Alfa Giulietta Sprint

[hot66]

looks great Andy. With it being frameless, is the perspex window rigid enough to seal against the body OK ?

[Lightweight_911]

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As I mentioned earlier James, the steel guide channels inside the door are infinitely adjustable so I've shimmed the bottom mounts outwards so that the top of the window is angled slightly inwards & presses lightly against the door seal when it's at its fully closed (up) position.

I haven't driven the car since I swapped the driver's window (I literally completed this side last week) so only time will tell how much noise/draught it creates ...

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[210bhp]

Knowing you it will be fine Andy.

Enjoying the updates and pictures. It’s a lovely car. I hadn’t realized it had been so extensively modified (knowing little about them) but the Italian touches are all very........well, Italian, and great to see an learn about. Keep the updates coming.

Regards
Mike

Ps. Got your package today. Will report back ASAP and thanks.

[Darren65]

Thanks for sharing Andy......

.....your little touches are always well executed and always look pretty cool

[964RS]

Looking good Andy

[smallspeed]

re: front windows, the e36 BMW has frameless windows on the coupe too, and usually the pressure from the perspex isn't enough once you get above about 40-50mph and they whistle/leak. Its worse on them because the glass is curved, but there are a couple of fixes which are quite common practice on the race cars..

1) fit a pair of stays from the top corners of the windows down to the door frame to hold the top in (not very pretty)
2) have a (2-3mm thick / 30-50mm wide) piece of aluminium cut which runs along the bottom of the window and then up the back edge just inside the window seals. That can be shaped (if the windows are formed) and either painted or anodized so its a bit better hidden..

If you run into similar problems with these flapping let me know and I'll post some pictures of the different versions I've gathered kicking around the kumho paddock

[Lightweight_911]

Thanks - I'm not too worried about wind noise - it's a very noisy car anyway (in a good way) -
accentuated/amplified by the lack of any insulation/sound deadening or carpets ... just the way I like them !

[jonno1]

Stunning car, and amazing attention to detail.

Chap I know is selling something similar....

http://www.mrspeedlux.com/1959-alfa-rom ... int-corsa/

Such cool cars.

[210bhp]

Doesn’t sound like he’s still ‘running in’ that newly built engine to me. Sounds like he’s thrashing it.


Regards
Mike

[Lightweight_911]

In the past, most of the time I've been out in the Giulietta it's been just me - but on the few occasions I've had someone else in the car with me, another problem has been highlighted.

When I first got the car it was fitted with the original 4.5in steel wheels equipped with 155x15 Michelin XAS FF tyres (incidentally, these tyres are superb but very expensive).

Subsequently - as mentioned earlier in this thread - I bought a set of SZ-style alloy wheels (which are slightly wider at 5in) & fitted them with 165x15 Vredestein Sprint Classic tyres & herein lies the problem ...

My car is lowered &, although fitted with uprated springs, anti-roll bars & adjustable dampers, the osf tyre makes contact with the bottom corner of the front of the wheelarch on full lock with 2 people on board.

Many other Giulietta Sprint owners have successfully fitted this size of tyre but these cars do vary from one to another.

For the first 4/5 years of production, the bodies were largely hand-built & painted by Bertone (as it wasn't envisaged that a great number would be built) but from 1959 onwards (after Bertone's move to new larger premises) manufacture became more 'productionised' with the aim of reducing costs, so there is less variation in the bodies of these later models.

During the changeover period (from the 750 series to the 101 series models) in 1959 virtually no 2 cars were exactly the same as the supply of 750 parts was gradually used up & the new 101 series parts were introduced - these '59 models have become retrospectively known as the 'intermediate/interim/transition' series.

My '59 car still retains many of the features of the early models (ie it's more '750' than '101') despite having the later 'chipcutter' front grilles & larger rear lamps, so maybe it's not surprising that I have the tyre issue.

As a temporary solution to the clearance problem I switched back to the steel wheels - now equipped with 155 Avon CR6ZZ tyres.

Here's a picture showing just how close the front of the 165 Vredestein tyre was to the wheelarch:



- & here are a couple of pictures with the steel wheels & 155 Avon tyres fitted showing the increased clearance - you can just make out the black mark on the lower edge of the wing where the paint has been rubbed through:






I know some people might be thinking "why not just shave a bit of the bodywork away to provide more clearance but it's not that straightforward - the wheelarches have rolled-over 'wired' edges.


Just need to switch the tyres on the SZ alloys over to 155's now ...


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[sladey]

ONly just caught up with your updates Andy - nice work and thanks for sharing

[Ian Gunney]

Looking great Andy. Simon is just finishing the shell on his 59 / 60 veloce spider which is looking great. They are beautiful things!

[Lightweight_911]

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Having completed the window swap on the other (passenger's) side & replaced the 165 Vredesteins with the 155 equivalents, I was now getting towards the end of my planned modifications.

One area of the car that now needed some attention was the brakes - they seemed to have been gradually deteriorating in efficiency & a fast run over to Shelsley Walsh for their Breakfast Meet early one Sunday morning brought this problem to the fore when, rounding a bend on a narrow country road, a tractor pulled out of a field entrance (seemingly not expecting to see any other vehicles) & I had to do an emergency stop - luckily contact was (only just) avoided but a closer examination of the braking system was definitely overdue !

To recap, my car was equipped with the 'ultimate' Giulietta braking system - as fitted to the racing models of the time (SZ & SS models) - the 3-shoe fronts c/w 'big' rears.

These comprise 10.5in x 3in finned alloy drums on the front with similar 10.5in x 2 1/4in drums on the rear:






The 3-shoe fronts in particular have a reputation for being notoriously difficult to set up with each shoe having its own adjuster & the necessity to ensure that the shoes are exactly 90 deg to the backplate to optimise the contact area with the drum lining (exacerbated by the wide brake shoes).

Added to this, the material for the brake linings had been chosen to give maximum resistance to fade at race speeds which meant that they weren't particularly effective (& required high pedal pressures) at lower speeds.

On removing the front drums it appeared that one of the 3 wheel cylinders on each side - the lower one in both cases - had developed a slight leak &, on the driver's side, had contaminated one of the brake linings. It had obviously only just started leaking since I had not needed to add any brake fluid to the reservoir & there were no external signs of leakage (eg any visible signs of fluid on the inside of the wheel).

On similarly checking the rears, no problems of leakage or contamination of the brake linings were found.

So, at the bare minimum, I was going to need 6 x Girling w/cylinder seals kits (no point in just overhauling the 2 leaking cylinders) & 2 sets of (3) relined shoes.

I canvassed the opinions of a number of Giulietta 'Alfisti' - both here, the US & in South Africa - who have owned/raced a variety of Giulietta models over many years & the general consensus was that the standard Giuletta braking system (as used on all of the models except for the SZ & SS) - prior to the introduction of disc brakes - was more than adequate for all purposes & that the 3-shoe/big rear set-up was expensive, unnecessarily complicated & a total overkill.

The final factor that swayed my decision was that the complete 3-shoe brake set-up is 3kg heavier per side than the equivalent 2-shoe set-up - plus, presumably, something approaching this figure at the rear ...

Now it just so happened that I had a complete spare 2-shoe front brake set-up complete with stub axles/hubs,etc so just need to source the standard rear brake set-up ...

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[Lightweight_911]

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So I put a few 'feelers' out for the rear brake parts I needed - basically everything including drums, backplates, wheel cylinders, shoes, springs, adjusters, etc &, thanks to responses both here & in the US I managed to source much/most of what I needed.

From my extensive research (as some who know me will vouch for, this is one of my favourite ways of saving money !) I discovered that some of the components are the same as those used on contemporary British sportscars - for instance the Girling rear wheel cylinders were shared with the likes of Morgan 4/4 & some of the brake shoe springs were used on TR3's, etc,

New parts are readily available for these British models (due to the higher numbers produced) - & marked up significantly if bought from Alfa parts specialists !! - but invariably the quality of things like wheel cylinders, etc doesn't match that of the original Girling components, so I've always found that it's better to refurbish the original parts if possible.

With a bit more searching I managed to locate some NOS Girling F&R wheel cylinder seals kits (the front 1" w/cylinders were the same as those used on Austin Healey 100/4, A90 Atlantic, etc) so work could commence.

The first job was to strip down the spare front 2-shoe brakes so that I could clean & paint the backplates.

Note the lovely (lightweight) cast alloy brake shoes:







The gasket at the centre of the backplate had seen better days so I cut some new ones from a suitable thickness of gasket paper:







The wheel cylinders were stripped, cleaned & refurbished & new kunifer bridge pipes were made up using my trusty (25 yr old) Sykes-Pickavant brake flaring tool.







The next job was to dismantle/remove the existing 3-shoe brakes - again note the lovely lightweight cast alloy shoes:









At this stage I decided not to undertake any further dismantling but to leave the existing stub axle carrier in place, so fitted the newly-painted 2-shoe backplate & refurbished wheel cylinders:







- followed by the shoes, springs, new bridge pipes & hub etc:











That now completed one of the 4 corners ...

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[Lightweight_911]

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In the meantime, the used brake parts that I'd managed to source from the US arrived so I set about stripping the old bonded-on linings from the brake shoes - a nasty/messy but satisfying process !!






These were then dropped off at Villiers (the motorcycle people) in Brierley Hill for relining in a suitable material to match the original spec Mintex MZ41 material ...

- picked up again 3 days later suitably relined: