Hello everyone!

For a long time I have been searching for a small, easy to drive, cheapish to run, but above all relatively exclusive open top 2 seater for the wife to be and myself.

I have worked in the motor trade from school, 30 years nearly, currently a Seat Master tech, but had a short spell working for what was originally a Lancia/Lotus dealer, subsequently promising myself an M100 Lotus Elan.

Well, life is a funny thing. I believe that when things cross your path they are worth checking out, so when a guy at work mentioned someone he knew was getting rid of his father in laws Barchetta, I had to have a look. Its now mine!!

Having only driven it about 20 miles to my workplace, I become aware of a few things I was not expecting, mostly the almost total lack of scuttle shake! It certainly seems to be a tight little bodyshell. I have driven a few drop heads over the years and can say there are some, Audi included, that are not good in this respect.

Anyway, as this post will be bumped to the B section, I do have one question to ask.

Basically it failed the mot on emmisions, lambda too high. I have had it on the gas tester myself (I am an Mot tester) and can confirm the co and hc readings are good,0.01 and 10ppm respectively, but the lambda value is too high,only coming in spec at idle.

My question is, it has the variator rattle on startup for a few seconds, the timing belt seems to be a bit whiney, so I;m suspecting someone has changed the belt without using the cam locks and the valve timing is out. Has anyone seen these concerns affecting emmisions before?

Many thanks in advance
John

Firstly John, welcome to the forum.
I have no answer to your question but there are some here who will know the answer, and with the knowledge base here if you don't get an answer to any question, you aren't asking the right question

Enjoy the Barchetta, it looks as though you (with your motor trade and MoT background) will be answering a good number of questions yourself...

A great little car, and as you state, easy, cheap, and fun to run.

Tell us what year, colour (never mind if it's red, we'll forgive you ) mileage etc.

Steve.

Hi Steve, thanks for the welcome!
It was bought new in Italy in 1999 and shipped straight to the uk, at which point it had the left dipping lights etc fitted. I have effectively become only the second owner! It is low mileage having 53000 km on the clock and no, it's not red, it's orange!
Regards
John

Hi and welcome.

The CO and HC readings look very low, could it be running weak?

Hi Pete

I checked the figures I got when I tried it with those recorded on the actual emissions printout, just to be sure I'd read it right and I had, the second fast idle test went to zero CO and 6 ppm HC, with a lambda reading of 1.114. The limit for lambda is 1.03.

My initial interpretation of these results would be on the face of it, a closed loop cat system working well, but the cat is capable of masking some fuelling faults, so it could well be running lean. There was a small exhaust leak which I fixed prior to trying it myself.

I have yet to get it on a code reader, due to the "3 pin" plug thing issue, i'll make an adapter to covert it to OBD 16 pin at some point, but the MIL isn't on.

I give it a good flush and changed the oil and filter today and will at some point tackle the variator using the repair kit and replace the timing belt, tensioner and water pump. The reason I asked about the possibility of valve timing causing the high lambda is due to experiences with the VWG's 3 cyl 1.2 12v engine, which had a tendency to jump teeth on the exhaust cam. If it only jumped one tooth, it would run ok, but would set lambda faults. Subsequently running the testplan for the lambda fault would draw a blank, as the lambda sensor was not faulty.

One other question, someone at work reckons the Barchetta was prone to oil pump issues, but there is nothing that I can find about it on the web. Does anyone know if there were indeed oil pump issues?

Regards
John

Not heard about oil pump failures. Cam belts and water pumps maybe on those not religiously serviced.

Mine blew 0.016 CO and 27 ppm HC with a lambda of 0.999 on last years test, it occasionally feels like it may be running slightly weak.

Hi,
For comparison my 1998 LE tested recently reported a CO 0.7%, CO at idle 0.04%, Lambada 1.009

Welcome from a silver car owner....

Orange is the best colour in my opinion.I have a thing for any orange car

How about this one?

A little OTT but I wouldn't dismiss the idea of driving around in an Orange..:devil:

I remember that orange Outspan promo car from an issue of (if memory serves me right) Custom Car, from about 40 years ago!

Welcome, Zukkermon! I've got a Fujimi model of an orange B that sits on the bookshelf in my study, so you can see that I'm a big fan!

Hi BB 440, yes I think its a good colour, though when I first drove it into our workshop there were shouts of "you've been tangoed".

Pete, lol, there is a guy from Bicester who turned a daewoo matiz into a cosy coupe!

Gar074, yep I remember it too!

Re the lambda, I've run a live gas reading ( o2 not used for MoT purposes) and the O2 is a bit high at around 1.65%, which could be a post combustion air leak.
Anyway, I've now been banned from working on it in the evenings/saturdays at work by the wife-to-be, until after the wedding/holiday.........nothing like starting as you mean to go on eh lol.

So I'll do the belt etc and see how it goes after that.

Incidentally, how do you guys find it in LHD?

Cheers
John