Improving the Berlina (pt. 2)

[Scott Fisher <sfisher71@domain.elided>]

So after working all day on the Berlina's seats, I
offered the keys to Kim, who hadn't yet driven it.

She released the lever... and the seat wouldn't budge.
 I tried it.  It still wouldn't budge.  We took
another car to go buy our dinner makings, but I was
grumpy.

Sunday was a slow day -- doughnuts for the birthday
sleepover, the guests departed, and I headed down to
look at the Berlina's seats.  It seemed simple: we'd
drilled a hole through the 1/8" plate welded to the
Berlina's floor, and the resulting hole lined up the
bolt about 1/4" too far forward for it to line up with
the seat track.

The easy way, it appeared, would be for me to loosen
the two inboard mounts, rock the seat up toward the
center of the car, and relieve the hole in the seat
track with the carbide cutting tip of my Dremel.

Thirty minutes of frustration and injury later, it
occurred to me that once again, the easy way wasn't. 
Among other things, it was nearly impossible to get
the seat slide to move in the track -- something had
gotten wedged.  So in seconds I had the inboard bolts
out and the seat was inverted on a protective layer of
cardboard (a folded-up shipping crate) in my driveway.
 Note to self: whenever you find yourself saying
"well, the EASY way would appear to be to...", imagine
a submarine dive klaxon going off, because you are
about to shoot yourself in the foot.

Once inverted, the cause of the binding in the seat
track was obvious.  Brief theory of ops for Berlina
seats: the seat slides forward and backward on a pair
of seat rails, which have an upper and a lower piece. 
The upper piece (fixed to the seat) includes a
spring-loaded lever that serves to latch the seat in
place; the lower piece (bolted to the floor) has teeth
that the spring-loaded lever fits into.  For the seat
to slide, the upper and lower pieces have to be
aligned.

And there was the problem.  At some time in the past
(perhaps in the accident that totaled the car these
seats came out of?), the upper outboard piece on the
driver's seat acquired a slight bend -- just a few
degrees, but enough to cause it to bind completely at
one point in the seat's travel.

Appropriate application of gentle but firm leverage
straightened it out perfectly.  I added some
wheel-bearing grease to the seat tracks, reinstalled
it, and the track went in perfectly.  The Dremel with
its carbide tip made short work of enlarging the hole,
and it allowed me to slip the seat in easily.  All
four bolts in place, I reached in to grab the seat
adjustment lever, and the seat slides easily back and
forth on perfectly aligned, well-greased tracks.

We drove the Berlina that night to the Aladdin theater
in Portland, Jeff, Kim and I, to see Kate Rusby,
appearing with the Irish band Altan.  The Berlina
continues to amaze me with its combination of
ordinariness and Alfaness.  On the freeway, just
keeping up with traffic, it's as quiet and comfortable
as the three-year-old Honda Civic that Jeff's wife
drives.  Then we got to the offramp and I decided I
needed to get around the traffic in the rightmost of
the two right-turn lanes, and suddenly it's Fangio at
the Nurburgring -- drop down a gear, give it the boot,
and from 4000 to 6000 RPM in second gear takes the
blink of an eye and all the cars that were beside us
are now just points of light in the mirror.

Incredible car.  Next weekend: replace the rear seats,
then run the AROO Mini-Rally on Sunday with my
daughter Bo navigating.  

--Scott Fisher
  Tualatin, Oregon
.
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