With or without cam belt covers?

[Fetta GTV]

I am thinking of running without the cam belt covers
What is the general thoughts on this?
It looks great and it all looks quite protected from anything coming up from below.
Only problem I could see would be dropping a spanner when you are tuning it

Would anyone have one of the nice cam wheels with the holes in it?
I have one and I want to replace the ugly pressed ones.
Are they the same from one side to the other, they look like they just turn over.

[Johnboy]

If it was me I'd keep the covers on! Or make some out of Perspex or polycarbonate. That would look trick and you won't destroy your engine

[Crank]

My 1976 Ti has no covers as they were added in 1977. I was told at the time that this was because small stones could be thrown up into the engine bay and get between the belt and the cam pulley causing the belt to slip. I have never added covers and never had a problem.

[Spacenut]

I agree - the chance of a stone jamming in the camshaft pulley and snapping a belt is unlikely, but is supposed to have happened during the engine development. But I suspect a more impotant reason for covering the cam belts is to try and prevent contamination. Every modern car does the same thing, irrespective of engine placement/configuration. But I have been running my engine without cam belt covers for several years now with no problems. I removed the covers because the engine looks less "modern" without them

Lauren

[ricky ricardo]

On my current Sprint I don't use covers and don't really worry about it because when I drove my 74 Sud many years ago that didn't have any problems without covers. Also many years after the Sud was taken off the road from irreparable rust I used it on my farm as a rally basher on a large course I made. The car and engine bay was continuously showered with dirt and small stones. I figure if that didn't break the belts I'm ok on the road.

[Fetta GTV]

I think I will risk running without them and see how it goes.
Shouldn't be a problem for a while, the car isn't registered yet
So who has one of these they don't need?
And are they the same left and right?

[AlfaCorseChris]

I cant remember on the 8v but on the 16v there are markings.

They are different by the way, you can read

AS
DS
AD
DD

Which stands for Destra Sinistra (right left) and a,d is up and down or intake, exhaust


Regarding the cam covers, I'm not using any on my racing sprint either, and not planning on using any on my other sprint or my 33

[Fetta GTV]

thanks
this one is marked with an S, so i need a D right?

[dickyb]

D = Destra - Right
S = Sinistra - Left
A = Aspirato - Intake
S = Scarico - Exhaust

You should have:

SD - Scarico Destra - Right Exhaust
AD - Aspirato Destra - Right Intake
SS - Scarico Sinistra - Left Exhaust
AS - Aspirato Sinistra - Left Intake