| Author | Message | ||
| Edward Gault (Irfgt)
|
This string will probably assist or inspire the newcommers to the overhaul process. | ||
| Herbert E. Gault (Irfgt)
|
It's ALIVE, It's Alive!!!! At 4:30 P.M. today it turned over, the oil pressure came up and after the fuel filter filled and the fuel distributor purged the air out it fired off. Only the idle speed needed to be adjusted. Nothing fell out, dripped, knocked, or rattled. As far as I can tell it should run well and give dependable service for years to come. I have yet to add up the receipts but I will post the expenses as soon as I get a total. I did not keep a time log but it did not take as long as one might think. I started on Feb. 23 and worked on weekends and some after work. It could have been done faster but there was a delay of one week on the heads but considering the price of the machine work on the heads it was worth the wait. Anyway if anyone has any questions feel free to E-mail me personally or ask on this site for all to hear. Keep one thing in mind that I do this as a profession, and am equipped to handle such a project and have all the tools necessary. Even though I have never done a Ferrari before I have always said that a Ferrari is just a car and all the same principals that make a Yugo work act on a Ferrari the same way. It is just packaged a little nicer. One thing I will note is that there is becoming a serious shortage of parts for these cars and I am concearned about the future of the 308-328 series as Ferrari and the Dealers seem to have ruled them as obsolete and do not seem to care if you find parts or not. In the future we may have to shell out some big bucks for someone to reproduce parts to keep these babies on the road. | ||
| Ben Lobenstein 90 TR (Benjet)
|
all I can add... SWEET! | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
Man, I'm jealous! Bravo! | ||
| BretM (Bretm)
|
It is impressive looking. Good work. | ||
| Larry (Larry)
|
nice!!! | ||
| Herbert E. Gault (Irfgt)
|
This picture was at 9:00 P.M. Saturday night after 2 hotdogs, a Sirloin steak, and a Macanudo.  | ||
| Herbert E. Gault (Irfgt)
|
The first picture was taken at 11 A.M Saturday morning. This picture was at 12:00 noon.  | ||
| Herbert E. Gault (Irfgt)
|
Weekend update on the overhaul progress  | ||
| Lamont (Lamont)
|
If you have any problems with the red paint on the heads try powder coating. I haven't had any peeling or cracking and it keeps the super shine. | ||
| Larry (Larry)
|
looks good! thanks for the photo update. | ||
| Herbert E. Gault (Irfgt)
|
Here is the latest update on the progress on my overhaul. I guess a picture says it all. I hope to have the heads ready this week  | ||
| ANGELO ALBANESE (Lbanez)
|
for those of you wishing to paint aluminum,and want the paint to stick, use ZINC CHROMATE PRIMER, this is the best primer to make the paint stick, this is yellow in color and only a very thin coat is required,this stuff runs like water, this is what they use in the aircraft industry,and good body shops, it's pricey, but works great....just my two cents.....Ang | ||
| carlos amato |
Just wanted to remind everyone that we are here to discuss Ferrari related issues, and in this case 308 early injected cars high oil consumption. Let's keep it clean. Thanks irfgt for your great input. | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
I'm weary of the use of just plain primer on aluminum. The covers on my car are painted wrinkle-black but are peeling off very easily. Krylon is excellent paint though, I use it with success, but yes there are etching primers for aluminum. The bead-blasting improves adhesion and with the special primer should never come off. I'm returning my covers to the original look but painted with silver (easier to keep clean). | ||
| Anonymous |
I remembered it because of the seat pattern you changed. It was on ebay January 19th. You seem to be the son of a •••••. Poor •••••••••••• that I found out! I am probably not the only one who saw it, so I rec to keep the screaming at a low level. | ||
| Anonymous |
Thanks for the info! | ||
| Paul308QV |
Thanks. I may be using my term 'throttle body' a little loosely. I may do this painting next Winter. It appears that I would need to take the intake manifold(s) off to get the housing unbolted. Take care. | ||
| irfgt
|
Now that is taken care of, I glass bead blasted the aluminum housings to hold the paint and used Krylon primer and paint. The actual throttle body section that the throttle cable attaches to was left natural and I do not recommend painting it. | ||
| irfgt
|
To anonymous: I have never attempted to sell my vehicle on EBAY nor anywhere else and I resent the implication and I challenge you to identify yourself you sorry son of a •••••. I also challenge you to prove your accusation. | ||
| Anonymous |
irfgt: Is this the one you tried to sell on ebay as "perfect condition"? | ||
| Paul Prideaux (Paul308qv)
|
Here is the other one showing the tired throttle body needing paint.  | ||
| Paul Prideaux (Paul308qv)
|
OK, let's try the image again....  | ||
| Paul 84 308QV
|
I want to repaint my throttle body red but I know how hard it is to get paint to stick to aluminum. Did you glass-bead or somehow etch your aluminum before spraying? What type of paint did you use? I am going to try to attach an image below that shows my engine when I was in the final stages of doing the belts, tensioner bearings and valve shims. This will be my first attempt to add images so let's see how it goes. \image | ||
| irfgt
|
I added some color to it as I think the standard plain aluminum looks sort of bland. I do not intend to show the car as I had rather show off the car. The same with the seats. I reversed the herringbone pattern when we did the new leather as I feel the original pattern looks like it is going backward and I think my design looks better. It's all in fun and whatever you feel makes you happy is what you should strive for. You can check out the interior and exterior of the car on the owners car heading. | ||
| Paul 84 308QV
|
WOW, how impressive ! You should be very proud of your ability. I just did a timing belt replacement and valve adjustment to my 308QV last month and I have to admit that I enjoyed the process. It blows people away when you tell them that you do this stuff yourself. Your effort is so much greater, however. I may do an engine out-of-car service someday but it will probably be years before it is necessary. It seems you have painted your belt covers and valve covers red. Is this a stock situation or are you stepping out to show your own style? I like the look. | ||
| irfgt
|
Well the engine is apart and good news! The pistons are not cracked and in fact seem to be like new.It took all day to clean everything up and prepare the parts for reassembly. It is good that I went ahead and took everything apart as one of the belt drive sprocket bearings was noisey and the seals behind the sprockets were hard and brittle. I am amazed that they did not leak. A bad sprocket bearing would be hard to diagnose with the engine running but would be catastropic if one should fail. The gaskets are glued to all the housings with the strongest glue known to man. It took hours to clean especially the rear housing between the clutch and engine. To sum it up it appears that the valve seals were the cause of my high oil consumption. Massive amounts of oil must be pumped into the cylinder heads for that much oil to get past the broken seals. I have no explanation for the broken pistons in my spare engine which I am enclosing a picture of. It is now time to order parts since I now know where I stand. I am going to replace the valve guides just to be sure even though the ones in the heads seem tight by normal standards. This has turned into a very time consuming and expensive set of simple valve seals. I also have included a picture of the transmission if anyone has never seen one out of the car, and some pictures of the detail work that will go back on the engine.     | ||
| larry dunn
|
irfgt; great stuff! thanks so much for the update and photo's.....looking forward to news at 11. | ||
| irfgt
|
I wish that was true about the lower end but I am going to add some pictures this evening of some cracked pistons that were removed from another engine with no apparent reason for the failure. I am hoping the pistons in the pictured engine are ok. Update at 11. | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
That is a serious bit of engineering there! You could probably lift the car with that! From what I've heard, the bottom-ends are bomb-proof, its the top ends that wear out. | ||
| irfgt
|
      I had to have a pulling plate fabricated to pull the cylinder head from the stuck studs without damaging it. It worked like a charm. After removing the heads I removed the two intake valves that had the oil puddling and the seal felt tight around the valve and the guides were OK also. After being puzzled for a few minutes I removed the valve seals and discovered that the sides were cracked causing oil to be pulled in from the sides of the seal. This is probably my cause of oil consumption but having gone this far I intend to do the rings also. There is absolutely no wear on the cylinders and if the pistons are not cracked it will save me four nights lodging at Indy. | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
'75 GT4's never had cats. Just the air-injection system to clean up exhaust. | ||
| irfgt
|
If you are using quite a bit of oil you still may not get engine smoking due to the operation of the catalytic converter. When the cat. heats up it will burn the oil before it exits the muffler. If you remove the cats I will bet you get smoke on a car that uses more than a quart per thousand. | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
Even with my bad seals, I still didn't loose much oil. I'd say about 1.5 litres over 2000 miles. That would be about 1.6 qt's. | ||
| carlos amato |
Thank you for contributing with your stories. The idea is to continue the forum until I can gather enough information and, with some I got from other sources, write an article for Sempre Ferrari, the FCA Southwest Region newsletter, or simply continue it here for future 308 buyer's reference. What prompted me to do this was the fact that I keep running into people that have purchased these cars and are "surprised" after the fact with problems associated with high oil consumption. I was advised of this issue prior to buying my car (an 1980 308 GTSi) which I purchased with 17,000 miles, and after running a VIN check with Dick Merrit at DOT and finding out that the car had not been been recalled and or the engine replaced. (At the time Merrit kept records of all engine replacement recalls for these cars). At 27,000 miles, the car consumes about 1 quart every 600 miles and does not smoke. The engine has never been rebuilt. | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
I'm in the process of pulling the motor from my car. I started in middle December and all that is left is to remove the clutch/bellhousing and the driveshafts. I've only worked on it during the weekends. During the week, the parts that I removed I clean at work (during coffee breaks). I usually don't feel like working on the car during the week because I work as a mechanic, so by the end of the day, I'm tired of burying my arms in grease. Yes, my intake valves have dark oily goo on them - seals for sure! | ||
| irfgt
|
My engine was using a quart every 400 miles and smoking badly at times and none at others. As I stated I am removing the engine at this time to explore the problem and I removed the intake manifold to help with clearance and I noticed that on two of the intake valves on the front bank that happened to be closed, oil had puddled on the back side of the valve. I don't mean a little oil but probably an ounce or so. This means that I at least have valve seals completely gone. The compression is perfect and there is no blow by from the crankcase vent so my problem may only be seals but since I have no history on my car I fully intend to go the whole rebuild route since I plan to drive it almost daily. Also pulling the engine is a pretty lengthy process and I only intend to do it once. My owners manual says a quart per 400 miles is normal but I say B.S. to that. There is no way an engine can run properly with that amount of consumption. No engine should use more than a quart per 1000 miles. | ||
| '75 308 GT4 (Peter)
|
Was it just this year of production that had bad pistons? | ||
| larry dunn
|
irfgt; how many qts. per miles were you using? thanks larry | ||
| irfgt
|
From what I have been able to gather, Some of the engines were replaced with new engines and the old engines were sent back to the factory and refurbished and sent back out to replace other engines with excess oil consumption. As I understand the oil consumption was caused by the piston design with cracking between the ring grooves and not from valve guides or seals. I recently took apart a 308 engine from an 82 model with 36000 miles and four of the pistons were cracked with no apparent reason for it to have happened. I am in the process of rebuilding my own 82 308 and as soon as I get the pistons out I will advise as to what I find. It also has high oil consumption and smoking. | ||
| mn mark |
I know nothing more than what I read over on the expensivecar.com (available in the links to the left under 'research'). I read these motors did use a lot of oil, and apparantly there were some motors recalled and replaced. My '82 308GTSi wasn't one of those. The owners manual states that normal oil use is up to one quart per 600 miles, unless my BSE (mad cow disease) is acting up. | ||
| carlos_amato |
I am looking for information regarding engine problems related to 2 valve injected 308's, specifically excessive oil consumption and engine replacements for an article. Any stories and or help will be greatly appreciated. |