I don't know the rpm you rev...

Third running event. Startup took a little effort, but it's been about a week since last startup. Some time with the fuel pump and pedal pumping helped out. Started it up, and let it run up to temp. Some observations:

• The idle continues to climb at idle - starts at 1.5k and climbs north of 3k rpm. I don't know what this means.
• We have oil pressure. ~20psi or so?
• The heater blows hot air. Well, maybe not "hot", but I feel a temperature difference swinging the lever from "hot" to "cold".
• Radiator is def getting some hot coolant flow. I actually noticed some smoking toward the front of the car. Probably some stuff burning off.
• Still a little smoky beneath the exhaust valve covers.
• From the overwhelming smell of Sex Panther in the garage, I would estimate that we are running "pig rich", as the kids say these days.
• We have no brakes. When running, the brake pedal goes straight to the floor. There is "fluid" in the reservoirs. Also, I didn't realize this contraption had 3 brake fluid reservoirs.

So, comment away. All ideas are appreciated.

I feel bad not posting a pic, so be jealous of THIS (Sarah rules):

Victory

To rewind a little bit, over the course of a month or so James and I managed to relocate the Scorpions back to my garage. They were located about 320 miles away in beautiful Roanoke, VA, so it was quite an effort - some of them didn't run, and the ones that probably would hadn't been run for a few years. So we figured it was best that we tow all of them back and not risk any damage or breakdowns trying to drive one back through the Blue Ridge Mountains. Our strategy for this was to drive two tow vehicles (w/trailers) down and get two at a time. It was about a 5.5-hr drive one way, 3-4 hours to load the cars/parts onto the trailer, and then a couple of hours to unload back at my place.

Incredibly, this process went almost 100% glitch-free. Only surprise was really that Bigfoot's starter failed the night before a planned trip, but luckily it was a straight-forward fix and it only delayed us a couple of hours the next morning. Oh, and I also learned that James and I can push a Land Rover LR3 with a trailer about 100 yards. Thankfully, there was no gas in the LR3 so that saved some weight.

Now it was time for the fun stuff - to try and get the healthiest candidate running again. We took most necessary precautions - drained/filled the gas tank (kind of), lubed up the cylinders, hand cranked a couple of times, new battery, debugged some electrical issues, starter fluid in hand... and then it was time to give it a go. Witness:

You may not be able to see it in the lower-quality vid, but the stuff that was being ejected from the muffler was actually mouse poison! Quite a bit of it. I hope that doesn't mean there are mice left in the exhaust system somewhere, but I suppose that's possible.

We let the car run for a while, and shut it down when we saw the temps getting around 210F or so with a lot of white smoke coming out of the tailpipe and header area. Since then, I've added quite a bit of coolant (we didn't check the level before our attempt - whoops), and it seems to run fine. The temp can still creep up past 190, but there's no smoke drama. I shut it down at about 210 just for precaution - I'm not really sure what temp is "normal" for these to run at. The coolant level still manages to drop a bit between heat cycles, so maybe the coolant just needs to work it's way through. Next steps are to bleed any air from the cooling system via the radiator plug, bleed/verify the brakes, oil change, and then the first road test!

Derrick

Greetings all, Derrick here. So James and I have recently acquired a few older Italian cars and hopefully this ‘blog will keep those that are interested updated on the status of these beauties (among other interesting, fun contraptions).

A little of my background – I’ve always had a thing for cars, but a few years back I bought a Subaru WRX Wagon, which brought the car thing to a whole new level. Before I knew it I was autocrossing the car every chance I had and was learning about ways to make it go faster. I’ve been competing and modifying the car for the past few seasons, and I thought it was about time I experienced some other cars. Enter the Scorpion. Enter the Scorpion. Enter the Scorpion. Enter the Scorpion. What have I done. Enter the Scorpion. Enter the Scorpion.

I'm pretty new to this Italian Car thing. My knowledge of these cars is pretty limited... but what’s NOT to love about a rare, 30+ year-old, Pininfarina, racing heritage’d, mid-engine, RWD, Italian two-seater?? We definitely have our work cut out for us. This should be fun.

Now for some pics of cars you haven’t seen yet:

The Gravedigger – if you ever see me gridded up at the autocross next to fully prepped Lotuses, Miatas, Civics, STIs – you’ll understand. This is my daily driver, prepped pretty well for autocross competition but far from “max attack”. List of upgrades include, but are not limited to: stiffer springs, adjustable struts, stiffer swaybars, camber bolts, camber plates, various suspension/driveline bushings upgraded, exhaust, wheels/tires for every occasion, and believe it or not, no boost modifications (yet). Might I note the mechanical similarity to… the Lancia Delta Integlory.

Bigfoot. This is relevant to the cause for two reasons: 1) it was/will be instrumental in retrieving cars/parts 2) it’s fixed or repaired daily which tends to take some work time away from the babies. That will be my excuse if it seems that progress is slow on the Scorpions.

That's it for now - I'll try to get some more exciting videos up of what we've done so far...

Scuderia Toro-serratura

Hi, I'm James and Derricks friend Bob. The origins of this post can be traced back to a spring day in early 2004 when James called me up and invited me down to his house in King of Prussia. It was on that day that he let me drive his GTV6 and not more then a few weeks after that Me, James, and Ange were driving to Lancaster with a pocket of cash and an Alfa in my sights. Little did I or James know what we had started... Now some 5 years later I have a few cars that I'd like to introduce.
My 1984 GTV6 was a carrier of the Alfa bug and the infection spread quickly. I bought the GTV6 with a 3.0L heart transplant. The aim of this car is a cruiser / track car and I try to keep this in mind when buying parts and making modifications. At this date I've removed the air conditioning, added stiffer rear springs and replaced several bushings with the poly replacements.


After being infected with the Alfa bug I couldn't last a full week and sometimes more driving a "normal" car. I found a neglected baby in need of some tender care. After replacing the battery and the timing belt I got the eninge to start but it was far from running smoothly. It took a long time to track down a minor vacum leak inside of the cold start air auxiliary valve. The small air leak was wreaking havok on Bosche L-jet fuel injection keeping it from being able to be a driveable car. After fixing the air leak, I cleaned up many bad sensors. Now she's my daily driver during the fall and winter months.

The next car in the stable is the classic GTV from 1974. As you can tell the outside is in need of some attention. The inside is in good shape as all the seats have been reupolstered. The engine was rescently rebuilt and since the picture it has been given performance springs which really improve the apperance and the handling.



For my next car I went south from Milano to the town of Modena to a tiny manufacturer called Maserati. The 1985 Biturbo has classic elegant lines which mask its true character that really wants to go fast. When the car arrived the previous owner didn't know that the wastegate has been disconnected. Luckily i found this out and reconnected it. Since then i've installed a manual boost controller, liquid to air intercoolers, bypass valves, and a SPEC stage 2 plus clutch.

Welcome & Introductions

Well, hello. Welcome to In The Garage. This is a blog to document and share the experiences of James and Derrick (and Shake and Bake, if they're interested) in dealing with the trials, tribulations, joys and excitement of buying, restoring and enjoying motor vehicles. It will, hopefully, be a fun thing.


So to kick it off, let's introduce the vehicles:

James' 1984 Alfa Romeo GTV6
I mostly use the GTV6 for nice-day cruising and Autox. Upgrades are not aimed at achieving 'maximum attack', but she still managed to perform respectably in STS. This is really a fantastic vehicle. I've driven just about everything from Porsche in that era, and while some are probably just as, if not more, capable, none were more engaging. Actually none were even close except the mid-80's 911, that's a nice vehicle. Anyhow, the Alfa really captured my interest, so I got one. I think that decision sparked the vintage Italian car spirit in my friend Bob and my brother-in-law Rick. It took longer to ignite Derrick's interest, but I think this car had something to do with it.

1976 Lancia Scorpion (Black)

Turns out I don't have a solid photo of Black without Derrick in it. So you get Derrick modelling the lovely '76. This Scorp is pretty well restored. It hadn't been run in 10yrs so we're working on getting it to run well, but the cosmetics are pretty solid. The interior has been converted from the original red to a subdued black. It's nicely done. There are also a host of mechanical upgrades which were done by either the PO or the fellow who owned it before him. I think there are relatively few things we know we want to do on this car. Euro bumpers would be a top candidate. The Ansa exhaust needs a restoration, and we might contemplate moving this car away from the Weber 32/36 to a set of dual Weber 40 DCNFs. It's all notional at this point.

1977 Lancia Scorpion (Gold)

So apparently neither Derrick nor I took a decent shot of Gold while we were picking it up. So I'm posting this shot Derrick's fiance Sarah took. Anyhow, the Gold paint is nice, except for one or two areas where the PO was eliminating a spot of rust. Overall though, very solid. The interior is a bit rough, as the seats are shot. Aftermarket wheels are neat. It also seems like the PO was in the midst of disassembling everything in the engine bay. Currently there's no carb, exhaust, thermostat, etc. The documentation we got with the car indicates that there were some planned upgrades, so likely the process to install those had begun.

1977 Lancia Scorpion (Silver)

Silver is interesting. It seems mostly complete, interior, exterior and mechanical. The PO seems to have stripped the car down to the metal and resprayed it in the OEM color (or close). The car needs to be reassembled now, but should be looking good once that's done. The interior is the oh-so-awesome Lancia red. This photo is of us loading her up and getting ready to haul her home.

1977 Lancia Scorpion (White)

Ahhh, white. Such a fantastic color. The base color of most Lancia Martini rally weapons. What's that? Unfamiliar? CLICK ME AND WEEP. Anyhow, the white '77 is solid, but there are a number of surface (non-structure or so we think) rust spots to address. The interior looks whole and fan-freakin-tastic in blue. I believe there's been some tuning work done on this one by the PO as well. We'll have to scour the documentation and get it all sorted out.

1976 Lancia Scorpion (Blue)

Blue is on the cusp of being a parts car. It seems like a lot of the structure is OK, but there are major areas of rust that will need to be carved out and replaced. Derrick believes this is less a problem and more an opportunity to create our own 037. If he or I had any of the required skills, I'd be completely on-board. Oh hell, I'm completely on board, who am I kidding?

1976 Lancia Scorpion (Red)

Red is likely going to be a parts car. It seems as though there are large portions of scructural rust and there's almost no major area that appears completely solid. I'd love for us to save it though, but it may be a bridge too far.

Well, those are the Derrick and James cars. Hopefully Rick and Bob will join in and post about their vehicles too. Similarly Derrick, if you want to chronical the WRX or the million BigFoot repairs...