The Alfa Thread

[LateFan]

Factory test track fire truck was a cut-up Berlina pickup!


Biff and Chip taking first place...










OK! My desktop is clean! You're it.

[LateFan]

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This is a later 2-liter. I like these black and tan dashes.
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[LateFan]

mm, Spiders....people used to love driving roadsters and convertibles, why is that changing? Horsepower is too high, too much wind? People are less tough, can't take the noise? People don't like cruising down a twisty country road with the top off? hmm..

[djjerme]

Anyone looking for a Spyder? Buddies got one for 6k, pretty nice.

74 Spider, best year of the square tail, last year with chrome bumpers. Has about 110k miles. Runs great, starts every time. Needs suspension bushing rebuild and has a little rust in the usual spots, floors, spare tire

If interested I can wander over and grab some pics. He’s a hardcore Alfa guy; rocks a Berlina, and just picked up a GTV6 from Seattle..


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[LateFan]

Alfaholics "GTA-R," just completed. 215hp.

https://www.alfaholics.com/our-cars/...020/completed/

[LateFan]

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[LateFan]

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Disco Volante = "flying disc"...duh...and apparently they had serious aero stability issues
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8C 2900, the Le Mans car
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Tipo 33 "Stradale" - the street version
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[LateFan]

A guy went to see the Alfa factory museum, posted pics -

8C 2900 These were the supercars of the 30s.


So aero ??


Bertone show car based on the T33 race car


Modern 8C clay buck in the center. The red show car on the right was pretty cool - I remember that in Road & Track.


6C 2500 "Golden Arrow?"
Besides being a cool-looking car, this is interesting because there are design elements in here from before the war, just like American cars had. Alfa tried to keep building big luxurious fast cars, but toned down and smaller....but that market had essentially vanished with the destruction of the economy. At the same time, Ferrari had quit, gotten out of his non-compete clause, and started building a very small number of fast V12 cars, mostly for racing. He only built road cars to fund the race cars, so it was a different kind of company and much smaller. Then by the early- / mid-50s, Alfa is building fast little 1100, 1300, and 1600 production sporting cars that people can afford, and many of them were developed into racing versions.

[LateFan]

OK, pics are loading today again.

Here are more pics the seller sent -

I figure the offset at about 19mm. OEM skinnies are 38.





This car won't be tracked, and it's mostly for fun drives over the mountains, so they won't be overly stressed.

[BlackbirdM3]

The biggest thing that bothers me with the stock steel wheels is that the centers flex like crazy. Before I got my Panasports on the GTV I was running the stock wheels and would toss a hubcap at least once a month. (Sometimes I was able to find them, sometimes not.) At $60 a month if not more, it added up quickly, and there was no reason for it. The wheels really don't look that good without hubcaps either. This would be my #1 reason for not running stock wheels. Also in there, weight. The Panasports were one of the best mods I did to the GTV.

Will

[LateFan]

Here's what I've got so far. A seam sealer and tape layer over the weld...

uh oh...photo posting has glitched out again. I'll try later.

[varg]

I haven't inspected a banded wheel from that side but I've seen it being done and it is done from the outside usually with a special rig that turns the wheel and MIGs it in one smooth bead. It makes sense that there would be a visible seam on the inside of the wheel, maybe finishing on the inside with a sanding wheel was not done, probably because it isn't visible once it's on the car. If you post a picture of the weld itself I'm sure one of the internet weld critics will chime in and tell you if it's underpenetrated or something.

[2mAn]

If it means the car gets off the jackstands and back on the road, yes

[LJ851]

^ Yes.

[LateFan]

Opinions on these possible wheels please -

I am fine with easily reversible mods on a car like this. They designed them in the 50s and 60s for windy rough mountain roads in Italy. They had long wheel travel and softish springs. The engineers built specials, and "sports purpose," and race cars much lower and stiffer.

So I'll keep my original, painfully skinny 4.5x15 wheels for originality, for historic shows, future value, whatever... But I want it to sit down lower and wider for everyday. I have Centerline yellow springs going on, better shocks, all new bushings.

I'd been thinking for years about widening an extra set of factory steelies to 6 or 6.5 x15, with original hubcaps about level with the lip instead of sticking out like Ben-Hur's hubs. It should look like a factory special, not deep dish hot rod - that make sense? Finding an old school hot rod shop that still does that is tough. Liability blah blah. Lack of demand blah. The phreshkid here had some nice ones done in Mexico for his 2002s. A 195 fits on a 6 or a 6.5" wheel. Everything I read says except for racing, a 205 is too much on the chassis and the antique steering box. 7" is too deep and too much tire on a 1900 lb car.

So I found a guy looking for original 4.5x15s because his PO widened his to 6", and he's doing a perfectly correct restoration of an early GT.

They seem to have been done by an old machine shop in NC. I see seam sealing. They're banded, so original barrels and centers for hubcaps. He said they balanced and rode fine the few times he drove it before stripping it down.

My concern is this exposed butt joint on the outer face. Maybe the welding was done from the backside. But I would think you'd want to fill or weld-in these joints and grind them smooth and repaint.

The four to the upper left, compared to a stock one lower right. I'm figuring out the offset now.


6" vs 4.5"




See that seam where the band meets the barrel?


And here.. I see the butt joint of the band here.