Classic Alfa Forums

AOG , credit to you for putting yourself through this mamouth project.
Your fabricators are doing a very thorough job.
There is so much going into this very lucky Sprint.
Thanks for sharing the journey.

This is looking fantastic
Coming along at a great pace as well
Keep up with the updates when you can

Hi gents, thank you.

I have to be honest and admit I didn't originally intend restoring the car to quite this standard. I spoke to two other body shops locally who warned me "ooh, Chris is expensive you don't want to go there". But it's like comparing apples and pears; the others do a very good job, but neither of them have the jig you can see in the pics nor can they match the standard that Chris does. The hourly rate is very fair and I'm paying for high quality work as you can see, the expense comes from the uncompromising standard. There's only one standard - period. That A post shroud had already eaten up a man day when I saw it, probably another one has been used up by now. The other factor was that Chris was prepared to step away from his usual Aston Martin & Jag work and take my car on. So what do we call my car when it's finished? An Aston Sud? Alfa Martin?

There will be a roll call of people & organisations who have helped out at the end of this (and maybe the rip off artist who didn't ).

Another update next week, in the meantime if you visit the Italia Autos Youtube site, Neil is putting up a video on a Sprint titled
"the most welded car I've ever seen"

I wondered if your body shop will be doing the paint job?
And how they intend treating cavities to avoid rust in the future?

And also who your psychiatrist is?
He/she must be very competent also?

Hi Dave, yes they will be doing the paint job. I'll ask about cavity protection next week.

No psychiatrist will touch me once they are aware I've been in contact with Italian rust since 1974. The incurable disease started with a Fiat 850, a masterclass in body rot. I've never owned anything other than Italian cars, apart from a three year adventure with a Citroen CX 25 Estate. What a car that was - I once loaded it up with four railway sleepers (real ones from a railway not B&Q softwood lookalikes). It just pumped itself up and off we went as if there was nothing on board. I loved the complexity, a real piece of engineering and the ride quality & handling was amazing. Tin worm and two blown steering racks in short order killed it in the end.

I know, I'm certifiably insane, Italian rust does that I believe.

If I remember correctly, there was an Alfa restoration company in London called "The Romance of Rust!"

Here's another installment of "The Romance of Rust".

This picture shows the near complete nearside A post fabrication. You can't see it, but the main A post pressing is inside the shroud. If only I could have got a nearside frame as I did for the offside. The new shroud gobbled up another man day, I'll leave you to work out the cost of this single item............
The nearside floors have been repaired in the foot well areas but as you can see the outer edges of the floors are gone. The inner sills have been removed for repair in much the same manner as the offside were. Chris can be seen offering up the A post. The pattern outer sills sourced from Germany are going to need some fettling as their profile isn't quite right, but hey ho, better than nothing. Interesting to note that even with a dunking in aggressive chemicals adjacent faces of spot welded panels defy treatment.

For some reason the next two pictures are wrongly oriented. Does anyone know why? If you click on them they open the right way up.

The offside front wing has been temporary installed for a profile check against the door, pretty good I think.
Not a particularly interesting picture, but here you seen the new rear panel & valance installed. The old inner valance had a cut out for the exhaust which caused a bit of head scratching as the new one didn't. Seems a saloon inner valance had been fitted in the past. And for the eagle eyed, it has been noticed that the rectangular recesses in the rear panel need to be made into apertures for the light bar!

It's looking good, high quality workmanship, - your rear panel is for a Green Cloverleaf rather than the Veloce, but identical other than the cut outs.
John.

Alfaoldgit wrote: ↑Sun Jun 12, 2022 9:48 pm Hi Dave, yes they will be doing the paint job. I'll ask about cavity protection next week.

No psychiatrist will touch me once they are aware I've been in contact with Italian rust since 1974. The incurable disease started with a Fiat 850, a masterclass in body rot. I've never owned anything other than Italian cars, apart from a three year adventure with a Citroen CX 25 Estate. What a car that was - I once loaded it up with four railway sleepers (real ones from a railway not B&Q softwood lookalikes). It just pumped itself up and off we went as if there was nothing on board. I loved the complexity, a real piece of engineering and the ride quality & handling was amazing. Tin worm and two blown steering racks in short order killed it in the end.

I know, I'm certifiably insane, Italian rust does that I believe.

I envy you having owned a CX. I just missed out on a very good XM and regret not sorting myself out more at the time.
It was a friends we and we did a few journeys in it. It was nothing less than fantastic.

I wonder if all that rotten steel for Citroen and Alfa etc came out of the Mariupol steel works ?

Are those new front wings and if so, where did you get them from? I was planning to get fibreglass ones for my 'get it finished one day' Sprint Veloce' restoration as new steel wings appear to be unobtainable.
Brilliant workmanship. Keep the photos coming.

Hi Crank,

The wings are NOS & I got hold of them by a stroke of luck from a Sprint enthusiast. The NOS rear panel came with the car, the NOS rear quarter panels from Germany (ditto new front inner wings & valance which may not be needed but I got them while I could).

I suggest John @ Justsuds in the UK, otherwise you're looking at EU suppliers, MyAlfa, Brinkmann or Fritz Wenger for starters. See my earlier post regarding shipping large items.

There is another UK option but due bad personal experience I'm not sign posting.

I thought there was a supplier of new metal wings, but that was clearly an extreme case of wishful thinking.
I will go for fibreglass and hope they are a good fit. After all they bolt on and won't rust.

I tried to PM you, but it says recipient doesn't exist!

Hello AOG
There is an organisation called Alfasud Parts On Line, not far from you in Hampshire??

.........and also a Greek guy, Alfa Restorations iirc.

Yes, I have spent quite a bit on parts from Thannis. I'll update with latest progress soon. I'm away for a few days this week. The talented young fabricator is on holiday for two weeks from today, so progress will be much slower.

Latest update from the romance of rust. These pics were taken on Monday 27th June. As before , click and they will show correctly oriented.

The NS rear suspension turret wasn't as sound as first thought, so a new one has been fabricated from scratch.


Here a general view of the inner half of the inner NS wing

Here we see the NS front floor neatly repaired
The A post is now installed, together with the repaired inner sill, floor outer edge, the newly manufactured sill chord and reprofiled outer sills.

And finally, this is the outer half of the NS inner arch. The mating edge with the rear quarter panel had fed the tin worms so has had to be repaired using a repurposed quarter panel repair section.
As mentioned earlier, Bobby is away for two weeks now so little progress will be made, In other news, a front wing repair rail has now arrived (you know who you are, many thanks). I have decided to swallow the cost of having a pair of rails fabricated to pattern as this rail appears to be the only one in existence. One UK supplier said they hadn't seen one in 14 years, 12 months spent by me searching all of Europe and OZ & NZ didn't find any. I shall be offering this rail as a pattern to others restoring Sprints (in exchange for a hefty deposit to ensure return!).

AOG

Great work with all the fabrication, going to be one of the most solid cars around

Love the idea of getting wing rails made as well

Keep it coming

Not so much the Romance of Rust - more the Appeal of Fresh Metal

Great metal fabrication work going on there!

Lauren

Yes, the quality of the fabrication & welding is second to none. This month's bill was for an eye watering 180 hours but a very generous 10% discount was applied
I should mention that the body shop team only consists of 3 guys and an apprentice, The name of the game is quality & if anyone wants a rush job they'll be pointed elsewhere.

Opinions please (which I reserve the right to ignore!). I have a GC tailgate; the rear panel as you know is also GC. Do I get the holes for the contact plate & washer nozzle welded up, or do I install rear wash wipe using original parts? The car already has GC seats, & GC B post covers so it isn't fully original anyway, so my take is that fitting the rear wash wipe won't make much difference value wise as the nit pickers will have dissed the car already.

Over to you, dear readers.

AOG

I do not think it will matter. The next people who will own your car will come from a different angle and the great concours fascists who have made people uncomfortable over the years may well be a thing of the past.
Your mods may enhance rather than take away from the car. I occasionally get a hint that mine is not quite in keeping with my local club, but then they often say `but it sounds fantastic'.

I wouldn’t fit a rear wiper, not for purist reasons but I prefer the clean and unfussy lines of the earlier chrome bumper models.

I’d weld the holes up and find some early b pillar covers, they just look nicer I think.

But it is your car

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/234609617130 ... SwvstiwGXk

Any use to anyone?

Are you going to use the car in the rain ? - if you are not, then it doesn't matter, other than using parts that you already have, rather than having to source a few more parts. Also, when its fininished, - and looking splendid, and you stand back admiring it, will you think....... I wish I had, - or hadn't..... ?
It's your car Chris do it how you want it !
Cheers, John.

I think the lines are cleaner without the rear wiper & washer
I also prefer the pre cloverleaf B post covers but as they are metal more difficult to find
At the end of the day it’s your car and your decision

Ref the ebay listing............why didn't this come up during the last 6 months, instead of now after I've chased my tail sourcing parts from all over! Ha, it's always the same isn't it! Shame he wants to sell the job lot as there are some items there I could do with (a good tank would save me the hassle of sorting mine out, the inner coating has started to disintegrate). i can't buy the whole lot, I'm drowning under GTV6, 164 & Brera parts in addition to everything off the Sprint.

Going with early B post covers, I agree they look better than the later ones.

Thanks for the comments on the rear wiper. I'm still undecided........The old plain tailgate is useable with a minor repair, the replacement better. I have both variants of glass.........so I could have both options

Chris'll shoot me !!

Sorry, shame you couldn't share with someone else who needs bits for theirs.
Personally, I am with Tim and Gary re the wash wipe. The set back head lights, stainless bumpers and trims and clean tailgate add to the pure design and lightness look of the car.