Beta Spider 2000 engine rebuild/refurb

[mangocrazy]

In an attempt to break the logjam and get this thing moving, I took the Barry Waterhouse/Evo head to stanwood Engineering along with my GC Beta manifold (for DCOE Webers) and the set of triple valve spring I bought from Guy a while back. They will match up the manifold to the Beta Inlet tracts and generally strip, inspect and tweak as necessary. The valve that are fitted look in OK shape, but a stripdown will confirm or deny this. I have a full spare set of standard size inlet and exhaust valves (and valve guides to suit) that I bought new from Vick Auto in the USA, so these are backup if needed.

Once I've got the bottom end of the engine ready (a lot of assumptions in that brief and flippant statement) I'll take that and the rest of the top end (cams, camboxes, vernier camwheels etc. etc.) and they have agreed to do the final build. This gets round the problem of Guy not being prepared to work with a head modified by someone else, basically by giving the job to someone else.

All the dealings I've had with Stanwood have been absolutely A1, and indeed Guy uses them for a lot of his work. The GC Beta manifold is machined by them, and Guy personally recommended them to me. Ironic that Guy's perfectionist approach has nudged me towards giving Stanwood the work that I had intended Guy to do. I wonder how much other work he has passed up as a result of that approach.

I'm not knocking Guy here, in fact I'm slightly concerned that he may be painting himself into a corner by his insistence on not trusting anyone else's work. I logged into his site recently, and it really is a bit of a ghost town these days. Guy was bemoaning how times are hard and work is scarce, but I think the answer is in his own hands.

[mangocrazy]

Well, it's taken a while, but my engine is now entirely in the hands of Stanwood Engineering. They already had my cylinder head and inlet manifold, and on Friday of last week I took the short engine, flywheel, cams, camboxes and assorted valve train components, fasteners, gaskets (including the MLS head gasket sourced by Eric Weston) down to Bawtry and left it all with them. As everyone else has they have suffered major challenges due to Covid-19, including a complete shutdown for 2-3 months earlier in the year, but now they are back in harness and are absolutely deluged with work. Thankfully I have now progressed to an active slot in their scheduling, so I can only hope that 2020 will see my Spider engine completely reassembled; some 5 years after it suffered its terminal mishap at the hands of an incompetent French garagiste. No-one ever said this would be easy...

[WestonE]

Hi Graham

Perhaps send them some ARP M10 Head studs from Delta Parts https://deltaparts1.wordpress.com/deltaparts-shop/engine-parts-modified-section-2/ They need thread sealant going into the block to stop water creep but are stronger than any bolt solution and a fine match for the gasket. ARP's website has fitting instructions and them come with the right installation grease.

I hope the is helps.

Eric
PS I use them on the Montecarlo and the Spider VX.

[mangocrazy]

Hi Eric, I'll check those out. Guy has supplied me with a set of his M10 allen head bolts and heavy washers - will these not be good enough?

[WestonE]

Hi Graham

The parts from Guy will do the job nicely. Studs are better but you do not need them if you have the GC bolts for your application.

Eric

[mangocrazy]

Thanks Eric.

[mangocrazy]

I received a phone call from Stanwood a few days ago advising me that my engine had been completed, so on Friday I drove down to Bawtry and collected it, spurred on by the fact that South Yorkshire would be heading into 'Tier 3' Covid status at midnight of the same day. Foolishly I didn't take a camera with me to photograph the engine, as I was more preoccupied with how I would unload the engine at the other end of the journey. But all worked out fine in the end and the engine, sat on its home brewed wooden 'dolly' is now ensconced in the corner of the breakfast room adjacent to a radiator in the house in Stafford. Pictures will follow as soon as I can get back there.

The next step is to dress the engine with all the ancillaries - water rails, brackets, cam belt cover, starter motor, alternator, distributor etc. etc. Which reminds me - before I can refit the distributor it needs to go for a full refurbish - something I should really have organised while the engine was away being re-built. Ho hum...

[mangocrazy]

It's taken me this long to get back to where the Beta engine is being stored, what with lockdown etc. I had a brief chance today to take a few quick pics of the motor swathed in industrial grade clingfilm and mounted on my home-brewed trolley (for ease of movement). I particularly like the one of the gold powder-coated cam boxes seen through plastic. Reminds me vaguely of a Cocteau Twins album cover...

I'll leave it in the plastic wrap for now, but I need to start dressing the engine with all ancillaries, and will need to get the flywheel on soon as well. At some point it will need to leave the trolley and be returned to the engine stand which then means it takes up a lot more space. At present it's tucked away in the corner of the dining room, close to a radiator. Unfortunately this happy arrangement cannot last for long.

[WestonE]

That is a very nice trolley and I like the engine as well!

Cheers

Eric

[mangocrazy]

I've never liked the idea of an engine sitting on the floor on its sump pan. And it makes life much easier if the engine can be moved around the place easily. The castors are rated at 160kg each, so easily take the weight.

I'm currently working on a cunning plan to mount the engine to my engine stand using the 4 x M8 tappings arranged in a rectangle just above the sump on the back of the engine. GC used these mounting points for most of his engine builds, but it will need an adaptor plate made up before it will fit on my stand. So today I've been drilling a mixture of 8mm and 12mm holes in a piece of 12mm plate using my trusty Startrite Mercury pillar drill. Next thing is to make some stand offs from 25mm rod, but that can wait for another day.

[SPIT TC]

The soft gold cam covers are very attractive , I might have to copy those Graham .

[mangocrazy]

The soft gold cam covers are very attractive , I might have to copy those Graham .

Cheers, glad you agree I did think about a number of colours, but figured that gold would work with the blue of the engine bay and add a touch of class. It also works with the Hammerite silver of the block and the bare ali of the cylinder head.

[mangocrazy]

I've at long last removed the shrink wrap from the engine that's come back from Stanwood and teried to re-acquaint myself with what are my next steps. The first thing I intended to do was to re-fit the piece that provides timing marks to the OE camwheels, connects to the top water rail and provides mounting points for the cam belt guard. As soon as I came to fit this I realised that it was an impossibility as the engine nw has adjustable camwheels fitted and these are far bulkier depth-wise. I did a trial fit and it was clear that to be able to fit the piece it would need a standoff of approx 10mm, which would of course push the cam belt guard out by the same amount. Does the fitment of adjustable camwheels of necessity mean that the timing mark indicator can no longer be fitted (or will require serious surgery)?

[WestonE]

Hi Graham You might need to be the pointers straight before fitting it. Alternatively just cut them off so there is no touch on the cam wheels and use the raised casting on the cam carriers. I actually use a diamond file line on the cam inside the cam box with reference scores in the cam box under the cover.

NB this is more accurate and something I do building the engine up marking 100 110 and 120 reference positions using the GC approach for dialing cams in.

Eric

[mangocrazy]

I was wondering how you went about lining everything up when changing belts using adjustable camwheels, so thanks for the pointers (no pun intended...) I think I'll try and acquire a secondhand item and butcher that, as the one off my original engine has been plated and I'd rather not hack that about. I think cutting the pointers off makes most sense - remove any possibility of obstruction.

[mangocrazy]

Yesterday I was able to spend some time on the Beta engine but accomplished the square root of bugger all, although I have expanded my knowledge of bolt thread pitches and sizes. Peter had very kindly sent me a spare pressed steel bracket that contains the timing pointers to match up with the holes in the OE camwheels, and I had butchered that to my satisfaction such that pointy pieces of metal no longer interfered with the bolts on my adjustable camwheels. Verifying that fact was to be the sum total of my achievements for the day.

I was intending to fit the top and back water rails, camwheel bracket, engine stabiliser/water rail bracket, oil breather and make a stab at getting the distributor approximately timed up. I was thwarted in all these attempts, mainly due to the interconnected nature of most of the parts mentioned. To fit the top water rail I knew that I needed socket head allen bolts to fasten it to the head but had overlooked that fact that I needed a long ball head driver to get at the bolts that shelter under the rail. I could have tightened the bolts down with an allen key but really wanted to torque them up equally and accurately and for that I need the long ball head driver.

At the same time as trial fitting the top rail, I fitted the camwheel bracket as they bolt up together. The bottom fixing (bracket to cylinder head) has quite a shallow tapping in the head. I tried using an M6 x 16 allen bolt, but that bottomed out before clamping the bracket. I then tried the only other short bolt I had (M6 x 10) but that didn't have enough thread in play for my comfort. So, on to eBay to grumpily order some M6 x 14 stainless allen bolts.

I next turned my attention to the back rail, and started looking for the sheet of gasket paper that I know I have. After fruitless searching everywhere for half an hour I gave up, frustration levels rising.

I then decided to trial fit the engine stabiliser/water rail bracket and see how it all lined up with the water rails for a trial fit. I'd bought new stainless bolts for this, an M10 x 30 and an M12 x 35, both in coarse thread. The M10 screwed in nicely but the M12 bolt jammed after a couple of threads. I tried various M12 bolts I had in fine and coarse pitch and none would screw in further than a couple of threads. By now small amounts of steam were starting to escape from my ears. I later learned, after trying out various taps in my spare cylinder head, that the M12 bolt has a thread pitch of 1.25 (fine/extra fine), but the M10 bolt is a standard 1.5 coarse pitch thread. Good old Lancia... Hit eBay to order M12 x 1.25 x 35mm bolts.

Casting around desperately for something to achieve before I had to come home, I tried the oil breather, freshly returned from the vapour blaster and with a new right angle rubber hose. I'd even had the spring clips electroless nickel plated. Except that no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get the spring clips to fit around the tube. I can only assume that the 'new' tube has a thicker cross-section than the tired old one. After grovelling around on the floor for the sixth or seventh trying to find the escaped spring clip I gave up and (eBay again) ordered some double ear Oetiker clamps of the right size. Completely flattened by now, I didn't even attempt to time up the distributor...

Not one of my more successful days...

[WestonE]

I can relate to days like that. You have solved multiple problems so when you revisit it is strangely easy. I have built up kits of bolts to have them to hand so now I just waste loads of time choosing bolts and maintaining the stock!

Plating is fantastic for creating good bolts from large buckets of old bolts. BUT you have to sort out all hose shiny bolts into some form of order and storage which makes watching paint dry seem exciting.

Eric   

[mangocrazy]

Thanks Eric. I went through the exercise of sorting out my collection of hex head bolts/nuts and Allen bolts into M4/M5/M6/M8/M10/M12 classifications a while back. I think I now need subdivisions for fine and extra fine. I could probably cover a small wall with bins with the variations I have if I had the space.

Graham

[mangocrazy]

Went back for another try today and experienced further setbacks, the main one being the rear water rail efusing to line up with the multi-functon bracket that bolts into the head by cylinder 4. It's not even as if it's close - the holes in the back rail bracket are 10-15mm distant from those on the main bracket and will not be persuaded to get any closer. I have two back rails and sent the least corroded one off for electroless nickel plating some while back. This is the one that refuses to fit. I'll dig out the other water rail and try that, but is anyone aware of any variation in these parts between models/years? The back water rail was fixed to the water pump housing but not tightened up fully, allowing the rail to move within reason.

In other news the universal oil filter block adaptor/take off point for an oil cooler arrived today from Torques UK, and it's bang on. Just what was needed. Very impressed with their knowledge and prompt service.

Here's the link to the bits I ordered:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Torques-Universal-Oil-Sandwich-Plate-Kit-In-Black-AN-10-JIC-10-3-4-UNF-M20x1-5/360783211905

And as I won't be fitting an oil cooler until the engine is reunited with the body, I ordered a pair of blanking caps:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AN-10-AN10-AN-10-7-8-UNF-End-Cap-With-Viton-O-ring-Seal-In-Stealth-Black/173545902844

[Neil-yaj396]

The water rail thing happened with my previous 1300 Coupe when I changed the water pump. All done in situ but I removed the flywheel end bolt to make fitting to the pump easier. Once the new pump was fitted I was never able to refit that bolt, like yours it was a good 10mm out.