Ventilation slots and steering efforts

["John Hertzman" <johnhertzman@domain.elided>]

'Nardo asks "Okay, I'm seen plenty of theories on the GTV6 tea tray. So now I
want to know why those louvres are for on the back pillars. For years I
thought they provided air-flow through the passenger compartment since the
fiber board above the back deck area have holes, but when I replaced a louvre
recently I found NO opening in the body panel!! So what gives?"

What gives is that somebody who is smarter than the beancounters at Arese
improved Bernie's car, no doubt to correct its aerodynamics to allow Texas
speeds. My Carolina GTV 6 has an original factory slot roughly 6" long by 5/8"
deep behind a flange below the rain gutter along the top rear edge of the area
covered by the decorative plastic; it is wide enough for me to touch fingers
with my other hand inside the car. If Bernie wants better ventilation he
should be able to restore the opening with a Dremel tool in half an hour or
so, but might have to reconcile himself to the speeds reachable by unimproved
cars in the 49 dwarf states.

Modelle writes "Yesterday I had the opportunity to drive a 74 GTV, recently
restored. The car's steering was much easier than my spider's and I was
wondering if anyone on the list had experience with what could cause
resistance in the steering mechanicals. The spider has been lowered, W & D
springs, HD sway bars, konis with 195-70 tires, properly pressured.  I suspect
the tie-rods are on their way south, but tie-rod binding doesn't seem to make
much sense. The steering box has been oiled; all other aspects of the
suspension are stock. - - Is the steering ratio different for the spiders and
the GTV's? My girlfriend says the spider drives like a truck."

He does not say whether the '74 GT Veloce was merely restored to an improved
state, or all the way to its deprived as-built state. My only experience with
originally identical Alfas which had markedly different steering efforts was
with two 1972 Berlinas; the one which steered like a truck had better tires
than the 165-14 Pirellis mine wore. According to tables 99 through 104 in the
2000 GT Veloce/Spider Veloce parts book there are no differences whatsoever in
the steering gear of the two cars. As with Bernie's missing ventilation slots,
improvements involve tradeoffs, and a tradeoff, rather than a mechanical
defect, may account for the heavy steering of his improved Spider.

Enjoy yours,

John H.
--
to be removed from alfa, see /bin/digest-subs.cgi
or email "unsubscribe alfa" to majordomo@domain.elided