Lancia Beta Forum

Perhaps I missed this but who's are the two VXs in Auto Italia at the moment. Both Northern Ireland I gather.

They are indeed in Northern Ireland, UK. Both where restored from a shell up wards and via the help of Betaboyz and friends in Italy feature as many new parts as obtainable over a 2 year period. The money spent was crazy but the goal was to make as new or where possible better. Every nut and bolt are marine grade stainless steel and as many original OE parts used, the suspension bushes took 3 months to find!
Later in the year Autoitalia plan to do an article on a RHD 1977 Gamma Berlina which is new / unreg plus a 99' Kappa Coupe 20V Turbo. I hope the two VX's featured by Autoitalia will help the values and desirability of this wonderful car, as is the whole Beta range. Patrick

I take it they're the ones you mentioned a couple of years ago then? Two very handsome cars now.

NB On stainless bolts, marine grade is usually taken to be 316 or A4. Standard A4-70 bolts are not suitable for high tensile applications while A4-80 is pretty hard to get hold of - please be careful. Oh and if you found M14 A4 bolts for the subframe you did well!

Are you planning to bring either to England ? I suspect John could find you a space at the NEC if not this year then next!

Thanks for the reply and advice - much appreciated. I would be delighted to bring one to the NEC if it helped the club plus it would be nice to meet other Beta owners. It's rather lonely over here in Northern Ireland, not aware of any other Betas in the country. I have worked in the Marine industry for 20 years so fortunately I have a brilliant supplier of Stainless fasteners and fixings. Regarding the subframe bolts and suspension they were newly sourced but high tensel steel with copper grease in the treads to prevent rusting and the heads covered in anti stone chip, then Dynax. My reference to Stainless Marine grade refers to the fasteners, fixings, screws, bolts, hose clips so apologies if the reference in the previous email wasn't clear enough. Your advice is gratefully received.

The cars were mentioned a couple of years ago but the Red one appeared locally as well. The Silver one was in good general condition, the Greg one turned out to be completely rotten (the joys of ebay) but the third red one was really good. I have a really good 2.0 VX engine including the super charger being rebuilt from the bottom up - if you know anyone is looking for one let me know.

Mark at Betaboyz as you can guess was brilliant!

As an aside Pilkington Glass Classic division made me two brand new screens in the correct bronze tint. It took 10 weeks but the quality was great.

Best wishes,

Patrick

Hi Patrick,

Good to hear you have restored a couple of great cars! Are you looking to sell the VX engine complete? I would be interested in the inlet manifold and blower if ever you wanted to sell it,

Thanks Ian

Dear Ian,

Would prefer to sell the engine complete, it was stripped down completely, pistons, liners etc all as new etc and rebuilt with the correct head gaskets etc. I do have a spare inlet manifold but not a supercharger - sorry.

Cheers,

Patrick

Hi Patrick,

Thanks for the reply, you are probably right to keep the whole engine together. I'll let you know if I need an inlet manifold,

Thanks

Ian


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Are both the VXs for sale now with Hollybrook Sports Cars?

I saw the advert on Pistonheads........but I’m not 100% sure, as the silver one seems very similar to a car Hollybook were selling a few months ago, at an advertised price of £23,000 ???

To me it seems a lot of effort to go to to then sell them.

Especially as it is probably unlikely that the sale price would be greater than the restoration costs.........?

I do find it odd that given the  documented attention to detail that the silver car doesn't have black sills.
The steering wheel on the red one looks odd I'm guessing it was an available accessory when new as I've seen one before on eBay.

Good evening fellow Beta VX owners and I have only had time to catch up on the discussion / chat on my two restored VX's. I am more than happy to answer the queries raised:-

1) Silver car - sill colour - only reason for keeping in body colour is it shows clearly the joints and that it's all metal at the bottom. For the owner that wishes for it to be painted in black this can be done. Often a load of black paint / stone chip / waxyol on the sills is just there to hide horrors.

2) Red Steering Wheel - this is a standard wheel which has been restitched in new leather, it is slightly thicker and softer to the feel. There is a similar one available for the Silver car. The Centre was new old stock from Italy.

3) Prices - I find it strange to have values queried by fellow Beta owners in terms of thinking they are over priced? Why would those that appreciate the car so much think last year the Silver one was over priced? Have you seen the Price of GTV 6's recently and having restored a couple of these and owned 7 in my humble opinion the Beta is in a completely different class of car. I was offered £22,000 for it at the time but when it came to it I couldn't let it go. Both have been fully documented / photographed and all parts have the invoices.

I hope for all Beta owners they sell for an extremely positive price as then it might motivate more to restore them as the cost doesn't mean it isn't worth it. I am sure you saw recently a Peugeot 205 GTi sell for £39,000.
 
4) Why Sell.

Simply I have too many classics and am just starting a third VX and an 1976 Alfa Spider, so I have four classics for sale, I need two away. I will hopefully keep one of the VX's if one sells, there is an unreg / new Fiat Coupe and an Alfa F12 Van. My expectation is the F12 and Fiat Coupe will sell quickly due to the level of enquiries in the first 24 hours.

You might think my endeavours are in vain to prompt Betas and get their values up where their contemporaries are today but that's just me.

Please feel free to ask any more questions.

Very Best wishes,

Patrick

The steering wheel centre has me curious! It's obviously OE but I've never come across that style on any other coupe/hpe.

It was bought in its original lancia packaging from a Spanish Lancia Dealer from the 1960's to the 1990's and today is just a service agent. If you want more pictures I will send them. The Centre hole and horn push etc is all standard fit.

Is it possible it was made for the seat beta coupé?

Can't confirm definitely either way other than the packaging, part number and labelling was all in Italian.

I, for one, feel the prices of Lancias in general and the Beta Volumex in particular, have been far lower than they should be, when compared to certain other cars from the same era.

It is a very welcome sign if values are finally on the increase - this is long overdue.

The two cars in question are both stunning. Take no notice of pedantic pickers such as myself and Alan (sorry Alan!). We obviously don’t get out enough ;)

They are a tremendous labour of love and deserve to reach whatever asking price you have in mind - I sincerely hope they do! It will only bode well for other VX owners :)

So.....you have a 3rd VX......do you breed VXs in Northern Ireland :o

 ;D If I ever finish mine it will be easy to pick on as I'm not doing perfect or original.

As another VX saved and on the road.......it will be perfect ;D

It will definitely not be perfect for a start my recaros have leather backs where someone in the past nicked the fabric to repair the bolsters........

Thanks for the recent positive comments, they are very much appreciated! I feel so passionately that all Betas are so under rated. I had to drive the Silver one today for a few miles to get petrol in it for a collector to view. Its is such a modern feeling car and what impresses so much is the engineering detial hidden behind the the trim.

I do have some spare trim parts that I am very happy to donate to fellow enthusiasts, Rossocorsa can you let me know exactly what you need for your seat backs and I can see if I can help.

Cheers,

Patrick
 parts

Thanks Patrick

I have actually have plenty of new original fabric that I could get the seats reupholstered with but tbh the backs have been done so well in dark blue leather that as the car isn't all that original and money isn't abundant I'm inclined to leave them as is.

No bother, just thought I would offer and I wasn't looking any money for them.

Sounds nice with the blue leather and hope to see photos sometime.

Cheers,

Patrick

I was just thinking about the cost to get an upholsterer to do the job, the seats are in my spare bedroom so I'll take a pic.

Hi Patrick

Could I ask you a question......?

Did you get your door cards re-trimmed or re-covered? I am plodding through restoring my Coupe VX and - surprise - the backing on both my door cards has warped and partially collapsed. Also, the black vinyl has damage to the lower corners......

I would be very interested to hear if you restored yours - or were they in good condition and did not require any work?

Thanks!

The seat backs, as you can see my memory is failing I think it is actually dark grey vinyl but nicely done so I'm unsure that is worth the effort to re do them. The rest of the seats are fairly good.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/z8J0GD0rIUo9BvN13

https://photos.app.goo.gl/2QBe5rxD9LIh9w1h2

Good evening and thanks for the messages.

Regarding the door trims they were very good on the Silver car and pretty good on the Red car. As such the Silver one didn't need much, just one corner and I got good quality black vinyl trim material cut a small piece to size and used automotive trim glue to hold it place. Then the tricky bit using a burner to heat plastic covering on electrical connections flashed the flame over the join which mouldering it together - when I say carefully I mean carefully and resisted the temptation to over do it. It's about 90% there and as it is at the bottom of the door and looking for it you won't notice it.

On the Red car I got 2 mm pvc sheeting and used it to as a backing. Again automotive glue (not the spray stuff) it's in a tin and is seriously stringy, apply both services and then set weights on it for 24 hours. In places where the card had start to crumble I cut it very carefully and dropped in a new bit. The pvc board then held it all to together. Hope that helps!

The pics of the seats look great with the alternative backing, more impressive in the bases being as new.

Cheers,

Patrick

The bases on my seats aren't quite perfect but I did find some parts of VX seats on eBay a while back and managed to replace one bolster cover from that. They are quite easy to take apart. I do have several metres of new cloth stashed but the problem with that is that the fabric fades quite badly so the new stuff looks really grey/black whereas the old is sort of dark grey/washed out grey-blue.

Thanks Patrick. Excellent information. Your re-working of the red car’s door cards sounds ingenious! I am resolved now to get on and have a go, using that method.

I have been procrastinating up to now, as I couldn’t see a suitable solution. Thank you!

Hi

I had a similar issue and used a solution of PVA and water to soak the area, then used some fabric which was originally intended as frost cover for plants, i.e. Soft and allows liquid between the weave and used it as you would fibre glassing, this left a hardened area but was not overly bulky and the soft fabric allowed for fitting to the contours. I guess the PVC gives it a waterproof layer as well if put on the door side.

Peter

Hi Peter,

That is a clever idea as well! Excellent.

Patrick

not used it on the door panels but sugru in black is good for repairing small cracks etc in the rear spoiler and similar, I don't know how durable it is but it looks the part. It's not very cheap unless on offer as each sachet contains only a small piece. It might repair small imperfections in the interior but I'm not sure if you could get the finish shiny enough.

https://sugru.com/buy?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8Niv257Q1gIV15MbCh0EogWXEAAYAiAAEgKYZPD_BwE#all

sometimes it's on a good offer on amazon, tbh I think it's over priced normally but I don't know of an alternative.

 

Hope you guys have seen the Mailbox in this month's Auto Italia. If you make it over here, Patrick, you'll have to let me know and we'll get the two Strattons together! The red and the black would look fantastic together. H

Good evening H, thank you for making contact and I was chuffed to read your letter to Autoitalia and see the pictures of you Black Stratton Beta VX! It looks fantastic,  the providence, its history being yours from new is increditable. It would be brilliant to get a picture of both together and I do plan to get over next year. I have 5 cars for sale at the moment with the plan to sell one of the VX's. However I am anticipating the standard Silver car will go first as was less to rebuild to new. That probably sounds strange but when I stripped the Silver engine the bottom end was close to new. The Red car showed sign of wear so the bottom end and top end where rebuilt. I had a deposit on the Red car but the guy ended up messing me about. Have a couple of collectors viewing later in the week. I keep saying it but the Beta in my humble opinion is hugely underrated. How can a car built 34 years ago drive like new! Similarly the Gamma, how can these fabulous cars be so under valued! Thankfully there are a few of us who get! Best wishes, Patrick