The revival of 650143R, 1970 with TS.

[Richard48Y]

Having made noise about my shed I decided to put it to the test.
Small propane ceramic heater gets it to near 60º F, a bit less once the sun goes down.
Small task, hmm, let's get a look at the carbs!
They look to have been in excellent shape prior to the car sitting for several years.
Now they have dark brown 'Fuel Varnish' in the bottoms.
I need to figure out if these use the leather shaft seals or not.
From the numbers they are probably original to an Alfa Romeo Spider.

Made a list of my jets and chokes.
Chokes 33, Aux Venturi 4.5, main jet 105, emulsion tube F15.
For the most part my jetting appears to be 'In range' but a 135 main jet and 4.0 auxiliary venturi would be more typical for a 400cc per cylinder (Now 1595cc) engine.
Billings MT where my car came from is 3,373' above sea level.
On checking my home is 4,377' and in a valley so to go anywhere I may frequently climb to around 5,000'.
Of course if I ever wanted to get to CA some of the passes are 14,000'!
Nice that Webers let you change most jets at the side of the road. 
Maybe I will replace the ash-tray with an altimeter.

So I have increased displacement a little, compression as well, and another 1,000' of elevation.
More displacement needs more fuel, higher compression wants more fuel, higher altitude richen's mixture.
These should be a cinch to configure! 

I also found time to mark the mis-match between my intake manifolds and the head ports.
Plan is to 'Match' them.
But I found a WTH? issue there as well.
I am completely baffled as to why anyone would cut down one intake mounting ear.
They did add another mounting bolt hole but there is no matching hole in the head.

It seems I will be looking for new Weber mounting seals too.
Of course these are not the common sort as used for TC's.

It appears the Payen head gasket set I have is for a wedge engine.
Anyone need it?

And finally, I find myself a little concerned that I will be trying to run-in a fresh engine with carbs that have not been fully sorted in advance. 

Pics below include the functional but too ugly to use trailing arm.

[BDA]

I think even new DCOEs have leather seals. Your carbs probably have brass throttle shafts which are fragile. You might want to upgrade to steel shafts and the newer sealed bearings but that is not a task for the weak at heart because it requires you to drill the hole in the shaft to locate the accelerator pump lever (at least that would give me pause).

You should at least replace the leather seals since they can get brittle over time and make sure sure the bearings are packed with good grease.

I’m not sure why your flex mounts would be different from those used on a TC. I think the same soft mounts are used everywhere. They come in different flavors (plastic mounts that incorporate an O-ring on either side or aluminum mounts with “O-rings” that are molded on and maybe there are others) but they do the same thing.

[Richard48Y]

I already have the steel throttle shafts.
Might be a past upgrade.
Mounting rubbers are pictured above the manifolds.
I see what appears to be the same manifolds still for sale so the rubbers should be available.
Unless they are silly expensive I will buy extras.
I need to find a Good aluminum welder to repair one manifold.

Spent a lot of time researching my jetting and chokes.
33 chokes may be a wee bit ambitious for casual street driving but the car ran well in the Hill-Climb video so I will keep them unless they give problems.
Main jet appears to be undersize and is not the correct way to compensate for altitude by itself.
I will buy a couple more sets, 115, 125, 135.
This will give me a pretty good range cheaper than buying the standard tuning set of five.
Overall my jetting is not unreasonable, it does appear some changes from factory have been made for altitude.

[Richard48Y]

Got my quote from Delta Cams today.
Welding up all the lobes $200.00, re-grind about $50.00
So half the price of buying a new cam from Cat Cams and no question that it is correct for my engine.
Now working on grind specs.

[Richard48Y]

Had a long talk with Peter Taft this evening.
He recently sold his Europa/Renault engine race car but shared a lot of knowledge from his several years of ownership. Yes, I made notes!
A shop he recommends here is the US is https://www.vintagesportscar.net
Probably one of the few shops that understand Renault builds.
Located in Woodstock, IL 60098.

In talking with Peter it seems I already have "Gordini" rods so all I need to add are some ARP bolts.
Nice to finally catch a break. 

He feels that even the Mild cam from Cat is pretty radical for anything but a full race car and will not idle reasonably.
I would like to find the cam specs from an 807G engine to work from.
I recall my old cam being .330" lift.
X 1.5 rockers that is .495" valve lift.
So tonights research is trying to find information from some manuals I have here.

[Richard48Y]

Found at the Aussie Frogs site, post is only eighteen years old. 
Not sure if 17G would be the same?
Now I need the casting number for the G cam.
If I have Gordini rods maybe my old cam is Gordini too?
Even if it is it still has to be repaired.
-------------------------------------------
This is off a photocopy from Franco-American Imports in the early 80's, it's was sourced out of the renault racing manual for 12/15/17. picture below.

7701452043 - R12G
Inlet Valves
opens BTDC 40 deg
closes ABDC 72 deg
Exhaust Valve
opens BBDC 72 deg
closes ATDC 40 deg

7700524884 - 1600cc Racing
Inlet Valves
opens BTDC 53 deg
closes ABDC 83 deg
Exhaust Valve
opens BBDC 83 deg
closes ATDC 53 deg

[Richard48Y]

Another cam suggestion from Salv Sacco.

A lobe profile that gives 290 – 296 duration somewhere close to these dimensions – (at cam lobe not at valve)
Total lobe height 0.285 – 0.290” lift
54 degrees from peak - .070” - .075”
If that can be ground at 108 LCA and using a theoretical rocker ratio of 1.52:1 and a valve clearance of .015” you should see something very close to these figures:-
Total valve lift = 0.425”
Lift at TDC = 0.099”
Set cam timing to show either an equal lift on both inlet and exhaust at TDC, or with .005” - .010” more on inlet than exhaust.
I find this gives a smooth idle, really strong mid-range with a 7K peak.
Start line RPM I guess would be around 4500RPM
All the above is based on what I have used and it works for me!

[jbcollier]

The 17G used either the 807-12 or 807-13 engine.  Cams were not mild but not particularly radical either.  IF you are looking for an engine on the "racier" side but still streetable, I would go with Sal's advice. 

[GavinT]

Hey, Richard,

Yeah, I expect Salv knows what he's talking about.
The R12G cam spec of 40/72/72/40 is the same spec as came in the R17G / R17TS and is entirely streetable as one might expect coming from the factory as volume road cars – though the R12G itself was't a large volume.
I'm told that forum member, StephenH uses the higher spec 53/82/83/53 in a 1596 engine and his car is apparently used happily on the road. Maybe send him a PM?

In general, it seems most of the 807 performance cams favour long durations but with more modest lift. Perhaps that's also a nod to taking lifter wear/damage into account.

[Richard48Y]

A couple of folk have painted the push rods as the weakest link and no superior replacement available.
I have also been told that too high an RPM begins to flex the rockers.
Also that a shaved head can mess with valve-train geometry.
Rockers are apparently 1.52 ratio so even modest lift at the cam goes over
.400 at the valve and these are small high rev engines.
I have been pointed to Dema Elgin as doing a very successful grind.
So now it seems I have several profiles to work with, some have more data available than others.
I have also been warned away from the current Euro cam sources due to quality issues.
Delta Cam guys will not be back until Monday.
I will organize my notes and send them an email to look over before our next conversation.
One thing I hope they can do is figure out what my current profile is.
Since I have G rods and pistons maybe I already have a G cam too?
I hope I am not the only one doing a TS and that this thread will help others.
I will also reach out to StephenH.

[jbcollier]

Custom pushrods are readily available, just google.

It is actually very easy to get these engines to spin 8K+ but they won't hold together.

The weak links are the crankshaft and the cam/follower faces.  At high rpms the crank will develop stress cracks.  How fast depends on how high you go.  I would suggest after 7500, you are on borrowed time.  Cam/follower wear increases dramatically was well.  If it is a full race engine, and you drive it as such, you can just consider them consumables: say 500 to a 1000 kilometres between full overhauls if you want to avoid grenading.

Naturally, that is bat-crap-crazy for a street engine.  If you keep to a 6500 rpm redline, you will be ok.  Often up there and you will get some extra cam/follower wear but the crank will be fine.

[Richard48Y]

Began cleaning my block today.
Outside cleans easily, are these blocks die-cast?
Not sure what to use to remove rust staining from the water jacket area of the block.
Pulling out all of the varied size pipe cleaners for oil passages.
Noticed that three of the main cap bolts go clear through the block so will need sealer.

[GavinT]

Yes, die-cast.
One of those phosphoric acid based rust removers works OK on ally. It will etch the ally slightly but it's not savage or catastrophic like hydrochloric acid. Even so, I don't leave it there for long. But in reality, It's probably not worth much to remove every last trace of rust; just any larger build up or flakey stuff.
The place to check is the liner seats. That's a fairly common place for corrosion to be found.

I'm not aware of sealing issues with those main cap bolts.

[Richard48Y]

Found my metric Allen wrench to remove oil galley plugs.
Scary to find the one just above the oil filter only finger tight. 
I'm always surprised to find so many bolts loose throughout an engine and none with any sort of Loc-Tite.
These have copper washers but clearly those do not work as locking washers.

I will get some more parts solvent in the morning.
Maybe mag wheel cleaner will work well to clean the inside water jacket?
Once it is looks clean I will use a pressure washer.
Then go after it again with solvent, brushes, and oversize pipe cleaners before a second power wash.
The best news for this block is that it does not have any water corrosion damage.

Also got my rear uprights cleaned up.
Have a minor weld repair to be done on one.
It would be fine as is but I'm being finicky.
Plan is to get them aluminum powder coated so easier to keep clean.

The butchered intake manifold is really annoying me.
It could be repaired but I am going to see if I may buy a single instead of a full set.

[Richard48Y]

A French parts site with English text.
Too bad they do not list prices on-line.
Also very few pics.
http://www.gbsalpine.com/english/a110/catalog/p0016mot.html
They have some interesting pieces, Ti. valve spring retainers, forged piston sets(By whom?) aluminum pulleys, aluminum oil pan and baffle plate.
They also have a lot of standard engine parts.