Rusted Out 1970 850 Spider Fix-Up

blown away by your skills and working it from...well not much...to what it is. First car was a 70 850 spyder. paid for after 2 years in happy RVN.
Time to get back to one.
Why thank you! I am not sure it is skill more than blundering through! If you do get one, beware the carburetor!
 
I don’t really have anything new to add today…but this thread was sitting at 999 replies for several days, and I could not take it anymore!
Hi Daniel,

I just checked and there is ONE - count them, ONE - other thread in the Rear-Engine Fiats section that even hit the three-digit post count. (That honor belongs to Ramona300's thread about a track car, currently at 213.)
Pretty good for a thread that started by asking if there might possibly be any interest in your project.
 
Hi Daniel,

I just checked and there is ONE - count them, ONE - other thread in the Rear-Engine Fiats section that even hit the three-digit post count. (That honor belongs to Ramona300's thread about a track car, currently at 213.)
Pretty good for a thread that started by asking if there might possibly be any interest in your project.
Wow. I do have to admit though, I too am a sucker for a build thread!
 
Alright brain trust…I need your input. First, that idle jet holder is working perfectly! Secondly, the idle still isn’t right. Car fires off, and idles but surges a fair amount. It revs up great, but let off the gas and it doesn’t idle, but just goes to zero rpm and dies. Start it back up, and it idles, but again surgey.
Running .040 jets, which is what the original car came with. Tweaking with the timing doesn’t make a difference. Dinking with the mixture screw doesn’t really help either, except to kill it if you screw it all the way in.
Spraying carb cleaner around the carb finds no vacuum leaks, except for the very minor Weber mandatory leak around the throttle shaft. Spraying the stuff does create a hair raising chance of fire though!
Now, this may be my problem, but I have my doubts did a compression check. 128 on the first three, but 88 on number 4. As you may recall, this is the cylinder that ate the washer. I adjusted the valves again, and that brought it up over 90, so a minor change.
So, is the weak cylinder causing my idle issues? Anything else y’all can think of to check?
 
Alright brain trust…I need your input. First, that idle jet holder is working perfectly! Secondly, the idle still isn’t right. Car fires off, and idles but surges a fair amount. It revs up great, but let off the gas and it doesn’t idle, but just goes to zero rpm and dies. Start it back up, and it idles, but again surgey.
Running .040 jets, which is what the original car came with. Tweaking with the timing doesn’t make a difference. Dinking with the mixture screw doesn’t really help either, except to kill it if you screw it all the way in.
Spraying carb cleaner around the carb finds no vacuum leaks, except for the very minor Weber mandatory leak around the throttle shaft. Spraying the stuff does create a hair raising chance of fire though!
Now, this may be my problem, but I have my doubts did a compression check. 128 on the first three, but 88 on number 4. As you may recall, this is the cylinder that ate the washer. I adjusted the valves again, and that brought it up over 90, so a minor change.
So, is the weak cylinder causing my idle issues? Anything else y’all can think of to check?


How about disconnecting the plug wire to the suspect cylinder and see if there is a change for the worse. If there is, you know that it was at least partially contributing to the operation of the engine. If no change, you know there is trouble.
 
How about disconnecting the plug wire to the suspect cylinder and see if there is a change for the worse. If there is, you know that it was at least partially contributing to the operation of the engine. If no change, you know there is trouble.
I like it. Will test tomorrow.
 
Alright brain trust…I need your input. First, that idle jet holder is working perfectly! Secondly, the idle still isn’t right. Car fires off, and idles but surges a fair amount. It revs up great, but let off the gas and it doesn’t idle, but just goes to zero rpm and dies. Start it back up, and it idles, but again surgey.
Running .040 jets, which is what the original car came with. Tweaking with the timing doesn’t make a difference. Dinking with the mixture screw doesn’t really help either, except to kill it if you screw it all the way in.
Spraying carb cleaner around the carb finds no vacuum leaks, except for the very minor Weber mandatory leak around the throttle shaft. Spraying the stuff does create a hair raising chance of fire though!
Now, this may be my problem, but I have my doubts did a compression check. 128 on the first three, but 88 on number 4. As you may recall, this is the cylinder that ate the washer. I adjusted the valves again, and that brought it up over 90, so a minor change.
So, is the weak cylinder causing my idle issues? Anything else y’all can think of to check?
At idle I wouldn’t expect a low cylinder to have an effect. There is so little load on the engine at idle it shouldn’t be an issue.

I would look for more crap in the carb myself.
 
Hey, it is warming up. Time to go work on the carb again!
F6162ADC-BA70-4582-B9ED-E37F56AB8E5D.png

NOPE!
 
Well, much to my disappointment, even WITH its perfectly machined jet holder, that DGS carb would not hold an idle. Further investigation shows an internal flooding issue that I could not resolve. So, other options? Hey, the DGEV carb looks like it is pretty close to fitting, and the Asian imports are cheap on eBay, so lets try one of those! BTW…if they say “or best offer” on an eBay ad, take advantage of it. We got 12 bucks knocked off of one.
It’s here! Let’s bolt it up!
08D89E30-383A-424D-A79A-4D4102173B61.jpeg

Uh oh. No problemo! I will just break out the CNC machine and whip up an adapter plate!
896702CD-5B9E-4558-8424-7608BCC44671.jpeg

Only the finest magic marker was used to make a precision CAD drawing before using my CNC 1.0 machine with my 4 inch cut off wheels.
This looks terrible. Let’s start drilling holes!
E67F9334-129D-4C70-992A-5C2B7B945EB8.jpeg

Now we are getting somewhere. I will use flat headed bolts to attach this to the intake, and then I will have to tap the holes and use bolts to mount the carb.
You didn’t think I wasn’t going to finish it to a SEMA standard? Wrong!
2858C66E-4C10-460B-851E-AD9CA5DF554C.jpeg
DB57D07B-91FE-4527-AB2A-F5B9BF00687D.jpeg

Perfect, and mounted to the manifold. Oh, that cut in the manifold is something I did when trying to mount another carb. It looks like crap, but there is no vacuum leak there.
And here it is with the carb mounted.
B0C5FA3D-ED38-4CFE-B3FE-5D019998D7DE.jpeg

Yeah, yeah, I know I need better vacuum line caps. But that does not look bad at all! Plenty of clearance for all the carb functions.

Time to start it.
That was its first start. Now don’t mock me for hitting the starter again after it fired. I was excited! The stupid car has never idled or zoom zoomed better since I had it. I have the choke hooked up, but I still have to created a throttle linkage. It came with several options, so I think I have a plan. My feet got too cold to work anymore today!

So far so good!
 
You might want to have cleaned up the manifold when you had it off, cut off the junk, loctite in set screws. Other wise sounds great. What is the idle jet size?

Can you post a link to the ebay listing?
 
What is the idle jet size?
I don’t know! When they clog, I will investigate then. Otherwise, I don’t want to jinx it by opening it up!
Can you post a link to the ebay listing?
Sure!
 
I don’t know! When they clog, I will investigate then. Otherwise, I don’t want to jinx it by opening it up!

Sure!
Ah yes, the old Chinese Holley Weber clone trick :)
 
Let’s build a throttle linkage!
Piece of threaded rod…
02D5C576-166A-4EE3-B2C8-6008E0431416.jpeg

I then proceeded to bend it with my MAPP gas torch and some welding gloves. Turned out pretty good!
F1D959EA-D46C-4A7E-9F58-9DF91C8DFCAF.jpeg

Drilled for cotter pins, some minor tweaking and taa-daa!
E1581511-1A57-45B6-B30A-0F0A7BE5FC79.jpeg

I made a short video of it in action in case you are curious.

Of course, testing it flooded the engine, so patience is necessary before I can start it.
 
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