SEE THE FOR SALE SECTION FOR MORE DETAILS
05/04/10. Another addition to the family. After selling 5 of my cars since xmas and saying I wasn't taking in any more strays, I did it again. My arguement is that the Range Rover is to big and thirsty for the short runs to the train station, and this is were a cheap little car would be handy. So I spotted the Cinq locally for sale and having owned 4 Cinq Sportings before knew straight away it would be perfect for the job if it was the right car. A few texts and a phone call later off we went to meet Joanne, the cars owner. The car was spot on mechanically having recently had a new starter, alternator, clutch, clutch cable, front struts and a wheel bearing. There's a little split in the rear bumper and the usual door parking dings but that's to be expected on a 13 year old car. A deal was done and "Lilly" Joannes name for the car, was off to her new home. She'll be well looked after Joanne so don't worry.
Sorry Joanne but the covers are a wee bit to much for me 
so will be coming off I'm afraid.
Thankfully the parcel shelf has no big speaker holes like most seem to suffer from these days.
13/04. I've noticed the last couple of days that the temp guage wasn't moving and there was no heat at all coming from the heater. This usually means the thermostat has stopped working. So I ordered a new one this morning and it was at the door when I got home. First job was to get the old one off. It is only held in with 2 10mm bolts. I took the heater pipe off before I took the thermo out as I find it's easier to do. It didn't take long to see what the problem was. The thermo's innards are all missing!
The space were the thermo goes.
New thermo on. I let the car warm through and bled the system. I didn't put in any anti-freeze beacuse there is a lot of brown water in the system so I'm going to drain it and flush it through.
17/04. In between spraying the Lancia I drained and flushed out the water system out of the car as it was a dirty brown colour from having no anti freeze. Fresh water and new anti freeze now in. I didn't bother taking any photo's.
28/05. Lilly's been making noises from the front and rear suspension that sounds very much like a wishbone on the front and rear trailing arm bushes were on their way out. So time to replace them. New wishbone and polybushes bought.
As soon as I got the front wheel off it was very obvious the track rod end was done to.
New one of those bought to.
29/05. Up early this morning to get stuck in. Front suspension first starting with the track rod end. 10 minute job. Losen the nut on the arm, the nut from the ball joint and a thump with the hammer. Out it pops.
New one fitted easily although the tracking will have to be checked now.
Front wishbone. WD40 over all the bolts and nuts to free them a bit. Anti-roll bar nuts are 13mm and the rest 17mm. Free off the bottom ball joint first then remove all the other bolts. It's pretty straight forward. When the bolts are all out one tap with the hamer and it will drop out.
There is a bracket on the wishbone that the anti-roll bar attaches to, this has to be transfered to the new arm. It's only held on with 2 13mm nuts. And you can see in the photo the ball joint rubber is spilt and it was knackered. refitting is just the reverse of taking it out.
Changing the trailing arm bushes isn't as easy. I took the handbrake cable off to allow movement. Then the bottom bolt off the damper so the arm would drop further. I know in the photo the arm bolts are already off but I forgot to take the photo first.
The arm bolts came out easier than I thought they would. You can see in the photo I have the inner bolt losened but didn't take it out until the outer one was off so the arm wouldn't be hanging on the one bolt.
Once the arm had dropped I started removing the old bush.
It didn't take me long to realise there was no way I was going to be able to do the job with the arm still attatched to the car. That ment the brake pipe had to come off and of course both brake pipes were ceased so had to be cut off and new pipes made.
Back to taking the old bush out. As I only had the one day to do everything I used a blow torch to melt the rubber bush out. That was easy, the outer metal casing though was not for moving and it took a lot of heat and a chisel before all 4 eventually came out. It took me over an hour to get all 4 out.
My nice new poly bushes.
Fitting them was pretty straight forward using the grease supplied with them to push them in. Getting the arms back in place in the car was a bit of work as they are a good tight fit. I used the trolley jack to push them into place and a good strong screwdriver to line up the holes for the bolts.
It took all day to get that lot done and just when I thought that was it I discovered both rear dampers are almost done and will have to be replaced. I'll get these on Monday.
17/09. Well all the mechanical work has been completed so it was time to concentrate on the body. I took the last 2 evenings and gave the car a good going over with G3 on the polisher then a good coat of wax. The paint has came up very well and the faded skirts and rear spoiler are like new. I gave the inside a good going over to. Then it was off to my tyre supplier for 2 new tyres, tracking to be set and headlights alighned. I even fitted a new set of mud flaps.
18/09. Since everything was now finished I took the car for mot today.
It didn't go to plan. Lilly failed on the headlights being to high, odd when they were only done a couple of days ago, the brakes were "overbraking" on the rear drivers side (never heard of that before) and all 4 jacking points were rusted. I thought they were ok the last time I checked them. Worst result I've ever had for a car. But not to worry, at least everything mechanical is perfect. Got home and checked out the areas that were listed on the failure sheet. Time to get the welder out.
Passenger side rear jacking point has rusted through.
So I cut out all of the area that had any traces of rust and welded a new piece in on the inside of the car and another new piece from underneath so the jacking point is now stronger and sandwiched. This the the plate welded in but not cleaned up as I'd no grinding discs left and it will be Monday before I get any. I will be doing the same with all 4 point. that will give good strong areas for any future jacking.
The front passenger side jacking area.
02/10. Re-test for MOT today, everythings sorted and a nice new piece of paper to say Lillies good for another year. I've had to do a bit more work than I thought I'd have to to get her through the test though. I did discover that the rear brake was actually out by 1%
yes it failed for being out 1%. Oh well.
I've decided to seel Lilly due to buying the Alfa 155 so the first person to grace my palm with £500 drives off. The only thing she might need as there is a slight whine from it is a water pump.
08/01/2011. I fitted a new set of plug leads to Lilly this morning as I think she has a weak lead. I also think she might need a new water pump so I'll be looking into that next. I'll drop the price of the sale to £500 if anyone wants to do the job themselves.
12/01. I hate things not working right so I bought a new water pump today. I'll not get fitting it until Saturday probably due to work.
15/01. So down to the business of fitting the new water pump and stopping the little whining noise that was starting to make its presence felt. First thing to do is remove the inner wheels arch on the drivers side.
Then the aux belt has to come off along with its pulley. This then allows the timing belt cover to be easily removed. Revealing the timing beltthat drives the water pump.
Now the timing belt has to be removed. So line up all the timing points and mark them, I've done it with yellow paint. Another little trick is to take out the spark plugs so there is no pressure in the head that can move the cams. And as an added security I clamped the top pulley wheel so it can't move. It's only done lightly with the grips.
The timing belt tensioner has then to be slackened off and this is were things got interesting, the bearing is completely dry and in the first stages of coming apart. Its what has been squeeling not the water pump at all. Basically its done and it's well I caught it when I have. I've a new one ordered. Clearly the belt has been changed but not the bearing.
Since I had the new water pump I just went ahead and fitted it anyway. The old one is perfect so it will be there as a spare now. I should have the car back on the road early next week. I am going to go ahead and sell the Cinq once its done. I was going to keep it after all the work I put into it but there is little point with the Alfa being almost ready for the road.
17/01. Got the new tensioner today, can you tell which one it is
And after I got that done I thought it best to take the radiator out and give it a good flush just to be happy that everything is now spot on. Then it was just a case of putting everything back together. A quick test drive later and all is fine with the world, the heater is even better than it was so the flush clearly helped. There is still a slight hesitation when excelerating once the cars warm, but it's just a niggle.
