Why Alfa Romeo & Moto Guzzi?

I get asked on occasion why I drive/ride Alfa Romeos or Moto Guzzis. Mostly this is from turkeys driving around or riding around in what I like to call "appliance" vehicles. You know the type. Solid, reliable, BORING...Toyotas, Hondas and such.

This little video sort of sums up why I like Italian vehicles. They are not an appliance to move us from one place to another. They require occasional time and attention from their owner to make sure everything is all right. But man, they pay you back in spades.

Mark, Don and Mel...Live at Shea Stadium 1971

Today's GFR song and video is Grand Funk's cover of the Rolling Stones Gimme Shelter. This is from the 1971 Shea Stadium concert in New York City. In this concert Grand Funk sold out Shea stadium in 72 hours, a feat which has never been matched by any other act, even the Beatles.

Very interesting video indeed. This Shea Stadium footage has been long unavailable but is now slowly leaking out thanks to some die hard Grand Funk fans. Watch around the 5:08 mark and you will see the stadium seats actually flexing up and down from the fans jumping around.

Like a GD kitten!

That's how this baby purrs now! Listen to the 164L in all its glory!

Grand Funk Railroad Tune O' the Day!

Those who know me know I am a HUGE Grand Funk Railroad fan, especially lead singer/guitarist/keyboardist/harmonica-ist/song writer Mark Farner.

In that vein, I will be offering a Grand Funk tune periodically on the blog. Today's is Queen Bee, which was released on the Grand Funk Lives (comeback) album in 1981. It was also released on the soundtrack of the movie Heavy Metal.

I recall how excited I was when this album came out. I played it on my MCS Series turntable time and time and time again. Man what a great album. Anyway, here you go. Turn it up to 11....

Huge Cornhusker win!

Nebraska's Cornhusker football team won a real nail-biter yesterday over rival Colorado, giving Nebraska a final regular season record of 8-4. The Cornhuskers are looking at a possible Gator Bowl berth.

Here's the school record 57 yard field goal that put them ahead for good with about 90 seconds left to play.

Harumph! What a day!

So, I left this morning in the now nicely running Alfa 164 for work. As I was rolling along the interstate I heard a loud BANG! I thought maybe I hit something r ran over something but as I glanced back I saw nothing in the road. I continued on for about another mile or so, maybe a bit less, and I started to feel a vibration from the right rear of the car. Uh oh, what happened....I slowed down and got off the interstate to the shoulder and sure enough...FLAT tire!

So I very slowly drove about 1/4 mile half on thr grass half on the shoulder until I reached a safe place off the interstate. Ahh, my first tire changing experience on the 164. In short order I had the blown out wheel and tire off and the tiny donut spare on.

At lunch I went to a tire store to have two new rear tires put on, as it was about time anyway. Fine and dandy...3 hours later :( my tires were on. I drove the short 5 minute drive home but when I arrived home one of the new tires was very low in pressure. Back to the tire store...only to find out that the rim had a tiny hole in it which was allowing air to leak.

So CRAP, now I need to see if the rim (aluminum) can be welded to seal it or I am looking at buying another dang wheel (not cheap!) Argh!

*****UPDATE***** I found a wheel shop in town with skilz in welding aluminum alloy wheels so I should have the wheel back today or Monday :) I also found a fella on the ALFA BB website willing to sell me a used rim for a modest price, so now I will be able to have a full-sized spare tire in the capacious 164L trunk, instead of the little red donut....



***** UPDATE***** Here's the welded rim...

Happy Thanksgiving!

Turk-o-meter.....turkey breast currently at 178 degrees internal temperature (1:06 p.m. ET)...it's DONE!


Happy Thanksgiving to my family and friends, both back in the Great Plains and here in Florida. Have a wonderful day enjoying time with your loved ones and feasting upon whatever delightful goodies you have prepared for the day! Go Lions!! Keep up the PERFECT season!

I am back in black and how sweet it is!!

For the past two weeks my beautiful black Alfa 164L has been sitting in the garage in a (relatively) non drivable state. A couple weeks ago the idle became suddenly very rough and erratic and the car lacked power at speed.

After some diagnosis I determined the problem was due to air leaks around where the fuel injectors slotted into the engine. So I bought a used set of 6 injectors on ebay for CHEAP and shipped them off the Rich at Cruzin Performance in Michigan to have them cleaned, reconditioned and tested. Rich does this for just $15 per injector. Considering the cost of one single new injector is ~$125 this is a major money saver!

Well I found out that 2 of the 6 injectors I sent him were not Alfa injectors at all but Porsche 928 injectors, so I told Rich to just keep those and only recondition the other 4. Those 4 arrived at my doorstep today looking clean and spiffy.

I immediately charged out into the garage and began the process of installing the 4 new injectors as well as new intake tube gaskets and rubber connector tubes I had purchased recently.

As I removed the 6 injectors on the 164 I noted that several of them were not in good shape at all. Missing or deformed o-ring seals and other missing parts...not good!

So I left what looked to be the best two and then added the 4 reconditioned ones to the fuel rail, reconnected all the electronic connectors to the injectors, reinstalled the intake runners, gaskets and connector tubes and screwed everything all back together. Probably 3 hours in total.

Then the moment or truth....I fired her up and she runs beautifully! Woohoo! What a dramatic difference and for a relatively paltry sum along with my time. I can't wait to get her back out on the road tomorrow :)

Here are the reconditioned injectors and the new connector tubes that connect the chromed air intake runners to the air intake plenum.

The 4 old injectors I removed. Note poor condition of these, including parts that were missing(!) and melted o-rings

Here are the chromed intake runners, the intake plenum (with Alfa Romeo written on it) and you can also see some of the orange fuel injectors

You think I'm old? Check out this city!

This weekend I visited America's oldest European settlement, St. Augustine, Florida. Saint Augustine is the oldest European city in the United States. The area was first visited by Ponce de Leon in 1513, but it was Juan Menendez de Aviles who established the first settlement, almost half a century before the first English settlers landed at Jamestown. St. Augustine grew to become the Spanish center of power in North America for almost 200 years.

My traveling companion was a visitor from the Great Plains. She was fun to have along and plus I needed someone to pay for fuel :=)....just kidding (about the fuel part)!! We embarked Friday a.m. in the classic Alfa Romeo Spider, meandering our way over to the coastal highway A1A. We headed north on the A1A all the way to St. Augustine, the mighty Atlantic Ocean within view most of the way.

Upon arriving, we found our hotel, the very nice and accommodating Bayfront Inn. This is a wonderful hotel right on Matanzas Bay, home to many boats and ships.

Here are some pics from the trip, as well as a link to my Kodak Photo Gallery album.... CLICK ME TO SEE THE PHOTO GALLERY!!

Nice Sunday ride on a wintry Florida day

Today I went for a ride with a great group of friends, old and new. Earlier in the week I put the word out to see if there was any interest in a ride and the response was GREAT! I think we had 15 people on the ride today, with 11 bikes in total.

Temps started in the upper 40's to low 50's but warmed to the low 60's.

The group was really fantastic and a lot of fun to ride with. We took a circuitous route to a place called the River Grille on the Tomoka River in Ormond Beach.

The food and company there were both great, with a nice view of the Tomoka River from the deck where we dined. On the way back we rode through some of the Tomoka Forest, which is really neat as the road is enveloped by a canopy of trees and irish moss hanging from the trees.

We then jogged east and rode along the coast with views of the Atlantic Ocean on coastal highway A1A.

Thanks to all the riders today. It was a fun and relaxing ride!

Take a walk...you're FREE to!

When I want to get away and think about things, or just have the freedom to not think about much of anything, I usually either take a walk or ride my Guzzi.

On this Veteran's Day holiday, I took a walk around my neighborhood and the surrounding area. It's a good chance to realize how lucky I am to have been born here in the USA, raised by good parents and having grown up with good siblings and friends and able to enjoy freedoms that many people around the world do not enjoy.

Thanks a Veteran today for what they have afforded to you and the ones you love. If not face to face then in your heart, your soul and your prayers.

Thanks to all you Veterans of our United States military for having served, protected and honored this nation.

CLICK PICS TO ENLARGE

Beautiful Sunday in FLA

Fall/winter has finally arrived in Florida! In the past week or so the humidity has subsided and temperatures in the daytime are in the mid 70's to low 80's with night time temps in the 50's to low 60's. Just perfect!

I got my haircut and think I asked the barber to take a little too much off! That's okay, it grows back quickly, even at my advanced age :=)

It's good flying weather and good convertible weather! Here are a couple pics of Cap'n Jim flying his 1946 Aeronca Champ over Casa Galardi on Saturday. It's a neat sounding but slow moving old bird. I took these two pics about 5 minutes apart...that's how long it took him to move about 40 feet hehe...just kidding Cap'n!

I fired up the 1986 Alfa Spider for a run up to Daytona Beach for a visit to Harbor Freight, the home of super cheap (and often junk) tools.

I took old hwy 92, which was THE way to Daytona before the interstate was built. A much more pleasant and relaxing route to be certain.

I got a few neat tools for next to nothing. Some nice long reach pliers, a magnetic pick up tool to get the nuts, bolts and washers I regularly fumble out of my hands into the bowels of the engine bay, a nice set of assorted hose clamps AND my personal favorite, a mechanics stethoscope! Yeah, now I can use this to more easily hear and track down those funky noises coming from my cars and bike!

On the way home I stopped by a landmark diner in Deland, Hampton's Drive Inn. They are known for their fried chicken, which is quite tasty!

Click pics to enlarge!

Buzzzzzzzzzzzzz!


Putt, putt, putt...

....putt, putt, putt...

Old hwy 92 heading toward Daytona Beach

House o' cheapo tools!

My keen new stash!

What a li'l beauty!

Mmmmmm, poultry! (on my finest dinnerware)

Compression testing

Tonight I spent a couple hours in the garage testing the compression of the engines in the two Alfas.

A compression test will tell you if your engine has good compression. An engine is essentially a self-powered air pump, so it needs good compression to run efficiently and start easily. Good compression is one sign of a healthy motor.

So anyway, both of these motors are a bit on the elderly side, with the Spider somewhere north of 100,000 miles and the 164L at just over 170,000 miles. I wanted to see how the compression was for each cylinder and make sure the compression values were all within 10% of each other.

Well I am happy to report that both motors are showing good compression values for all cylinders! The Spider motor is by design a lower compression motor so it naturally has lower compression values than the 164 engine. This is not bad, just different by design.

Here are a few pics I took. You can see the black engine control unit (computer) in the Spider under the rear parcel shelf. I needed to get at this so I could disconnect the fuse which powers the fuel pump (for testing purposes). Other pictures show both motors with all spark plugs removed and with the compression testing gauge in place (it gets screwed into each spark plug hole, one at a time, test is performed, then on to the next).

Also you can see a picture of one of the rather unique (and pricey) Golden Lodge spark plugs which the Alfa 164L uses. Notice that these plugs have 4 side electrodes instead of the single side electrode commonly found on automotive spark plugs. One nice thing about them is that you never have to adjust the gap between these electrodes and the center electrode. Neato!

Finally, you can see a pic of my scrawlings on a piece of paper as I recorded the compression values for each cylinder on the two motors.

What a fun night! I like "garage time" :=)