attacked the head gasket situation at the weekend, didn't get round to posting and i'm bored at work at the mo haha.
first off the replacement fiesta, have absolutely no love for this car but it does the job, more comfortable and easier to drive than the Punto, but boring as hell, as the radio reception is poo!


Ingenious use of bungee cord to support the exhaust mani if i do say so myself. got the cylinder head off to discover the gasket wasn't actually in bad shape, was expecting something horrific. A LOT of carbon build up on both the cylinder head bits and tops of pistons, probably because i ran the car for more than a year with the lambda sensor unplugged! what can i say, just gotta run rich
(can't view images on this PC so annotations below)











collection of all the removed parts (in a tesco delivery grocery crate lol)

discovered a piece of rubbery stuff inside what i assume is a coolant passage in the black, pulled/ripped it out but not sure what it is, maybe water pump sealent?

planning on cleaning everything up at the weekend, get the brillo pads and we n dry paper out and go to town. will remember to use a block etc. so as not to make any surfaces uneven, tempted to buy a dremel when i get paid and use a brass wire wheel to help. also picked up a valve reseater stick thing(?) from halfords while i was there, saw a youtube vid guide on it and thought i might give it a go.

onwards and upwards!

yep that looks like some instant gasket - some previous person working on it clearly got a bit carried away with the sealant lol. That might be how your thermostat got stuck i suppose...

those black color valves, does that mean engine is ****ed up?

not at all, means it could do with a clean though, its a bit black than it should be and running rich all the time does result in bore wash eventually

do you need to take valves out to clean them or just clean the top and with what

depends how bad it is really

cant remember if there is a guide in haynes on how to remove valves

had a quick flick through haynes and don't think i saw any pictures of valves being removed. i asssume you take just camshaft off first > somethingelse > abrakebabra = valves slide out?

just ordered a dremel off amazon so should cut down on carbon cleaning a fair bit, gonna do a light once over on the ports while i'm at it. might do some polishing as well? i understand now what people say about head gasket jobs, it's just a slippery slope of 'I might as well since i'm in there'. at this rate the car won't be running for months!

to be honest i have never gone as far you are going... I would soak it all in petrol for a bit and then clean off what comes off easy with a rag. Repeat a few times if its properly stuck on.

After that if there was anything left on mating surfaces i would really carefully clean them off with a stanley blade.

blu73 said:

to be honest i have never gone as far you are going... I would soak it all in petrol for a bit and then clean off what comes off easy with a rag. Repeat a few times if its properly stuck on.

After that if there was anything left on mating surfaces i would really carefully clean them off with a stanley blade.

Click to expand...

not a bad shout blu, will give that a go before resorting to extreme measures.

Reminded me of a Simpsons scene haha
"That's not a knife, this is a knife!"
"That's a spoon"
"Ahh, I see you've played knifey-spooney before then"

been plodding along with this over the last few weekends, delayed a bit waiting for a valve spring compressor of ebay, the ones in halfrauds were 50 quid! one i picked up was £27.
at first i thought the compressor was the wrong size, took a bit of brute force but got all springs compressed eventually and got the valves out, with all the little bits kept together in sandwich bags. cleaned the valves up using a combo of a screwdriver, rusty nail, and emery cloth whilst spinning the valve in a powerdrill, wedged between my legs/table. heard of this trick while preparing for the task, worked a treat!






once i got the valve stuff out i could see that one of the valve stem oil seals was perished, which could explain the residue in the ports. new gasket set arrived with head bolts (and oil seals), and new water pump is on its way.
next job is to lap/grind the valves into thier seat with the suction stick + paste stuff i'd picked up previously

have decided that I will get the cylinder head skimmed just to be on the safe side, won't be for another few weeks as I'm away at the weekend.

weathers getting colder now, luckily doing most of this work in the shed at the moment but not looking forward to putting the engine back tother on the driveway with freezing hands!

been fairly productive since last post, lapped the valves into thier seats with the fine grinding compound since they weren't in too bad shape.



got the cylinder head refaced/skimmed for £30 at a engineering shop near Epsom, dropped it in one evening after work, was ready to pick up same time the next day, friendly fella as well!


after finally getting this done i've got no excuses not to be cracking on with putting everything back together. put in the new oil stem seals with a bit of convincing with a hammer, then in went the valves, springs etc. fairly easily after i got the hang of it.



have also got the camshaft back on the other side of the head, had to redo that after finding out that you need to position the shaft so the no.1 cylinder lobes are pointing upwards in a V shape, meaning TDC. (hope this is right)

next job is cleaning up the engine block surface before fitting the new head gasket and putting the head back on. if the weather is on my side i could probably get everything reassembled in one weekend, although doubt that'll happen haha, especially as I didnt really label any components when removing them :devil:

Thread resurrection

wow it's been a while, and the Punto's been off the road nearly 10 months. time for a shameful thread resurrection.

Unfortunately I moved away from home to a place nearer to work, with no space to store another car and not many free weekends to pop back and work on it. The Punto has been looking very sorry for itself at the end of the driveway, gathering cobwebs and moss, tires deflating, as I drive my boring Fiesta as a daily.

Have no fear however! I was home at the weekend after deciding to get my arse in gear. I didn't have time to take any photos, but summary of progress so far.

- i put the resurfaced cylinder head back on without cleaning up the block. didn't torque the bolts so was able to remove it again and do it properly with fine sandpaper and a woodblock.
- before this i had been trying to ignore a nasty problem - thermostat housing bolt hole in the head had stripped and would lead to a massive leak. ordered an M6 helicoil kit and eventually got that done after nearly ruining the hole completely (drilled out hole, re-tapped, screw in coil etc.) thread now stronger than ever.
- so cylinder head and manifolds are now back on the car and attached, just need to torque the head bolts.
- next job is timing belt. I have a new belt and tensioner, but not sure if i'll be able/bothered to remove the old one, as it requires removing the alternator pulley and such.
- also worried how i'm gonna sort the timing. i left the engine cranked at TDC cylinder 1 (I hope), and the camshaft in a V which should hopefully match. the car is on gravel so can't jack it up to access the crank pulley timings marks. would love to know another method of setting up the timing.

other than that, i'm confident i could get the car back on the road in another day or 2, its just finding those spare days!

the main reason i stopped work in the first place was due to the winter weather last year, need to get this done before it comes round again!

if anyone's out there, I hope some of this is somewhat enjoyable haha

I find this enjoyable as I too have a punto 75 I'm restoring

the car runs! done a fair bit since last post on this thread, started a new one to figure out a idle hunting/surging problem, have a look here:
https://www.fiatforum.com/punto/431127-75sx-idle-problem-fluctuating-surging-hunting.html

so I replaced the timing belt after initially getting the wrong one, getting the crankshaft pulley off was a bit of a nightmare as well which took some chin-scratching, timing now all ok, and fixed the engine trouble through the above thread. It still has quite a high idle, but i plan to patch up some vacuum leaks at some point and the ECU will also need a while to re-learn etc.

I took it out for a spin to the local Tesco for petrol and a dual carriageway stint (no MOT, tax or insurance but needed to do it). ran fairly well, although i'd completely forgotten what the car feels like, steering and gear shifting feels weird, and the lowered springs are still as bouncey as they were....... nothing like my boring Ford Fiesta daily, which in fairness is a lot more comfortable, quieter etc. haha

it's been a long journey up to this point, i've learnt so much and couldn't have done it without this forum. I now find myself at a crossroads however....
Plan is to bring the punto to our family friend/mechanic to look over and see if he could get it through an MOT. some new floor pans and rust were marked as advisory on the last MOT about 2 years ago, so lots of welding may be required, which I couldn't do myself realistically.

So at that point i'll have 2 possibilities, either the car passes the MOT, i keep it and start to drive it daily again. I need a fairly reliable car for work so not 100% sure on this.
Or my beloved punto needs too much work to get through an MOT. at this point i'm not sure what I'd do, break it a try to make some money back on parts? (takes time and effort), sell it as spares? or scrap?
I definitely don't want to be thinking about this, but it has to be done. I also have been thinking I need an upgrade anyway, and have been looking at Mk2 Golf GTI's, but that's another matter.

I'm also aware that this car is getting on a bit, fairly rare these days and potentially a classic (lol)
any advice would be appreciated!

well first thing to do is have a look for rust and give any bits you find a good poke with a screwdriver to see if they are bad or superficial - welding takes time and its the labour that costs alot so unless you can get mates rates somewhere that can end up costing alot - plus you really want a decent job doing and not just crappy patches here and there..

Ultimately we can't tell you what to do here, you have to decide... But i really would get under it and check the sills, pull the carpet up and assess the floor, same in the boot and around the rear arches. If its bad then its prob not financially sensible to repair, you could try find a decent shell and convert it to 75 stuff, you could just throw in the towel and scrap it, you could break it for spares (75 parts are getting rare and sure you could sell quite alot of it pretty easily). Which all brings me back to only you can decide - but first things first, assess where the shell is - ask this family friend mechanic dude if he can stick it on his lift and have a poke around, try be there to witness so if he says its the end you can agree without a doubt is what i would do.

wise words thanks very much, i recently acquired some car ramps so along with my jack stands I can have a good look at the underbody. I've noticed a fair bit of surface rust whilst working on it over the years but not had a proper look. my main concern would be jacking points maybe; I don't use these anymore in case I squash them, now jack up from the ARB or wishbone mounts. wheel wells look fairly clean from what i remember.

if i had more time and the car was based where I currently live, I had always planned to invest the time and money to buy a welder and learn, but no can do at the moment.

We'll see how it goes anyway, will update on any progress

not sure if anyone's seen the other thread I had on the dodgy idle, but it's all fixed now, thread can be found here:
https://www.fiatforum.com/punto/431127-75sx-idle-problem-fluctuating-surging-hunting.html

forgot a few other photos from the weekend, got the Punto out from behind the house and just gave it a blitz with the pressure washer to remove over a year's worth of grime/mould.



and the low-hanging speed-bump basher:

If i remember correctly it's just a generic exhaust thrown together when the muffler blew on the old one. I tried using cable ties a while back to 'tighten' the rubber hangers, which only helped a little. I plan to take the rear lowered springs off anyway and put the original ones back on before the MOT, it looks good parked on a flat drive, but over bumps or with any people in the back, I remember it being an absolute nightmare of metal-on-concrete action....