Tuning Giardinera engine upgrade

[thepuddlejumper]

Hi, I’m looking to get a bit more power out of my 499cc Giardinera engine. Has anyone modified one. I saw a couple of engines on youtube which they said they had upgraded to 650cc. This seems to me to be a bit involved, are there any easier options. Any help and advice on what options are available would be appreciate.

 

[Toshi 975]

Hi R****, good to see that you are still in the thick of it. Obviously boring out the crankcase to take 650 cylinders is often the chosen way as the new pistons and cylinders are the least expensive. As for bolt on upgrades you could consider having your current cylinders bored to take the high compression 540cc pistons that are available. Porting and larger inlet valves on the cylinder head is possible. Some outlets sell a sports exhaust and if the camshaft is in reasonable condition you could consider having it reprofiled to a sporty aspect.

 

[thepuddlejumper]

Yes never really left, still have the Gamine, an old rusty 500, a rusty 126 and new to me Panoramica. I never did get the VW 800cc engine finished, have all the parts but found machining cost up here horrendously expensive, cheaper to buy an off the shelf 800cc kit. Anyway my Panaramica struggles up hills and not that steep either. My 500, to my memory didn’t have any problems but this maybe the Gamine with the 650 engine and panda head. Therefore I intend to use the car till winterish then remove engine and box for a rebuild and while doing this mildly tune it. I have plenty 650 engines I can plunder for bits but am interested in the 540cc conversion you mentioned. Do you or anyone on here have an idea of the increase in power for the 540cc conversion. The 650cc conversion, does it require a strengthening plate and if so do the barrels require the plate thickness machining to keep the headboard height.

 

[porta]

Wehn you say ‘up here’ where is that as there was some air cooled specialists in West Yorkshire, although ‘dubbies, one of them is an Italian family run business who’s bread n butter if Italian cars…im sure some of them could advise or even take on machining?

 

[thepuddlejumper]

Hi, I’m in Scotland and we have lost a lot of machine shops. The majority from my investigations only deal with new cars or hgv’s and aren’t interested in one off jobs for the older car. I was quoted £900 to have the block opened out to accept 126 barrels long some alloy welding, some blobs to stiffen the block, and machine the barrels to length. I have worked in a machine shop before and to be honest it would only take a couple of hours to do all of it. I wish my lethe was runningmay be possible to drive South to have work done.

 

[porta]

Think that reflects the uk at the moment
It’s like the Industrial Revolution all over, innovate, industrialise, sit on your laurels and squander

 

[the hobbler]

Think that reflects the uk at the moment
It’s like the Industrial Revolution all over, innovate, industrialise, sit on your laurels and squander

 

[the hobbler]

When I worked at Radbourne Racing, we used a Giardy van as our parts dept runabout, complete with a Nardi 652cc conversion.The boring out of the crancase is, I would have thought, a couple of hours work at the most. Depending on the depth of the barrels (the 126 barrels are 10mm shorter than the 500 barrels) you MIGHT need a 10mm steel 'spacer' plate between the top of the crankcase and the bottom of the barrels. When we did the conversion on the cars, we didn't put any strengthening plate between the barrels and the crankcase. These are available from a number of Continental suppliers. By hunting around, you might even find a dedicated Giardy conversion kit (try "Nanni Ricambi" for a start, but the carb that they are using in the kit is NOT a genuine Dellorto). If you go up in engine size, you might require a larger carb, again available from continental suppliers.
The Giardy is heavier than the standard saloon, which might explain some of your lack of performance vis-a-vie the car, but you have Fiat 600 brakes which will help when enhancing the performance.

 

[the hobbler]

When I worked at Radbourne Racing, we used a Giardy van as our parts dept runabout, complete with a Nardi 652cc conversion.The boring out of the crancase is, I would have thought, a couple of hours work at the most. Depending on the depth of the barrels (the 126 barrels are 10mm shorter than the 500 barrels) you MIGHT need a 10mm steel 'spacer' plate between the top of the crankcase and the bottom of the barrels. When we did the conversion on the cars, we didn't put any strengthening plate between the barrels and the crankcase. These are available from a number of Continental suppliers. By hunting around, you might even find a dedicated Giardy conversion kit (try "Nanni Ricambi" for a start, but the carb that they are using in the kit is NOT a genuine Dellorto). If you go up in engine size, you might require a larger carb, again available from continental suppliers.
The Giardy is heavier than the standard saloon, which might explain some of your lack of performance vis-a-vie the car, but you have Fiat 600 brakes which will help when enhancing the performance.

Ralph; Have you changed your e-mail address? I have tried to contact you on an e-mail address we have corresponded on before, and it just bounced back to me. Contact me on :--- tommontagu @yahoo.co.uk and I will try and help you with some more information wiith regard to tuning the Giardy engine

 

[thepuddlejumper]

Thanks, email sent

 

[thepuddlejumper]

Hi R****, good to see that you are still in the thick of it. Obviously boring out the crankcase to take 650 cylinders is often the chosen way as the new pistons and cylinders are the least expensive. As for bolt on upgrades you could consider having your current cylinders bored to take the high compression 540cc pistons that are available. Porting and larger inlet valves on the cylinder head is possible. Some outlets sell a sports exhaust and if the camshaft is in reasonable condition you could consider having it reprofiled to a sporty aspect.

Hi, I bought a modified camshaft from you many years ago, do you know what the spec is?

 

[Toshi 975]

Hi, I bought a modified camshaft from you many years ago, do you know what the spec is?

Hi , yes that was nine years ago and if my memory serves me well yo were the first to buy one of those. That project was a journey and a bit of a story. I was told by a reliable source that a well known Abarth garage in the UK were no longer buying 35/75 camshafts from Italy but were having good used 500 and 126 camshafts reprofiled to a sport aspect by a UK specialist. Sounded interesting and a potential plan so I got together with a fellow Fiat fan and between us we had 17 used camshafts. I checked out the full specification for a 35/75 sport/fast road cam then contacted a camshaft specialist and managed to speak to the man at the top. I always remember the conversation as my knowledge of cam technology was limited. I asked if it was possible and rattled off all the spec details I had written down. He replied “ah I know what you want” which was reassuring and proceeded with a verbal quote if we supplied a batch of 10 for regrinding and nitriding (case hardening and core refinement for strength and surface hardness). We shipped all 17 to them, they rejected 3 as being too warn and processed 10.


Very pleased with the result and with all the costs we were able to sell them at about a third of the price of the garage at less than £100 making a sport cam affordable to guys that could not afford the higher prices. There was no real profit for us but a challenge and a kind of club thing done through a Fiat forum. Had absolutely no problem selling them in fact at one time a dealer wanted to buy the whole batch which I refused. However the initial idea of doing this on a rolling exchange program broke down because the buyers just wanted to buy the new cam and not do an exchange. I had the last four processed which cost more due to the smaller batch and that was it. As a footnote I was contacted earlier this year by a guy who had just bought a batch of spare parts and he suspected that one item was one of my uprated cams. I found a buyer for him and the cam is now running in a very nice Abarth replica that has just gone on the road and is doing the rounds.

 

[thepuddlejumper]

Hi , yes that was nine years ago and if my memory serves me well yo were the first to buy one of those. That project was a journey and a bit of a story. I was told by a reliable source that a well known Abarth garage in the UK were no longer buying 35/75 camshafts from Italy but were having good used 500 and 126 camshafts reprofiled to a sport aspect by a UK specialist. Sounded interesting and a potential plan so I got together with a fellow Fiat fan and between us we had 17 used camshafts. I checked out the full specification for a 35/75 sport/fast road cam then contacted a camshaft specialist and managed to speak to the man at the top. I always remember the conversation as my knowledge of cam technology was limited. I asked if it was possible and rattled off all the spec details I had written down. He replied “ah I know what you want” which was reassuring and proceeded with a verbal quote if we supplied a batch of 10 for regrinding and nitriding (case hardening and core refinement for strength and surface hardness). We shipped all 17 to them, they rejected 3 as being too warn and processed 10.
View attachment 422373

Very pleased with the result and with all the costs we were able to sell them at about a third of the price of the garage at less than £100 making a sport cam affordable to guys that could not afford the higher prices. There was no real profit for us but a challenge and a kind of club thing done through a Fiat forum. Had absolutely no problem selling them in fact at one time a dealer wanted to buy the whole batch which I refused. However the initial idea of doing this on a rolling exchange program broke down because the buyers just wanted to buy the new cam and not do an exchange. I had the last four processed which cost more due to the smaller batch and that was it. As a footnote I was contacted earlier this year by a guy who had just bought a batch of spare parts and he suspected that one item was one of my uprated cams. I found a buyer for him and the cam is now running in a very nice Abarth replica that has just gone on the road and is doing the rounds.

Mine is still in its original packaging not sure if I should use it in the Giardi or not.

 

[Toshi 975]

Mine is still in its original packaging not sure if I should use it in the Giardi or not.

You will not be able to do that because like the 126 Bis the Giardiniera has the oil pump drive built into the camshaft.

 

[thepuddlejumper]

You will not be able to do that because like the 126 Bis the Giardiniera has the oil pump drive built into the camshaft.

So can a bis cam be used? I’ve got an engine block for a Giardi which I will use for the modified engine, to keep the original original with matching numbers

 

[Toshi 975]

So can a bis cam be used? I’ve got an engine block for a Giardi which I will use for the modified engine, to keep the original original with matching numbers

I would think that if you can get your hands on a Bis cam there is a good chance. Also almost bound to be a better profile. The Bis bell housing fits the Giardiniera and apparently facilitates an uprated clutch.