General 16V Turbo or 20V Turbo Diesel???

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General 16V Turbo or 20V Turbo Diesel???

Liquid Knight

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I am logistics away from collecting my next car.

A low mileage red 16V Turbo Coupe'.

Apart from the colour and needing a few jobs I'm going to love it but the car was described as a "donor" and I have rescued it from becoming a Punto GT transplant victim.

Now I have a few options.

1/ Restore the car to her former glory as 16V Turbo's are the rarest of the breed, low mileage, low owners car with a bit of history and mostly cosmetic work required for the M.O.T

2/ Make the most of the engine and use the Coupe for track days.

3/ Use the 16V turbo engine to build the car Fiat should have and convert my Bravo 1.8 HLX.

If I choose option three I'll have a rolling shell ready for something interesting.

A 2.4 20V JTD conversion could be a possibility. I've seen diesel Coupe's before and they have always been four cylinder engines. There's a cheap Alfa 156 near by with a brilliant (for a diesel) engine but the body had been beaten up a bit.

With the Stilo Abarth block being used to up the capacity of the 20V Turbo Coupe' shouldn't the JTD 2.4 be a fairly straight forward swap?

With a few Brera bits and a chip 250bhp is easy for the lump and that's before...



...redneck nitrous is added. :devil:

250bhp+ Fiat Coupe' that can run on chip fat?

How hard can it be?
 
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With the Alfa GT and Brera available with the JTD engines anyway by the time I've repaired the Coupe and prepared the engine and parts for the conversion I may as well have bought one of those in the first place.

I prefer the way the 16V engine delivers power and with the reduced weight up front compared to the 20V I prefer the way the 16V handles. Knowing what the engines are capable of it will be hard not to get "ye olde tuning forke" out.

Here's the fail list...

MOT history of this vehicle

Test date 20 September 2014
Test Result Fail
Odometer reading 75,687 miles
MOT test number 8352 2316 4280

Reason(s) for failure

Offside Stop lamp not working (1.2.1b)

Nearside rear parking brake recording little or no effort (3.7.B.6a)

Offside Front Suspension component mounting prescribed area is excessively corroded (2.4.A.3)

Nearside front brake binding (3.7.B.1)

Offside front brake binding (3.7.B.1)

Parking brake: efficiency below requirements (3.7.B.7)


Advisory notice item(s)

Nearside Front Lower Suspension arm has slight play in a ball joint (2.4.G.2)

Offside Front Lower Suspension arm has slight play in a ball joint (2.4.G.2)

Oil leak

front brake discs rusty

underside of vehicle and outer sills starting to corrode.

...from eighteen months ago. I can't imagine sitting about has done any good.

Here are the photo's I have been sent (haven't seen the car yet but put a deposit down as soon as I could)

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Right on the project donor boarder line.

Either way I'll have my work cut out for me. MOT'd 16V Coupe's are getting good money these days but like all of my cars this is not a profit making exercise.
 
That MOT list isn't half bad. Discs, pads, shoes, cable, bulb and fuse check, lower ball joints and maybe a weekends worth of welding. :D

Typical red Fiat faded to pink in places. Will a colour change ruin the car? I've never been a fan of red cars and she needs a respray anyway.
 
My racing colours are Violet and Yellow but you can not put yellow paint on a red car. Even with a dozen coats of maxibase it'll still look orange. As she's red on the log book it will have to be a shade of red.

With the Bangle angles I think a candy or mild flip red would look nice...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2K-Sprayd...hash=item487352fd88:m:m8-VR_KA2H8uDWzQD4GqC2g

...but that would be too showy for an otherwise standard car.
 
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I can get Porsche colours mixed by a mate who works at the dealership outside Cambridge. I've seen a few Coupe's in Ferrari Rosso but I like the kind of blood orange Guards Red from the 996 onward...

porsche-996-gt3-club-sport.jpg


...but this forum member's Coupe looks resplendent in this...

front-high.jpg


...shade. No faffing about original restoration must be the original colour otherwise it's a custom project and I may as well do more to the car. That's another catch twenty two.
 
I think that's the right code. I haven't seen the car yet. Popping over tomorrow but won't be able to bring her home as my mate is working. :(
 
They depreciated and went to owners to be unappreciated. With the exception of a cherished few you really need to keep your eyes open when looking for or at one.

Having said that this is one of only thirty or so 16V Turbo models left so I dropped a deposit blind based on the photo's above and limited information from the chap selling the old girl and what I could stalk from the net. ;)
 
According to howmanyleft, there's just 177 16v turbos left in the UK: 59 on the road, 118 on SORN. All the more reason yours should remain standard, lol! ;)
 
16V Turbo Project

So today I drove to see the car in the flash as it were.

She started first turn of the key with a jump and the downpipe was a bit blowy near the flexipipe where they always go. ;)

The brakes are...

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...very rusty but free. I was thinking of taking a set of discs and pads when I collect the car so it would be safer to drive home. I'll wrap the flexipipe and replace it at home unless I have time to do it on the spot.

One of the wheels...

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...needs replacing, the headlights are a bit milky and the tail lights...

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...are a pretty good nature reserve but mechanically the car is sound. Cosmetically?

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Dent under the drivers side tail light, rear bumper and boot lid where the old girl has hit a post from the looks of it. Dent on the bonnet where someone has leaned on it to change the wiper (the one most Coupe's get near the headlight). New rear bumper, new boot lid, respray and other touch ups (aluminum mirror bits and the other usual suspects).

Also I need to strip...

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...red paint from the engine. Looks nice from a distance but terrible up close.

At least the boot...

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...wired up for a sub. :slayer:

I am really looking forward to this. :)
 
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