Scottish Italian Car Day - 24th May 2009

[Eklipze3k]

Being held at Craigtoun Country Park just outside St Andrews. Organised mainly by AROC, but always has a great selection of all-Italian vehicles.

Hopefully Stew and I will be there with our 126's and it'd be great if anyone from south of the border would be up for the adventure   [-/

Details of entry fee etc to follow when I have them

[K666STW]

I'll hopefully be there. If I get everything sorted on mine.
For anyone pondering and has never been to this show before. I'd describe it as the same sort of atmos and feel of Stanford Hall, but on a scale much closer to MITcar.

The park itself is like a bowling green. So your not marching about in a field.

[Eklipze3k]

Entry fee seems to be £5, I'm still trying to clarify if that's per head or per car but very reasonable anyway.

C'mon guys, I'm making the effort to attend a couple of the events down south, no-one else interested in this?

[Pete126]

Anyone got any pictures

[Eklipze3k]

I will have when I get home, currently in Carlisle having suffered a monumental oil leak yesterday as well as the bolts holding the manifold on deciding to shake themselves loose. Nothing serious really, but as I have no pennies I'm grounded here until payday. Seems the filler cap had worked loose - hence the leak, and the dipstick jumps around like a deranged acrobat so going to have to secure that somehow before attempting the drive home. New bolts and lots of firegum should sort the manifolds enough to get me home, and lots of rest stops.

The day itself was great though, much bigger turnout than I was expecting - have been told it was on the scale of MITCAR but with much more exotic metal with a very large contingent of Ferraris, Maseratis, Lancia and even an Alfa 8C! Mine was the only 126 there, there was a 500 and even a Gamine (sp), a fair few X1/9's, a couple of Stradas, surprisingly large number of Barchettas and the usual selection of Alfas and standard Fiats. Gorgeous weather, great location, great people, great day!

Edit: I left my handbook at home, what oil do I need to get?

[Rusty's Uncle]

  Grounded in Carlisle eh! Have you been naughty ? 
I jest , sounds like you are like me & want to make it home under your own steam. If you have a loose oil filler cap it is because the cap locates on the thin metal on the oil inlet & on high mileage engines once they start to rattle they quikly get worse. Quick fix is to cut out a cardboard "washer" that will pack out the rubber seal, fit under the seal , use a suitable thickness to take up the slack & when you fit the cap put it full on then turn back untill it bites.
Dip stick again is a common problem. Get you home solution, pack out the grommet with a small piece of paper wrapped around to get a tight fit. Cheap fix , stretch a small o-ring (or two) over the worn grommet to get a seal. Posh job , get the new grommet from an eBay shop.
Exhaust manifolds, take care of the threads in the head & I would recomend fitting stainless bolts if the head is sound to avoid future problems,
Good Luck [-/

[bis13]

like rusty said theres some quick fixes try these if you dont fancy his.
the filler cap can be made tighter by applying pressure with a pair of pliers on the part of the cap that sits under the rocker cover lip and holds the cap on be carefull to not over do it so go slowly and test it each time you apply pressure.
 as for the grommet wrap some electrical tape around it until it fits snuggly and leave a length of tape so it hangs out of the hole so it doesnt fall off and end up in the sump as it will tend to go brittle, also you can tuck the dipstick under the thermostat operated door just above the dipstick and it will prevent it from falling out and spraying oil around your engine bay.
when it comes to the manifold bolts if you hear a shrill squeaking noise its the manifold or exhaust coming loose its a very recognisable sound and once you know it will spot it every time.
good luck getting home and just remember it wouldve been so boring in a normal car ...   

[Eklipze3k]

Thanks for the suggestions fellas, I've already started to recognise that squeal and don't like it

The head has already been threaded prior to my ownership as the bolts for the rear manifold are M8 as you'd expect, but for the front one they're M10 I think (17mm head). As for topping up the oil, what oil do I need to get? It's currently sitting about 1/3 on the dipstick but I'd like to keep it a bit higher than that if I can.

[Rusty's Uncle]

For the engine oil the handbook says multigrade 15W/40  [-/

[Eklipze3k]

Cheers for that, oil is now filled up, filler cap "adjusted" to sit tighter, new bolts "crafted" for both manifolds (originals were very short so have made them as long as I could) just got to secure the disptick and we'll be ready to roll.

Not going to head back up the road until tomorrow tho, ideally don't want to be driving at night if I can avoid it and would like to take regular breaks if possible (thinking every 70-80 miles for about 30-45 minutes) to let the engine cool down a bit, also noticed a crack in my nice shiny new exhaust pipe  A bit of firegum as a get-me-home fix but it's going to need welded