A Leslie Wong Blog

When we first got our 1972 BMW Bavaria, the paint was failing. I bought this Makita 9227C 7-Inch Hook and Loop Electronic Polisher/Sander to try to save it.

I didn’t know that the paint was already dead. All the Meguiar’s compounds, glazes and waxes couldn’t save it. After hours of work, the paint would look good for a week or two.

Now, with relatively new (single stage) paint on the car, it’s a different story. After washing the car, I’ve been using Meguiar’s NXT Generation Tech Wax, Zymol Cleaner Wax or Eagle One’s NanoWax, applied by hand with a foam pad.

Then the Makita polisher, with a wool polishing bonnet or a foam pad, removes the wax easily and leaves the paint nicely polished. It doesn’t take a lot of effort and the paint shines; I’m just trying to protect it. I still dread having to wax the car, but it turns out, with the Makita polisher, it really isn’t a big effort now.

This week is the big car week on the Monterey Peninsula. The weekend before the Rolex Monterey Historic Automobile Races at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, they have the “Pre-Historics.” A lot of racers are already setup in the paddock and anyone can go in and look around if you pay the $6 parking fee, which is about my speed.

We saw some of the practice for Group 7A, 1964-1971 FIA Mfg. Championship Cars: there were two 1969 Porsche 917Ks, a 1970 Ferrari 512S, 1969 Ford GT-40, a 1968 Alfa Romeo T33/2 and various Porsche 908s.

In Group 7B, 1973-1980 IMSA GT, GTX, AAGT Cars, there was Henry Schmitt’s (whose father started German Motors in San Francisco in the 60’s) 1974 BMW 3.5 CSL. I saw it in the paddock with hood off and took a piture of the engine. There were also a bunch of Porsche 935s, a bunch of 1977 Dekon Monzas and various Porsche 911 RSRs.

There were three Bonhams cars that are going to auction next Friday: a 1975 BMW 3.0 CSL in Taiga, the metallic green that looked ugly to me; a 1929 Bentley 4½-Liter (the Mrs. said, “This must have been where they came up with the term wind screen”) and a 1939 Auto Union 3-liter V12 Grand Prix Racing Single-Seater. When we went back to the parking lot (we drove the Bavaria), there was an E9 parked behind us. As we were leaving, we saw the Auto Union broken down on the track while doing a demo lap – they were attaching a tow rope the a fire truck.

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One night, while driving through the grove of Eucalyptus trees on US 101 near San Juan Bautista, California, I realized that the sealed beam headlamps on my Alfetta were inadequate. This is the same road that Scottie Ferguson and Madeleine Elster (Jimmy Stewart and Kim Novak) took to Mission San Juan Bautista in the film Vertigo.

A modern car had pulled up next to me in the other lane and I suddenly saw the road ahead. That’s when I realized that I had to improve the lighting on the Alfa Romeo.

Research turned up 5.75 inch (146 mm) Cibie H4 (low beam) and H1 (high beam) headlamps for the quad setup I needed. For the H1 headlamp, I used Osram Silverstar bulbs (NOT Sylvania Silverstar) and for the H4, I used Narva Rangepower High Output Plus 30 bulbs.

This setup is more economical than the Cibie Complex Surface Reflector (CSR) headlamps and I’m only replacing the right side headlamps in my crashed into Alfetta. Osram Sylvania produces a Xenarc HID conversion kit I’ve seen for US$ 588.

I’ve read that installing relays was a good idea for the Alfa, since the factory setup has all the headlight current going through the switch on the steering column. Daniel Stern has covered this and other lighting topics so thoroughly that I didn’t have to look anywhere else.

Comparing the Cibie headlamps to sealed beams is literally like day and night.

A little over two months ago, an incompetent driver slammed into my parked Alfa Romeo. The Alfetta was in the body shop for 46 days while I argued with State Farm over the value of the car and searched for replacement parts.

I was lucky to find some Euro-bumpers on AlfaBB.com. Larry Jr., at Alfa Parts Exchange was more than helpful in getting me grills and headlight buckets. I was up in Berkeley, so I made a personal appearance at Alfa Parts and bought a reproduction turn signal lens, complete with white gasket. Skip, at J & J Autobody in Monterey, did very nice sheet metal work.

Daniel Stern only had a 5.75 inch Cibie H4 headlamp. I had great difficulty finding a 5.75 inch, flat face, Cibie H1 headlamp. A deep Google search for Cibie “flat face” led me to Joe English, owner of Group2 Motorsports for the H1 headlamp. The last thing I’m waiting for are some Osram SilverStar H1 bulbs I bought on eBay.

In the end, it’s an experience I prefer not to have gone through.

The body shop called today to point out some rust they found when they removed the rear bumper (like I didn’t know about this). I guess what they really wanted to tell me was that it was going to cost more money.

I had ladled POR-15 on the sheet metal above the left bumper shock six years ago when I saw it looking not so good. I tried to put out of my mind the rust that I could see inside the bumper where the rubber had split.

Mo’ money, mo’ money, mo’ money…

So far the body shop has repaired rust in the front rocker panels, around the base of the windshield on the passenger side (without removing the glass), around the right windshield wiper drive shaft, on the door under the driver’s side window, around the rear bumper shock, below the bottom edge of the rear window and the trailing edge of the trunk lid.

Over the years I had treated those areas with POR-15 and/or Eastwood Rust Encapsulator and that seemed to slow the oxidation down almost completely.

I’d previously done my bush league repair work on the rust on the inner front fender wells and a large hole in the spare tire well – my first attempts at using fiberglass. Those repairs look great if you don’t look at them.

After haggling with State Farm Insurance over the value of my car, they agreed to pay for the repairs caused by their insured, errant driver.

Since the front end was being worked on, I decided to pay the body shop for some additional work, mainly replacing the Swiss-cheesed rocker panels behind the front wheel wells. Wolf Steel actually sells the lower front fender repair panels, but when I called them, they said it’d take at 3 weeks to get them. J & J Autobody in Monterey, where the car is being repaired, fabricated the panels and also replaced some of the rusted inner wheel well.

I was also lucky enough to find some Euro bumpers, so I thought it would be a good time to put them on too. Someone had made a bracket for the front that attached to the existing bumper shocks. Unfortunately, they were pop riveted together, so the shop took it apart and put in bolts. I guess the Euro bumper mounts lower so they used snips to remove some metal from the top outer corners so it would clear the front fender a little better.

The body shop also pointed out that the door panels were rusting at the bottom. I’m already spending more than the insurance company paid (and more money than I have) so I told them that was a back burner operation. It’s polyester resin (Bondo) time, for now. That started me thinking about taking off the inner door panels and going at it with Eastwood Rust Encapsulator.

I also have to give a plug to Larry Jr, at Alfa Parts Exchange for going the extra distance to help me with replacement parts. When the body shop told me the car needed a RF fender, the front upper and lower valence, Larry went out an procured an Alfetta for the parts.

I was shopping at the supermarket and came out to this scene. The police officer said the driver was trying to park and she stepped on the accelerator. Go figure.

Her car went up and across a ten foot divider, slammed into my parked car and knocked it eight feet out of its parking space. The Alfa’s right front fender is folded in half at the impact point. The body shop said the fender was irreparable. The Cibie headlights are toast. The apron is pushed into the hood, which won’t open. The frame the radiator is mounted to is bent. The bumper is broken.

The PO at the scene thanked me several times for my equanimity. WTF could I do?

It’s not that I love this car, but I have put a lot of work into it. Next time I park, I’ll make sure there is a tree in front of my car. Like that would make a difference with my luck.

Thanks to my friend Kenny, I have an Alfetta Sprint Veloce.

Thanks to my friend Steve Fields, purveyor of automobilia, I now have the book, Alfa Romeo Alfetta GT by David Owen. Owen is the author of numerous Alfa Romeo books.

Alfa Romeo Alfetta GT covers some of the history of Alfa Romeo, the Alfetta’s family tree, Alfa Romeo racing and the Alfetta GT through the GTV6.

The Alfetta GT chapter outlines the design ideas and engineering solutions to problems such as weight distribution and rear axle design. The result being a clutch-transmission-final drive unit, DeDion rear axle and in-board disc brakes.

I’ve read that Giorgetto Giugiaro’s original design for the Alfetta GT had retractable headlights, but I’d never seen any images. Owen’s book illustrates that with some of Giugiaro’s original sketches.

For the illiterate crowd, there are eight pages of color photographs plus black and white photographs of Alfettas and its predecessors throughout the book.

I think because my 1979 Alfetta Sprint Veloce has an air conditioner, engine cooling seems marginal when the ambient temperature is above 80 F (27 C).

When running at speed, the temp gauge indicates a normal 175 F. But when stuck in traffic, though the engine doesn’t overheat, the gauge goes halfway between 175 F and 250 F (79 C to 121 C).

I had the radiator checked at a radiator shop; they said there’s nothing wrong with it. I’ve bled the cooling system at the pump and thermostat and use Red Line Water Wetter in the coolant.

In an effort to help with cooling when the car isn’t moving, I replaced the stock electric fan with a new one. My reasoning was that a fan with a modern design might be more efficient. I bought a model 390 Flex-a-lite S-Blade fan. It’s a 10″ fan that advertises 775 CFM. The space behind the radiator doesn’t allow dual fans or a larger fan. The new fan doesn’t seem to make an difference in cooling.

I also thought about using the new fan to replace the one in front of the A/C condenser but I wasn’t sure I’d be able to remove the old fan without removing the radiator and A/C condensor. I know the old fan won’t come out through the gills below the bumper. I haven’t removed the grills yet. I cleaned a few bugs off the condenser, but even when the A/C fan is on, I can’t feel much air coming through if I put my hand behind the radiator.