The continuing saga of my Lancia Beta Spider

[dern]

Nice car.

@weeksy - car project area? Actually, that's probably what this is, right?

[mangocrazy]

Part Three...

Part two concluded with the Beta minus its engine and gearbox, still in France. Thankfully I have a good sized garage (a rarity in the old village houses). Winding back about a year, when I returned to the UK in November 2015 leaving a broken Beta in my garage in France I decided that the following year I would take a spare 2 litre engine I had down to France, along with an engine hoist, remove the broken engine and substitute the spare one. And in March/April 2016, that's (sort of) what I did. I removed the broken engine (and brought it back to the UK); but I only got as far as bolting the replacement engine onto its mounts. Unforeseen problems with the exhaust meant that was as far as I could go. Here's the moment when the broken engine was lifted free of the body:

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With the broken engine and gearbox back in the UK, and the engine bolted to a stand in the utility room, it's become very apparent that nothing less than a complete strip down and refurbishment will be required. This is what I'd been planning to do all along, it's just that the engine's untimely demise had accellerated that process. So in the UK I'm starting the process of doing a top to bottom refurbishment of the original engine, while in France I'm trying to get an engine of entirely unknown provenance into a working condition. I'd bought the engine on trust, having been assured that it was working when removed from the donor car, and the engine certainly turned over freely. I was advised to do a compression check on the motor and even bought a kit to do this, but inexplicably never got round to doing it. This would prove to be a major oversight on my part...

Back in the UK, and with the original engine stripped down to its component parts, I handed most of the engine parts over to Stanwood Engineering in Bawtry (now relocated to Clay Cross) for them to put throught their deep clean and ultrasonic tanks and then rebore the block to first oversize to suit the 10:1 pistons I'd had squirrelled away for 3 or 4 years. The crankshaft and VX flywheel were sent to Guy Croft in Lincoln for him to polish, lighten and dynamically balance. Unfortunately he'll never see the engine running - he succumbed to cancer a couple of years ago. Here's a photo of the crank prior to Guy's work:

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and the block after Stanwood have worked their magic:

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[Supermofo]

Great thread, really enjoying reading this

[mangocrazy]

There's definitely a split in this thread. On the one side I'm slowly (I mean r e a l l y slowly, like glacial, maan) trying to rebuild the original motor in the UK, and in France I'm trying (unsuccessfully for the most part) to refit the replacement motor and get the vehicle working again.

But for the moment, we'll stick with the UK side of things.

The photos in my last post were taken in 2017. I can't precisely remember what happened that took me so long to get round to any meaningful progress on the rebuild, but I imagine that sloth, indolence and the acquisition of a KTM Duke 690 (R) in late 2017 may have caused me to take my eye off the ball. And then we have the all-purpose excuse of Covid, of course.

Yes, let's blame it on Covid...

Initially (in a fit of overconfidence) I had intended to rebuild the motor myself. Once the reality of the situation dawned on me (i.e. that I'd never rebuilt a car engine before), I decided to take the (ahem) pragmatic route and hand that piece of the process over to Stanwood Engineering. In doing so I joined at the back of a fairly long queue (any engine builders worth their salt are booked out for months ahead), and initially I only asked them to do a short engine build; i.e. crank, mains, big ends, con rods and pistons. My plan was then to hand the short engine over to Guy Croft and get him to build the top end. Unfortunately the head I was using had already been fettled by another tuner and Guy flat out refused to touch it.

As a result I had to re-join at the back of the Stanwood Engineering queue, just as Covid hit. Consequently it was November 2020 before I could retrieve my engine and start work on all the ancillaries. This is how the engine arrived back from Stanwood (mounted on a home-built dolly to assist in moving the lump around).

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And here's a gratuitous close up of the rocker boxes that I'd had powder coated in gold metalflake. Shiny, shiny...

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I'm not entirely sure why, but those cling-film wrapped engine photos make me think of a Cocteau Twins album cover...

Stanwood had built up the top end, dialled in the cams, shimmed the valves and done all those other tricky things that I couldn't honestly trust myself to do, but there were still a multiplicity of pieces that need to be re-fitted to the engine. Top and bottom water rails (metal on these engines), refurbished oil pump and reworked sump pan with more effective baffling than OE Lancia, and of course major items like the clutch and gearbox. To conclude this episode, here's a picture of the revised sump baffling.

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If you're wondering why the main baffle plate is at a jaunty angle, it's because the Lancia designers decided to tilt the engine back by 20 degrees, to get the engine as close as possible to the centre of mass of the car. As a result the sump is asymmetrical when viewed from the side. Those old Lancia designers were a bit tasty, I reckon...

[dern]

Nice. I’d love to learn how to recondition and rebuild an engine but I suspect it’s one of those things that you’re better taught to do by someone who knows how to do it and can stop you fucking up before you fuck it up.

[mangocrazy]

Nice. I’d love to learn how to recondition and rebuild an engine but I suspect it’s one of those things that you’re better taught to do by someone who knows how to do it and can stop you fucking up before you fuck it up.

Yeah, I wasn't feeling brave enough to do it myself, to be honest. At some point I'd like to strip and rebuild a car engine myself, just to prove I can. I've rebuilt bike engines (mainly two-strokes, which are simpler), but I completely rebuilt the engine in the very first bike I ever owned , a Honda C200 - a 90 cc OHV single and it worked after I'd finished. The 'what could possibly go wrong' attitude of a 16 year-old, I guess.

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

Nice. I’d love to learn how to recondition and rebuild an engine but I suspect it’s one of those things that you’re better taught to do by someone who knows how to do it and can stop you fucking up before you fuck it up.

Get yourself a Suzuki GS550 engine and give it a go, they're still cheap and are as simple as a 4 cylinder 4 stroke gets.

[DefTrap]

Great stuff, more please.

[dern]

Nice. I’d love to learn how to recondition and rebuild an engine but I suspect it’s one of those things that you’re better taught to do by someone who knows how to do it and can stop you fucking up before you fuck it up.

Get yourself a Suzuki GS550 engine and give it a go, they're still cheap and are as simple as a 4 cylinder 4 stroke gets.

You only really find out if you’ve done a good job after many miles though and with the best will in the world I don’t want to learn the skill enough to ride a gs550 for as long as it would take to prove the build

[mangocrazy]

Nice. I’d love to learn how to recondition and rebuild an engine but I suspect it’s one of those things that you’re better taught to do by someone who knows how to do it and can stop you fucking up before you fuck it up.

Get yourself a Suzuki GS550 engine and give it a go, they're still cheap and are as simple as a 4 cylinder 4 stroke gets.

I'm not sure what it is - probably some kind of mental block - but I'd have no qualms stripping and rebuilding a bike IL4 engine, but to do the same to a car engine makes me apprehensive. It's irrational, I know, but that's just how I feel about it. I have a spare VFR750 engine sitting on a dolly in the cellar that I've been intending to strip for shits and giggles, but have just never got a round tuit...

There was also the fact that I've been acquiring and storing all the bits for a full engine refresh for at least 10 and probably 15 years and I really didn't want to fuck up and waste all that patient acquisition/spending by doing something stupid on the rebuild. This is a list of the parts I've gathered over the years and either have gone or will go into the refurbished motor:

10:1 cast pistons from Vick Auto in Texas (OE is 8.9:1)
Set of Cunningham rods (safe to 9000 rpm!) from Guy Croft
Set of Guy Croft triple valve springs (also safe to 9000 rpm)
Full set of new inlet/exhaust valves and guides from Vick Auto
Pair of Weber DCOE 45 carbs with 36mm choke
Guy Croft manifold to suit Webers and miss the block-mounted distributor
Standard distributor overhauled and modified to suit engine specs
Cometic MLS (multi-layer steel) head gasket
Uprated Monte Carlo water pump with deeper impeller
Uprated Denso starter motor (lighter and twice the cranking speed)
MSD ignition box and matching coil (bought from USA)
Completely overhauled and refurbished oil pump (Guy Croft again)
228mm Flywheel from Beta Volumex (permits fitment of Thema Turbo clutch)
Clutch for Thema Turbo 16V (much cheaper and more readily available than uprated Beta clutches)
2000 i.e. gearbox completely overhauled by Day & White (just down the road from Brands Hatch)
All bearings and seals replaced throughout

As part of the engine build Stanwood gas flowed & ported the head and matched the inlets to the manifold. I've resisted the temptation to go for lumpy cams as it's a road car, not a track day special, and I want tractability and sensible fuel consumption. Where possible I've tried to use uprated parts and this, combined with non-standard parts like the Weber DCOEs have meant knock-on changes have been required - change one thing and three others need changing as well. A perfect example of this is the addition of the GC manifold which is angled to miss the block-mounted distributor. But that then takes up the space that the dipstick tube formerly occupied, and so I had to figure out where to put that, and then either modify the old one or fabricate a new one. In the end I had to make a new one and the only place it could go was between two of the manifold inlet runners. The photo below hopefully illustrates that.

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At this stage the clutch was fitted but I hadn't bolted the gearbox up to it. My original 'dolly' only catered for the engine alone, but it soon became clear to me that I'd need an extended dolly that would cater for the engine with gearbox attached, and would also (hopefully) ease the process of fitting it to the engine. As a result the 4 wheeler gave way to a six-wheeler. This is a top down view of the engine showing the dipstick tube nestling in its new location. The finish on that, and on several other parts, is electroless nickel plate. I really like the look of it - it's probably closest to stainless, but slightly 'warmer' and it also has excellent corrosion resistance properties.

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And here's a pic of the engine with gearbox fitted, and mounted on the six-wheeler...

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[mangocrazy]

The last episode brought us pretty much up to date with progress on the refurbished motor. Since the last round of photos the starter motor has been fitted, the bracketry and fixings for the alternator have come back from the platers and have been bolted on. The alternator is a NOS uprated 70w version from the last of the line i.e. and VX models (standard is a puny 55w). Can you imagine any modern OEM regarding 70w as a sufficient alternator output? How things have moved on...

Still to do is setting the ignition timing; as the car isn't running yet it's difficult to set it precisely with a strobe, but I have a Cunning Plan involving a 12v car battery, a strobe gun, Tipp-ex, a degree wheel and Blu-tak. And a couple of helpers - one to switch 12v to the starter motor, one to hold the strobe gun and me to adjust the distributor on its spline. This should also prove whether the motor is oil-tight or not. I would hope it is, but I'm not taking anything for granted. If there are any leaks I want to find out before it's bolted into the car.

I also need to do a trial fit of the Weber DCOEs before I go much further, just to make sure there aren't any gotchas. They'll be removed before the engine is winched into place, as a precaution against damage. But none of this is time-critical stuff. The car (with a duff engine) is currently in France and I need to repatriate it before any thought can be given to fitting the refurbished engine. So - talking of which, how did we get where we are?

Back in October 2016 I'd returned to the house in France with the intention of a) removing the broken engine and bringing it back to the UK b) replacing it with a spare engine, albeit of unknown provenance and c) getting the car running on the replacement engine. I accomplished point a, as demonstrated by an earlier photo, but achieving point b was proving a much tougher ask. Winching the replacement engine in wasn't an issue, but lowering it into the engine bay without fouling the exhaust manifold was proving to be a real biatch. Don't even ask about point c.

At this point I should mention that the exhaust manifold was actually a 4-2-1 performance exhaust from either CSC or Ansa (can't remember which) that had originally been fitted by a garage in the late 80s. A garage that had the luxury of a 4-post lift. The exhaust probably measured at least 2 metres (probably more) from stem to stern and there was no way the exhaust was going to pass the drive shafts at the back of the engine as it was being lowered in. This is the exhaust section we're talking about.

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There was also no way I could detach the front section of the exhaust from the remainder of the system, grovelling about on the garage floor as I was. So with time slipping through my fingers, and Mrs Mango angrily telling me my evening meal was getting cold, I did the only thing left to me. I fired up the angry grinder fitted with a slitting disc and cut the fucker off as close to the joint with the rest of the system as I could. That showed it who was boss...

When we drove back to the UK a couple of days later, the recalcitrant exhaust accompanied us in the van. I had decided that the single section needed to be converted into a two-piece at a point before the 4 pipes were siamesed into 2, with both sides terminated in flanges that could be bolted together.

Flanges...

Fortunately in Sheffield I knew an excellent (and friendly) engineering firm and a couple of excellent (and friendly) welders. After getting the exhaust bead blasted to remove all the rust I handed it over to these guys and told them where I wanted the cut made. A week or so later I had them back and it only cost me something like £60. Bargain of the century. This is what the parts looked like after they had come back from being ceramic coated black (Cerakote is the trade name).

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On advice from the guys on the Betaboyz forum I'd incorporated a couple of flexi-sections in the twin pipes before they merged into a single section to negate the possibility of stress failures in the pipe(s). And here are the two halves bolted together into a single unit (shame about the manky old bolts I used...)

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So at least with the exhaust system in two parts I could now have the engine and the exhaust occupying the engine bay at the same time. Fitting was not without its challenges - there is precious little space at the back of the engine, especially as Lancia canted the engine back towards the bulkhead by 20 degrees, further reducing what little space there was. All this was done with the car jacked up as high as my trolley jack would go, and the car supported on two axle stands under the front subframe. I could just about get under the car on a crawler but then getting my arms and hands in the space they needed to be was horribly complicated. I hate working on cars - give me a motorbike any day of the week...

[Mr. Dazzle]

Not sure you're supposed to Ceracote them braided flexy bits, but I'm also not sure it matters!

[mangocrazy]

Not sure you're supposed to Ceracote them braided flexy bits, but I'm also not sure it matters!

It was a case of 'do I get the flexi bits welded on to the downpipes before or after they've been Cerakoted'? After thinking about it for all of two seconds I decided not to knacker the Cerakote by subjecting it to welding heat. If the Cerakote flakes off the braided bits as a result of them flexing I really won't care...

[Mr. Dazzle]

'tis a nice manifold BTW, bet it sounds proper old school sports car.

[ChrisW]

...if the Cerakote flakes off the braided bits

So - self cleaning flexi sections - yay!

[mangocrazy]

'tis a nice manifold BTW, bet it sounds proper old school sports car.

It'll sound even better when I've fitted the twin DCOE 45s...

[David]

Nice. I’d love to learn how to recondition and rebuild an engine but I suspect it’s one of those things that you’re better taught to do by someone who knows how to do it and can stop you fucking up before you fuck it up.

No....it really isn't hard.


FFS I have done it,,,,,

[Mr. Dazzle]

I watched a whole series of YouTube vids on stripping and rebuilding a Triumph 650 engine+gearbox. Even with stopping to explain what was going on it's only about 6 hours total ISTR. I didn't end up rebuilding it in the end because I don't have a clear space to do it in and tools to do it with

It's true that's it not that complicated, there's potentially just loads of little esoteric bits unique to particular engines, 'specially with old and worn out stuff you're restoring.

[mangocrazy]

The other thing is that quite a few bike engines can be stripped and rebuilt on a workbench; certainly I've done that to my old LC a number of times during its life. But to successfully strip and rebuild a car engine you really need an engine stand.

[Mr. Dazzle]

'tis true.

On the flip side - far fewer tiny fiddly Japanese screws