The Ultimate X - Fiat X1/9

[Mark Bowden]

I will have to make some brackets for the solid brake lines to fix on these studs. The original on body fixing was a thin strip of metal that had had rusted away...

Some people would be appalled by repairs like this but never mind, other people paint over anything

 

[svensktoppen]

Will do the job nicely

 

[_James_]

Awesome thread! Just read through the last few pages, will be reading from the beginning tomorrow as that’s some effort you’ve put in.

 

[Mark Bowden]

Awesome thread! Just read through the last few pages, will be reading from the beginning tomorrow as that’s some effort you’ve put in.

Cheers, it's taken a lot longer than expected. Looking back, I had no idea what I was getting myself into, and honestly if I had known I probably wouldn't have started.
Hopefully in a few months, the endless scraping and painting will end and my uploads will become (relatively) more interesting, leading up to the rolling road and mapping etc.

 

[svensktoppen]

Can't wait to see (and hear!) it running

 

[Mark Bowden]

Can't wait to see (and hear!) it running

Me neither

 

[Mark Bowden]

Still the benchmark 2-litre NA X

 

[Mark Bowden]

I got a solution of sorts, happening regarding the pipe clips, then routed the solid brake lines through them to the flexible sections -

 

[Mark Bowden]

The nearside wheel arch saga continues...

 

[Mark Bowden]

 

[Mark Bowden]

 

[Mark Bowden]

Front damper to body components -
top nut
thick washer
upper centering cone
lower centering cone
thrust washer
pivot bush
collett
debris shield

steering rack tunnel

control arm to body

nearside front suspension and brakes final assembly

The arb is off being powder coated and I'm waiting on a pair of long arm steering ball joints.

 

[svensktoppen]

See now the really fun bit is starting, building it all up

 

[Mark Bowden]

See now the really fun bit is starting, building it all up

By the end of next week all the parts will be on the car and the car will be built!

I still have to prepare and paint the offside sill, and a few small areas of the underbody and at some point I plan to take the doors off and do those almost as a separate project, and fit a new windscreen in due course... like you said it's never really finished!

It actually needs a wheel alignment and a headlamp adjustment and an MOT and a rolling road session and tax and insurance and a set of new tyres, and I've spent so much time on the build this winter I've run out of money.

So likely there will be an interlude while I sort out my finances.

I will at least be able to post some pictures of the car back on its wheels albeit temporarily, before too long.

At some time I will fill the cooling system and get some fuel and attempt to fire it up

 

[Mark Bowden]

It's been very deja vu the last couple of days, reacquainting myself with the intricacies of Gaz Shocks camber bolts (curses) and various other awkward challenges such as how to load the suspension during the tightening sequence.

Anyone who's ever had a new nyloc rotating the ball joint instead of going tight, becoming unremovable by obvious means, knows what I mean.

Apart from a couple of days sliding around the floor getting covered in HT silicone grease and generally contorting myself, I have got the geometry as best I can basically by eye using a long straight edge.

I think I put the ARB on upside down, but it's a simple job to take it off rotate the bushes and put back the other way up, because it was designed to fit on to a complete suspension therefore is the first thing to remove when doing a complete teardown, although it can be removed as a sub along with both reaction struts.

Hopefully I'll get a reply from Midwest Bayless confirming what I suspect.

 

[Mark Bowden]

Haha, looking back at the pics, as you do after you've uploaded... I can see I forgot to remove the 1" thick pieces of wood under the front wheels, so the car isn't level and all my pictures are wrong.

No wonder it looks so weird, it's been a long day

 

[svensktoppen]

Beautiful, definitely on the home stretch now

 

[Mark Bowden]

Beautiful, definitely on the home stretch now

I've been working on this car for so long I've begun to forget things for example the true meaning of one of my 'notes to self' concerning the front suspension mods - "128 et al dip down".

I had absolutely no idea what that meant but, after a few hours realised it's because the front control arms are not unique to the X1/9 they originate from the Fiat 128 and all Fiats/Lancias with 128 front arms need an arb that dips down at the ends to match the angle of the (downward dipping) arms .

I might add that the arms on this car don't dip down because the spring and damper assembly is far shorter.

When I fitted the arb the suspension was on two thirds drop, and the angles matched but when fully loaded the ends of the bar are out of alignment with the arms.

Finally I thought to read my own blog and refer to page 1 picture 5 which clearly shows the arb installed dipping DOWN

So that's 4 out of 4 control arms plus 1 out of 1 arbs I fitted initially upside down.
H Aha

 

[svensktoppen]

Trial and error, all part of the fun

 

[Mark Bowden]

I've been trying to sell the E reg 1500 for years without success.

I have to accept I will not be able to build it better than the D reg but I could build it different and do it as cheaply as possible.

One of the most radical ideas is simply to look at the original concept which was pretty radical let's face it.

I wonder if it would be possible to completely delete the original interior and all the glass and the windscreen surround and the quarter light glazing bars and the roof, as well as the bumpers and the windscreen wipers and motor and both the window regulators and the spare wheel and both the glass mounted rear view mirrors.

That would leave nothing above the doors apart from the open roll hoop, and the top of the headrests and steering wheel.

Adding a wind deflector to the scuttle if designed correctly would mean it wouldn't be necessary to wear a full face helmet.

Shell seats don't mind getting soaked.
All I need is a waterproof instrument cluster and a waterproof fuse box, drain holes and rubber mats.

Haha

 

[Maranellohouse]

Holy moly that is one serious build. What skills and knowledge.

 

[Mark Bowden]

I took the arb off and noticed that paint had been scraped off the pair of back to back cup washers half way up the bushing column (where the long bolt runs parallel to the flat face on the front of the control arm) on both sides, also scraped paint off the arm.

On closer inspection it looked as though there wasn't enough overhang on the attachment plate or the 2 holes in the attachment plate weren't quite far enough apart, either way the washers were pushing the bolt away from the arm.

I cut flats on the sides of 4 washers (making them slightly D shaped and deleting the interference).

On reassembly I noticed that without any interference the ends of the bar naturally fell in to a position that didn't look quite right.

When things like this happen, I always assume it's because the car was crashed and isn't quite straight.

I found evidence of crash damage that had slightly deformed the box under the track rod end on the offside, which looked like a longitudinal impact had very slightly reduced the distance between the reaction strut front hookup and the (control arm) rear hookup.

I partially loaded the front suspension equally on both sides using props, and through trial and error began to understand how the lack of bilateral symmetry could be allowed for.

With various things semi tight/ semi loose, I eventually equalised the left/right position of the bar by equalising the angles of the attachment plates relative to the control arms on both sides before fully tightening the saddle clamp bolts from nearside to offside.

The nearside clamp I set flat because I know that corner of the car is straight.

The offside clamp rotated itself slightly under tightening, presumably reflecting that the reaction strut and the ARB don't run exactly parallel.

The main thing is the bush columns are now at a sensible angle, nothing chafes, and the bar is on the right way up

Holy moly that is one serious build. What skills and knowledge.

 

[Mark Bowden]

Having done the front suspension I moved on to the underbody area and the offside sill.

At some point, previous owners had Waxoyled the floor pan and sills completely.

They sprayed over everything - original underseal, holes, rust, grease, mud, black paint, red paint whatever.

This was a very challenging job to physically and chemically remove as much material as possible down to bare metal, factory primer, and factory underseal that was sound.

I used acetone and a cabinet maker's scraper to redress the wax that was below the textured surface of the factory underseal.

Bare metal I prepared conventionally but because underseal can't be sanded to a feather edge I had to chemically feather the edges.

I then washed the area with paint thinners to homogenise the surface and soften the underseal.

I then applied one coat of grey etch primer on to the entire area, followed by one coat of blue oil base (marine superstructure) paint.

The final 4 coats will be water based black acrylic, same as all the other areas on the car I've restored.

During the preparation I uncovered various things including some areas that I had done myself before I finalised the paint system.

Areas where I hadn't got all the rust out that were etch primed then painted black, were already rusting through from the back and had to be redone.

Areas where I used the blue oil base between the black and grey on top of bare metal or minimally oxidised steel, were spectacularly robust.

Offside sill bottom seam inboard face

... outboard face -

Nearside underbody -

... offside footwell -

 

[Mark Bowden]

R

 

[Mark Bowden]

I started this blog called the Ultimate X years ago, about building what I thought would be the ultimate X1/9 but I had no idea what I was doing.

The process of building not the ultimate X1/9 has at least forced me to consider what the ultimate X1/9 actually is.

Considering the other most closely related cars in the group - Ferrari 308 GT4, Lancia Stratos Stradale, Lancia 037 Stradale and Fiat X1/9 as production cars, both the Lancias are not exactly production cars more like limited production homologated specials.

Nevertheless the V8 from the 308 is offered in the Lister Bell Stratos proves there is enough space, as well as how unobtainable is a Ferrari V6.

A 2 litre 40V flat plane V8, transversely in an X1/9 Dallara Bertone lookalike, would be killer because was always the smallest lightest car in the group to begin with.

I like the idea of circumventing all the known problems associated with period Italian V6's and V8's and replacing them with a different set of problems
This engine -