Fresh fluids for the Spider

As I type this strong rain and wind is beating against my windows. The brunt of Tropical Storm Faye has finally reached Deland. Looks like it'll be going on all night.

Tonight I spent a few hours in the garage, the door open and the rains of Tropical Storm Faye pouring down, working on the Alfa Romeo.

I changed the engine oil and filter and changed the gearbox oil as well.

The engine takes 7.5 liters of oil for an oil change... 7.5 liters!!!! Yeowwww! I used Castrol 20w50.

The gearbox oil is kind of a pain in the *ss to change. I had to jack up the right side of the car to gain enough room to crawl under and get at the gearbox drain plug. That damned thing was on as tight as can be but I finally broke it free and gashed my arm in the process. The position of the fill plug is such that I had no room laying there to add the fresh gear oil. So I bought a 6 foot length of clear tubing and ran it down from the engine bay to the fill hole and shoved it in there. Then I proceeded to add the gearbox oil through this tube until I had added the requisite 2 quarts of 80w90 Shell Spirex.

Now she's all happy. Started up and oil pressure looks better than ever...gearbox shifts well ta boot!

Today at lunch I took the Spider to European Motors, a repair shop specializing in...you guessed it...European cars :) I wanted them to give me an idea what kind of suspension work the Graduate needed to get her back in good shape. The only thing they found she needed was a new lower right ball joint. Excellent! I have an appointment to get that replaced Monday morning.

My next job...rear diff oil change and then pull out all the carpet and clean/paint the floor pan with rust preventing chemicals/paint. That'll keep me busy Saturday :)