ALFAGTV6.COM

[zambon]

Hi all,
I am James from Wisconsin and I have 2 Alfa75 milano verdes. I am in the process of shining them up and i am enjoying the process very much. I am 24 years old and I recently graduated from college. I have no square job at this time, and what little money I do have is being dumped into my cars.
The reason I got into alfas is because I was able to purchase a very clean 120,000 mile verde from a friend for only $500 . He had been trying to sell it for much more, but people were interested in it mostly for parts (body kit, recaros, 3.0). He sold it to me because I told him I wanted to keep it together.
Verde number two was purchased for $900. I intended to use it as a parts vehicle. I bought it site unseen. When I picked it up, I found it to be much nicer than expected . Of course i didnt have the heart to part it out.
So far, my first verde (grey) has recieved new paint and nothing else other than tune up items. It runs kind of rough at low rpms and I suspect injectors are to blame. It also has fairly bad synchros.
Verde number 2 (red) currently lives in Mexico with me and it is getting most of the attention. although it is not as nice to look at as #1, its motor runs stronger.
I am in the process of having the trans rebuilt right now with lightened gears. I am also installing poly bushings throughout. I have purchased a milano gold brake system and I intend to install that in the future. I also hope to convert my steering rack to manual. Possible mods include seam welding the engine compartment (TIG welds?), Moving the battery to the trunk, and carbon hood and trunk lids. I know that weight is not the weak link in my car, but I am interested in working with the carbon, so why not? Also, I hope to balance the car out at 50/50 with the spare tire removed.
Perhaps I will be able to go through the motor at some point, but I dont think that my driving skill level warrants extra horse power at this point.

[zambon]

Here are some broken bits from my transmission that I cant seem to locate. anybody know where to get these? The race/ bearing item has one of its plastic fingers broken on one side. I am (gasp) considering cleaning the plastic and glueing it, please give me all of the reasons why I should not even think of doing so. Or better yet just give me a source for the part

[SamW]

Zambon, send me a note through the forum, I should have some used one lying around, I would just have to dig them out...

[zambon]

SamW,

I sent you a private message.

james

[zambon]

One day while I was towing my red milano through missouri, a car pulled up beside the truck and began giving entusiastic thumbs up. He then proceeded to speed off. A few minutes later, he was back on the passenger side of the truck, he wanted me to roll my window down. He shouted ¨Hey, I have some momos for your car.¨ ¨What?¨ I asked, feeling very skeptical. I decided that the polite thing to do would be to humor the guy. Although I highly doubted that: 1. He actually had wheels that would fit my car, and 2. That I would be able to buy any sort of wheels as I tend to be without money. ¨How much?¨ I asked He quickly replied, ¨FREE!¨
I looked at my father, who was driving, and he shrugged. Ten minutes later we were at this guy´s garage staring down numerous race cars, many of them fiat spiders (winners), and some sweet motorcycles (ducati, bmw).
He had just sold his black verde for $6500, but he hadnt given the buyer the wheels or his manuals. I guess the buyer must have rubbed him the wrong way or somthing. It had been listed on ebay and I even had seen it. I had wondered if my car would ever look so nice.
The next thing I knew we were back on the road with a grip of alfa 75 booty.
The gentleman who generously gave my project a shot in the arm was none other than the owner of pfm racing. His business is building and maintaining race cars. He specializes in Italians. If anybody lives in Missouri or western Illinois, they should definitely look at his web site www.pfmracing.com

[zambon]

I have now finished with the wheels. I had the dings repaired and now they are painted. They are 15/7/et38. I painted them a little differently than they had been painted originally (all silver). I am very excited about the prospect of mounting up some nice wide rubber and going around corners extra fast with them. I think with the charcoal star they will be more low key than all silver, plus they wont attract too much small town police attention to my machine as they are (only) 15s.

[zambon]

I also got my gears back from the machinist yesterday. I only lightened three on account of my budget. The difference is enormous. Here is a photo.

[Que Boludo]

I’m sorry to say but I think them gears will break, best of luck thou.

[pancho]

Yes I agree. We have seen this sort of modification self destruct. If too much metal is removed then the inner part of the gear seperates from the outer part of the gear. (the teeth)

[zambon]

I too have reservations about the amount of material that has been removed. What can you tell me about the cars that had problems? Were they big hp machines? When they went did they take the whole box down with the ship due to shrapnel inside with the moving pieces?

[zambon]

Pancho-
Who does "we" refer to? I would like exposure to more of your collective knowlege.
thanks
james

[zambon]

Here is a link to the alfabb page that has discussion about extreme ammounts of lightening.
http://www.alfabb.com/bb/forums/showthr ... ge=5&pp=15
There is an interesting point about the dog teeth and their thickness (or lack there of). The thread has many oninions about the advantage/cost ratio of this modification. However, there are no reports of anybody breaking any gears. Prior to having my lightening done, I searched for complaints about fragility and found no horror stories.
I even made some foolish sounding posts (I am THE alfagtv6.com rube ) asking how far lightening could be taken. The result?
Few replies.
First and second gear are the two gears in my box that will be at considerable risk. Reverse should not be a serious issue. These are also the gears that should be safest for lightening, right?
With the most teeth, they are subject to the most consistant application of force.
I thought about the gears on my road racing bicycle. The largest ring on the rear cassette has extreme ammounts of lightening. The smallest ring has none. I have DurAce components and they always remove every gram of material that is available when building those components. They remove the most material from the large ring because it is the farthest from the fulcrum (the axle, or shaft in this case).
I may be all wrong with my line of thought, if that is the case I would be happy to read the correction.
My main concern about my lightening is that I removed material from only one side of the gear. This will result in uneven force on what is left inside the outer ring. Only one way to find out for sure, I guess.

[Que Boludo]

Why, oh why.

Do you really think taking 100grams will make that much difference?
They don’t look to be hardened either.

The box is the weakest link after the donuts mmm..dounuts!
And people take metal of the gears, take weight from the flywheels prop shaft’s
but not the gears.

Oh well, best of luck.

[pancho]

zambon,
the gear came out of a normal car, not sure how long it was in there fore for the teeth part of the gear physically seperated from the centre.

Both me and boludo saw it at our mechanics workshop.

I wouldnt be removing any metal from any gear unless its been properly done and also approved by a metalurgist. Guessing is not a fun game when it comes these things.

[DaveH]

Zambon,

You really can't make comparisons with a DuraAce cassette. These components are very competently designed by Shimano using some fairly nifty failure analysis and modelling tools. You're talking about a company with a huge design budget here.

Plus, these chain-driven sprockets see very different forces to the ones your gears do. The reason sprockets 1 - 7 are lightened and not 8 - 10 is because there is no room to take metal off the small sprockets.

You might want to try lightening your flywheel & clutch...lots of rotating mass there.

DaveH