Frank Weinert uses this Alfasud Ti which once was a 1.5 QV. He has bought his "everyday Alfasud" in May 1989. Of course it did not look brand new anymore. Frank had already planned to make some improvements and so he disassembled it in the winter 1989/90. By the way he easily could repair the damages on the body (rust - what else). Frank gave the Ti a lowering spring kit and the engine was power-tuned. A respray in red finished the work. The result can be seen on the photo on the right. Unfortunately luck was not with him. In May 1991 he crashed his Alfasud. Having had not much time in 1991, Frank had to wait 17 long months till he could bring the car back on the road. The front of the car had to be replaced completely. In August 1992 the Ti returned.

One month later Frank got in contact with deer which standing on the road. This time the front end was not so seriosly damaged but the left side got in contact with a tree and could not be repaired. The car again stood in a garage for six months. Maybe it was the colour's fault? After the second crash the car was sprayed in another colour. In December 1992 it was sprayed in yellow. Frank chosed the yellow of the 1992 Spider 2.0 (series 115). The serial 1.5 litre engine quickly was replaced by a 1.7 litre version. It was a 1.7 ie. The crankshaft was polished, lighted and nitrated, the rods were weighted and polished. Mahle sport pistons were used. The cylinder block was planned at both cylinder sides by 0,8 mm. Also the cylinder heads were planned, but only 0,6 mm. The result was, that the compression ratio  was raised to

was raised to 11,3:1. The engine then got two camshaft housings from a 1.5  Ti-engine, so that the hydraulic lifters on the 1.7 i.e. were changed to mechanical lifters. Frank used 306° camshafts with a valve opening of 6 mm at the time of overlap. Therefore it was necessary to make cut-outs in the pistons. To get enough gas flow through the optimised system, new 40 mm carburators were mounted and finetuned at Viktor Günter in Cologne.
After 4 months of work the result according to the rolling road tester was an engine power of 156 bhp. 

Frank's next project is a 2.0 litre 16V which shall replace the 1.7 litre. "Power can be only replaced by more power", Frank said.

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Last Update: May, 27th 2004    Created: December, 29th 2001

© Layout and text by Tim Rauen. Photos by Frank Weinert. All copyrights remain at him.