5.17.06

Has it really been over two years since I last posted an update on the Alfa?  I should be shamed.  My punishment should be that I should have to drive a Ford Pinto for the rest of my life.

Alas it has been many moons since I last did much to the Alfa. To bring you up to speed, here's a brief history lesson. 

Several years ago I found a local GTV on craigslist for a very low price.  I'd always wanted to restore one of these for my wife and despite the fact that I was in graduate school and had a lot of other things going on, we bought the car and towed it home.  We actually did get the engine to fire and drove the car for a very brief period. 

The car was not in good shape at all.  The engine made bad knocking noises which sounded curiously like a big end bearing gone bad, the suspension was completely shot, and the body was in horrible condition.  We had no illusions, we knew when we bought it that it would be a complete restoration project, for some day in the future.  I pulled the engine out, took it apart, found the bad big end bearing, and carefully boxed up all the parts.  The transmission and exhaust and driveline were removed, and the car was stored under a cover in our front yard, awaiting the day when I would get to lay my hands on her and bring her back to life.  In the mean time my friend Carl bought and had a 66 GTV restored, which always piqued my interest in the little car.  I collected Alfa books and when I wasn't fantasizing about my CSL my thoughts would wander to the GTV.  My wife named it Shakespeare and every once in a while we'd pull the cover off to look at the car's lovely shape.  Every time I see the car it makes me smile.

Fast forward to 2006.  My CSL is not back from paint, the engine's ready to go, and I have some time on my hands and nothing else fun to do.  There was space in the garage, so I pushed it up the driveway and in to the garage and began cleaning.  I started with the engine compartment, removing wiring, hoses and ancillary equipment still mounted to the fender wells and firewalls.  I attacked the interior, removing seats, insulation, and wiring.  I removed as much from the car as I could, and over the past two days I've made significant progress.

Make no mistake, this is the tip of the iceberg.  It will be years before she's on the road again. There are some pretty serious body issues, not necessarily related to rust, but badly done body repair that has resulted in thick layers of bondo.  So far I've found very little rust, which is a nice change (old BMWs were packed in saltwater before they left the factory).

I've restored a lot of old cars in my life, and I must say, that despite some bad bodywork, this car is remarkably original.  There haven't been any aggregious attacks on her interior, no 6X9 speaker holes cut in the door panels, no chopped body bits.  It will be a lot of work, but what I have to start with is not horrible.

The goal is to have her completely stripped to a bare shell on a rolling dolly sometime this summer.  She'll then go to be plastic media blasted and primered so that I can begin the bodywork.  When I sold my CS I used some of the funds to equip my workshop with a proper air compressor (5HP, 60 gallon tank IR rated at 12.3 CFM at 120PSI). This thing should handle just about any work I need, including sanding, grinding and painting) and a Millermatic 210 MiG welder (I can also do aluminum).

Over the past couple of days I've been removing seats, wiring, interior, and every part that isn't part of the shell and either boxing it or throwing it away.  As you can see from the pictures above, there is a lot to do.  The front left fender has been pretty mangled over the years, and is probably going to need to be completely replaced,  Ditto for the front clip which has serious amounts of damage.  Luckily the rest of the car is not too bad.  For the most part it's very clean, with only mild surface rust (for the most part).  There are several rust areas which will need to be fixed, but for a nearly 40 year old car that has been sitting a lot over the past ten, she looks pretty good.  I can only compare it to my BMW CS/CSL experience and in that light the car is amazing.  An E9 BMW would be rusted horribly with this sort of history.

I've been making good use of my Dynabrade angle grinder, and my DA Dynabrade sander.  Using 3M sanding discs I've checked several areas of the car and have been happy to find fairly clean metal. So far, so good.  There's plenty more work to be done.

Ciao!

TJ