had armco railing on the outside of the corner, one lane either way, and about a 200 metre dropoff behind the armco. On that occasion, I overcorrected the slide, then overcorrected again and made the decision to just let it go and jump on the brakes hard. This was (unknowingly) the right decision (and is one of the first things you should be taught at a sprint meet, when you've lost it properly, clutch in and brake as hard as you can until you completely stop), pulled up very quickly facing the wrong way, put it into gear and drove away with a look over the edge. And one time (actually when I went to look at my Zed!), turning off fitzsimmons lane? to warrandyte at a roundabout there - casually ROLLING around the corner in second with no throttle at all, lucky to be doing 35km/h, and the back just went into a dead slide. Flicked the normal (I'd learned by this time how much opposite lock was required to catch a slide in this car, from a lot of wet days) amount of opposite lock in, no change at all. Wound more lock on, and hit the steering stops, and still no change. There must have been oil or diesel on the road, because it was like ice, and it went into a 4 wheel slide even with near new Pirelli tyres on it and no speed involved. Only regained grip once I got onto the concrete driveway thing that happened to be exactly in the right spot. I had a paddock bomb when I was growing up too, a series 1 landrover shorty with a holden 161 in it. Used to do great fishtails on a gravel road under power, and the steering wheel was the size of a bus one, with about 8 turns lock to lock. That practice still didn't help me when it came to wet bitumen. If I'd had the GTV6 from the start, I'd be dead, in a wheelchair or in jail now. And to be honest, by driving a low power but nicely balanced rear driver, you learn so much more about a cars handling and grip levels than you ever can in something with heaps of torque and power. With something low powered you can rev the ass off it through 4 gears, and stilll be doing about the speed limit. I'd honestly say buy something like an Australian delivered sprinter (with the carby 4AC lump), Datsun 180B, maybe an old NA Gazelle etc etc. Something fairly light, that doesn't really do burnouts, but with reasonable handling. I'd personally say no commodores for two reasons - 1. P-plates on commodores REALLY attract police attention. 2. They are great for burnouts, just don't try and turn one into a roundabout fast on a wet day. I vividly remember the first VN I drove - it was a loan car from work, and I was taking it somewhere. Turned the wheel to navigate through one of those chicanes they put in some suburban streets, at a speed the Alfa (my daily) would easily handle, and bump bump. Straight over the top of it. Not to mention everytime the auto changed gears the back would come out. Doesn't teach you much about car handling if the car doesn't handle at all. A mate of mine had a Honda CRX on his P-plates (2nd gen). Pretty quick little front driver, he could keep it stuck to the road like you wouldn't believe - and unstick it from the road like you wouldn't believe, I can remember being in the car one day while he held it sideways for about 20 metres in a straight line. Got himself a Aus spec Toyota sprinter (80hp) some time after his P-plates expired, and put it through a fence on the second week of having it registered. Swears to this day he was going slowly around a roundabout, and his girlfriend backed him up (she hated him driving like a knob). Still don't know what he did, but I can only conclude part of it was that he had never driven a RWD car, and had no instinctive feel to catch it. I drove the thing in the same trim, and it was pretty well planted to the road. Nevertheless he rooted every panel down the left hand side. He now has a white front guard and door on a red car, and a ripply back quarter half in primer, and he hates it - what was a very clean car when he bought it now looks horrible on that side, but he can't afford the money and time off the road to get it repainted, as the CRX deceased itself sometime after buying the sprinter.

You beat me to it Lurch! P76 is definitely 4.4, and has a wider valley (due to the block height being extended to allow for extra stroke) than the Rover engine, which came in 3.5, 3.9 (sometimes badged as 4.0, but still the same capacity) and 4.6. You can bolt rover v8 intake manifolds onto a P76 4.4, but there needs to be spacers put on the heads to account for the width difference. There are a couple of other differences to, I think from memory the valve gear on the head is different for one... The rocker covers were tin ones, and a much squarer shape than the rover ones, which IIRC were alloy even in the early rounded style. The Leyland rocker covers also had smooth flat tops with no branding on them, while the rover ones had fins cast into the alloy. Rover 3.5 is around 160hp and 210 ft/lb in standard form. Bit of a slug pushing a range rover around (especially when down to 7 cylinders!), but quite fun in a lighter car.

The last Ebay item listed is definitely NOT genuine Bosch, as it says so in the listing! When I need a Bosch 070, I walk into Bursons and hand over about $140, and walk out with one....

Ha ha - its so tiny.... And with 8 hp, you could probably quite easily jump out, run round the front and stick a brick under the front wheel! I still want one though... not sure why exactly!

Exactly. Just tell them you don't want to sell it, so there is no point them trying to lower the value of the car, and despite the fact they may loose sleep over it, you will enjoy driving it every single day with a non original radio face/window seal/whatever the pedantic pricks are on about this time. What model Alfa did you have, out of curiousity? If it was a Selespeed, thats a good choice.... Why would they want to buy it at all if its apparently a piece of crap? After all, you can buy two commodes for a grand quite often, so obviously its at LEAST twice as good...

I'm guessing the thought behind it would be something to do with the twins interfering with each others airflow.... Which shouldn't be a problem if they have a good shroud around them, like on the AU falcon twin thermos I put on my rangie.

Back to the original question for a sec - an L28 complete with A/C, carbies and 5 speed is quoted at 237 kilos (523 lbs). As found in this thread (which perhaps should be made sticky?) http://www.viczcar.com/forum/index.php/topic,3549.15.html My crane is 2 tonne at shortest extension, then 1500kg, then 1000kg, and finally 500kg, and has a 6 ton ram. Also has folding legs so when you aren't using it, it only takes up a fairly small area. Paid about $350 for it 4 or 5 years ago from a place in tullamarine, they're about the same price now but seem to come with a removable engine stand as well (can't see one listed without this, could try I guess.) http://www.radum.com.au/shopping/product_info.php?cPath=38_223&products_id=706 I have no idea what other cranes are available for what price, as I already have one (well, I THINK I do!), but just thought it may be of interest to some (obviously not the original poster who is a little far away!) One thing I would comment on though is that the zed had to be jacked up a bit for the legs to clear under the wishbones (but it did fit in terms of width between the tyres), may be an issue with some of the others available as well. The fact that it folds up is nice though - not that I've ever had to store it long! I think out of the 4 years I've had it, its been at my house for about 6 months! Has lifted out a couple of zed engines, 3 or 4 Rover V8s, a Saab motor, an MR2 motor, a complete TR7 motor and gearbox, a GU patrol cylinder head, 2 4ac engines out of sprinters, a 4AGE into a sprinter, and I'm told its currently got a Lexus V8 dangling off it. And I only used it for the zed engines and two of the Rover v8s!

I HATE those three spoke type wheels with a passion, even more so with the anodised outers. I don't care what car they are fitted too, they look crap - and even worse on a zed (sorry if anyone has them fitted, but I really do hate them. A lot.) Its rather unfortunate that they seem to have been hugely popular in Japan or somewhere, because there are so many sets floating around on various imports. I love the mismatched front bumper screwed (literally) on there too - wouldn't you at least cut the center bit out where it obviously used to continue up into the grill/bonnet of the original owner? Wonder how long the intercooler would last in Australia before the cops pulled you over. Not to mention it can't be working too efficiently mounted that way.

There seems to be an increase in the number of pink cars on the road at the moment..... I used to see a satin pink Telstar on the way to work every day, looks like a $500 respray. Girl driving it is always singing away to herself driving it.... Also saw a Lancer the other day that was full on Barbie pink - I reckon she took some of her old Barbie dolls into the paint shop for the colour match.

Awesome work! Good to see I'm not the only one who was crazy enough to say to themselves its just a bent piece of metal, how hard can it be to make from scratch!

Don't bother rebuilding them! Track yourself down some with the correct size throats, and chuck them on instead - 38s on a car that's supposed to have 44s will seriously strangle it, and I reckon you'll get worse fuel consumption from having to keep the boot into it all the time.

It won't be much of a pain in the arse.... However it will be expensive, as I wouldn't tackle a complete rewire if you are not fully confident with your electrical ability (and no offense intended, but I get the impression you're not?), which means palming the job off to an auto elec. Manufacturers wire things up in seriously weird ways, and often seem to use twice as many wires as needed for the job, especially on switches for things like headlights and indicators. 3 + 4 you can do something about though - if you have wires that don't go to anything, you can remove the tape on the loom, remove as much of the offending wire from the loom as you can get to, cut it off at that point, then retape the loom up. Where the wires change colour, you could always remove the different coloured section, and solder on a bit that is the right colour (assuming you can get some). With number 1 - try running a new thick earth from the rear light assembly to a good clean earth point, this may help - also clean the contacts where the globe sits. Also, are you checking this one with the car running, or just the ignition on? If you are checking it without the car running and the alternator charging, try starting the car and then have a look, you may find the extra power provided by the alternator solves the issue.

This may be incorrect, but is it possible that the Zed headlights are wired in such a way that when you go to high beam on the switch, it intentionally cuts the low beam to reduce current draw? Because from my reading of this quote, you are saying that (previous to no high beam at all) when you went from low to high beam, one side headlight would go completely out, and the other side would go to high beam. If this is the case, I'd start by looking at the headlight globes (assuming you don't have sealed beams!). Check for power at the plug on the back of the headlight. When on low beam, should have power at one of the three terminals (since low beam works). One should obviously be earth (usually a black wire), which means the remaining one should have power when headlights switched to high beam. If it does, change the globes (or headlights if sealed beams!), otherwise its more than likely a fuse or the actual headlight switch. I don't think it will be a bad earth in the case of the high beams, as I'm pretty sure it uses the same earth as the low beams.

That's a leakdown test, not technically a compression test. However, for an idea of the condition of a motor you know bugger all about, its a pretty good method, as it tests the seal of all the valves and rings, whereas a compression tester simply records the highest pressure seen in the cylinder. Doesn't mean the cylinder is holding compression well, just means that it managed to reach that pressure before it all leaked out. The other problem with traditional compression tests is consistency in results - the battery gets lower as you work through the cylinders, so when you get to the end, the engine doesn't spin as fast, which can affect the readings. 300psi sounds a bit extreme though, you'd want to make sure your fabrication skills are good with the adaptor (actually, you may be able to buy one through normal tool suppliers?). You don't want bits of metal flying off with nearly half a litre of compressed air behind them. A standard L series engine is unlikely to exceed 150psi on a comp test I'd imagine, with flattops it'd probably just go over 150. 300psi is approximately what you'd expect on a 20:1 CR engine like a diesel. So in reality testing at 200psi would likely give just as good an indication - especially since you are testing a cold engine, meaning that piston/ring clearances are much bigger than they would be once at operating temp.

No vacuum at all would mean all 3 cylinders which that carby feeds aren't firing, which is very unlikely to be caused by rings etc. I'd also be very surprised if the idle would not go below 1000 rpm under this condition, it would struggle to stay running. I'd say you mean you have less vacuum than the rear, but there would still be some there. Couple of possibilities: 1. Front carby mixture way out. To check this, pull all the spark plugs out (keeping them in order so you know where they came from), and see if the front 3 look different on the electrodes in comparison to the back ones (example, the back ones might be really black and the front really light coloured). Then put new plugs in, if you haven't already - cheap, and always a good idea - especially when chasing these sorts of faults - since you started with 6 shiny clean spark plugs, after fiddling with it some more you can pull them out again and have a look, any differences will be much easier to spot. 2. Front carby butterfly way out of sync with the rear one (meaning its open either much less or even much more than the rear one). Check the clearance between the bottom of the butterfly and the carby body with a feeler guage for a rough balance. Personally, I'd be starting at option 2, and putting new plugs in so I could get an idea of whats actually happening.

Check the fluid level in the dashpots on the carbies. On the twin strombergs on a rangie this can make the idle rough, and give it a miss when revving up. If too low, top up with ATF or similar weight oil. Cable operated throttle sounds odd, I thought they were all pushrods - maybe yours has been converted for some reason? Check that its not holding the butterflies slightly open even when pedal not pushed. Check your ignition timing too, roughly balance the carbs, then set the mixture screws under the carby, then finally fine tune the idle and balance.

If you saw the girl I was referring to in conjunction with the GTV, you'd REALLY want to find one like that - she's a stunner as well as a quick driver. Dunno if my girlfriend can do fast times on the track - the seat in my car has been very deliberately bolted to the floor, and her legs are just enough shorter than mine she won't be able to operate the clutch She can take her TR7 on the track if she ever finishes it, but if someones going to blow my car up, its me.

Unfortunately, not many people agree with us. I reckon it should be compulsory to do a couple of advanced driving courses, and be given a pass or fail grade by the instructors - a real pass or fail, not a P-plates "everyone has to get through otherwise we're discriminating against people and not giving them equal opportunity to suceed in the world" pass or fail. A lot of people agree with that part, but its my next point that upsets most people - you should have to pay the full cost of these courses yourself, NO gubmint subsidy. In that way people are actually motivated to do well in it, otherwise they've blown $500 odd a time, and they may actually learn something the first time. This avoids the current mentality among many would be L and P platers I knew which was "Hey, I failed my test last week for the 5th time, I'm off to try again next week haha." Oh, but thats not fair, then some people can't afford to get their licence blah blah blah - SO WHAT? If they can't afford the test, they sure as hell can't afford to keep up with the maintenance on their car to keep it in a safe condition, and last time I checked, driving was supposed to be a privilege, not a right. Dunno about the women comment though Lurch, I know a fair few Alfas that are double entered for sprint meets, and the wife is usually faster! A certain 3 litre quadcam powered GTV (not mine) does 1:56 around the island, or 1:54 in the hands of the wife! And she holds back, because if she goes too fast, hubby cracks it and packs the car up for the day