UK Owners Club National Event September 2021

We attended the UK Owners Club National event on September 10th~12th in the Brecon Beacons, South Wales.  A weekend of great driving and fun.

The event was really well organised by Rob & Charlotte who had meticulously planned the weekends events, a huge thankyou to them as it could not have been easy to do and must have taken them days of work.  Great job!

We had booked a Caravan at the Lakeside Caravan Park (https://llangorselake.co.uk) along with a bunch of other club members and our plan was to set out around 11:30am on Friday 10th and meet up for a drink around 6pm.  Our route would take us out to Thame and then onto Oxford to pick up the A40 and follow it all the way to our destination.  

Along the way I had booked us in for lunch at the The Royal Oak, Burford.  A beautiful stone built pub off the main street of Burford which has some nice beers on tap and a great selection of food, well worth seeking out.

The traffic around Oxford was a nightmare and it took us longer than we had hoped but BART coped with it well and didn't overheat!  After lunch we headed back out and made good progress until we got to Monmouth where we faced a 30min traffic jam.  The Satnav took us off the A40 at Huntley to cut the corner via the A4136 but by the time we realised the amount of traffic trying to cross the River Wye we where stuck.

After that hick up we picked up the A40 again and made it to our destination, a little late but relieved!

BART and Caravan

The following morning we all gathered for some photos and coffee to clear our heads after the night before and get prepped for the days driving.  Rob had worked out routes over the Black Mountain pass for the morning and an afternoon run that would see us all end up in Brecon in the afternoon.  A meal had been organised at the Caravan park for the evening and a bit of light fun with a Quiz and chat afterwards.

Curious Swan

24 cars attended in total with only one suffering a mishap with some serious engine issues.  The Black Mountain run was spectacular, there is a short video published at the bottom of this page and an action shot of BART: photos.app.goo.gl/jwn9BELJUEM9SSNf7  and more pictures here: https://www.x1-9ownersclub.org.uk/forum/4-news-and-views/31657-the-brecon-national-a-few-pictures.html

For the second day there was a more gentle and less frantic drive out to the Elan Valley reservoir and lunch at the Penbont Tea Rooms.  We all met up at the visitors car park where for a bit of fun we all voted for their favourite car and cleanest engine.  I was incredible surprised and bowled over when I was told BART had won the favourite car section, thank you guys!

At Elan Valley Rob had arranged for Youtuber 'HubNut' to meet up and review one of the x1/9s.  To say he was impressed would be an understatement his video can be seen on the following link and also the convoy of x1/9s:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzyIOMfSNPg

Its probably one of the best reviews of the x1/9 on the internet.

After lunch we parted ways with everybody heading home.  We covered 457 fun (well mostly) filled miles and averaged approx 40mpg despite some hard driving.  Many thanks to the owners club committee and especially Rob, Charlotte and Juliet.

The Prep - UK Owners Club National Event

A few weeks ago (10th-12th September'21) we attended the UK Owners Club National event in the very beautiful Brecon Beacons.  It was a fantastic few days of great driving,  food and chat but more of that later...to get BART and our selves to the event I needed to do some prep.

First off I changed the oil and filter as it was due anyhow.  I also wanted to sort out an issue with the front brakes; they weren't inspiring confidence in me and I had started to note a slight steering wobble under hard braking which I suspected was a warped disk.  I had some new spare front disks and pads so swapped them over making sure everything was clean and the calliper sliders greased with hi-temp goo.

That sorted the brakes, the pedal was firmer and stopping power increased.  Next was to do a few rust treatment and prevention jobs as well...it's Wales after all and sure to rain!

I purchased a food syringe and tube off eBay the idea being to inject Waxoyl into parts of BART I couldn't directly access.

The areas to tackle where the leading edge of the Frunk, it had started to show signs of rust, the leading edge of the engine cover, the R/H side of the engine 'well' under the vent and for peace-of-mind the inside of the A pillars.

The A pillars where straight forward, if you remove the Targa front sealing rubber (two screws) it reveals two holes above each sun visor that are large enough to squirt Waxoyl into.

A bit difficult to see but the holes are there!

I diluted the Waxoyl with White Spirit to the consistency of Tomato Soup and injected about 100ml into each pillar and along the windscreen top.

Next I tackled the engine cover and 'well'.  This was best done by removing the engine cover.

I treated the rust then squirted diluted Waxoyl into the cavity sloshing it about and then left the cover overnight to dry out.  The R/H engine side 'well' was tackled next.  I hadn't realised this was in a poor state, some previous welding and repair had been done before but cosmetically it didn't look great and really needs to be done again.

I removed all the loose rust I could and vacuumed the area then I treated everything with a rust killer and preventer.  When that was dry I painted Hammerite over the area and after drying Waxoyled the lot!

The rear cover mounting screw seemed to have been cross threaded at some point but some quick work with a tap fixed the thread so it was all good.  The last bit to do was the Frunk leading edge which had stated to split on the inside.  Again I treated the area with the rust killer and then applied Waxyol directly and also injected some into the Frunk box cavity frame and U channel.  Hopefully that should be good enough to stop the evil rust from coming back!

Rust just starting to rear its ugly head on the Frunk lid.

Next:  The event itself!

Swish, Swish...

If you are familiar with Chris Rea you'll identify the sound of windscreen wipers clearing the windscreen of a car in the dark and moody opening of his track 'Road to Hell'.  Windscreen wipers working as they should despite the slightly depressing theme!  Unfortunately for BART this was not the case, not even close.  The wipers barely moved, stuttering slowly across the windscreen as if trying to clear away treacle or some other thick and gooey substance, switching to high speed made no difference.

With the UK x1/9 Owners Club annual event due to take place in Wales this coming September I thought it was time to address the problem.

Like the headlights, the wiper power feeds run through multiple switches and connections and as I discovered with the lights the combined losses of the wiring caused a drop of 2.5v.  The solution was to install some make and break relays to switch a high current feed directly from the battery taking the load off the original wiring and connectors.

BART has two speed wipers so I ordered 2 relays from 12voltplanet.co.uk plus relay holders and a fuse holder.  These all clip together making for a neat installation.

Fuse Holder:  https://www.12voltplanet.co.uk/standard-blade-fuse-holder-with-terminals.html

Relay Holder:  https://www.12voltplanet.co.uk/standard-mini-relay-socket-with-terminals.html

The relays where 40amp 5 pin change over relays or you can use 4 pin make and break relays, either will work.  All the wiring and fuse where 20amp rated.

I started by removing the drivers side scuttle grill and separating the wiper motor connector.  You need to locate the Grey (high speed) and Red (low speed) wires and remove the connectors from the plug (female connectors) by sliding a very fine screwdriver into the small square cutout of each terminal.  These will now control a relay each to switch a fused feed from the battery.  

I used a spare two terminal connector to connect and extend the Grey and Red wires into the Frunk via the bulkhead wiring grommet connecting up to the relay block on pin 86 of the relay.  Pin 85 of the relay is the ground pin and I daisy chain connected them together and found an earth on the bulkhead grommet studs.

A feed then needs to be taken from the battery and connected via the fuse block to pin 30 on each fuse, again I daisy chained the connection.  Pin 87 (normally open) from each relay then becomes the output (high current feed) from the relays connected back to the wiper motor using the existing OEM connector.

This shows the earth tag to Pin85, the relay block connected together, the battery feed and wiring to and from the wiper motor connector.

Wiring completed in the scuttle.  The return wiring to the motor requires female connectors with tags

I finished off with some spiral wiring wrap to neaten everything up.  The result...Wow, just like the headlights the difference was night and day.  Even on a dry screen the wipers move quickly and smoothly traversing without stopping or stuttering, result!

Wiring diagram (click to expand):

My Boots are leaking!

After the camshaft swap saga it was time to see how BART ran on the road and bed in the new camshaft.  I went for a short rev. limited 5mile drive to get him warmed up and to see if there where any issues.  

Back home all looked OK, no leaks from the new seals or gaskets and the cam belt was still running in the same place on the auxiliary pulley, however, I could smell burning oil.  

A quick look under the car revealed...

The long drive shaft inner boot was leaking...badly.  Enough for the oil to fly back on to the exhaust causing the smell.  I also managed to burn my forearm on the exhaust whilst taking the picture adding to the smoke!

I had anticipated replacing the inner drive shaft boots and had already purchased the parts so now was as good a time to do the work as any!

The long drive shaft has to be removed from the car to replace the boot, the short one can be done on the car.

The first job was to undo the axle nut on the drive shaft and then get the rear of BART up in the air on axle stands.

Then it's necessary to remove the brake calliper and tie it up out of the way.  With that done undo the hub to strut bolts leaving one in place for now and then undo the three small bolts that hold the inner boot retaining plate to the gearbox.  Access to these is tight with the lower engine mount and cross member in place but can be done with a 1/4" drive socket and extension.

I use adjustable camber bolts on the top retaining strut bolt so marked the relation of the bolt head and tab to the hub with a marker pen, this should mean that I'll get the camber just about spot on during reassembly.

I noted the piston dust cover on the calliper had perished but these are easy to replace, they just pull out and the new one slipped over the piston, make sure the cover fits into the groove on the calliper.

Somebody had already been here on BART and replaced two of the small bolts with studs for the retaining plate, not a bad idea but the third bolt had been replaced with a different sized 12point bolt....

Of course I didn't have a 12point socket so had to purchase one from Amazon! It came the next day and I was able to undo the last bolt.

With that done place a very large drip tray under the gearbox and pull the boot back away from the gearbox.  A large amount of oil will issue forth!  Line up the Tripode drive bearing with the cutouts in the gearbox then remove the last hub to strut bolt and separate the two.  Push the A arm down and carefully ease the splined shaft from the hub, it has to be pushed a fair way down but will clear the hub.  With that done you can now gently remove the drive shaft from the gearbox.

One Driveshaft

With that done I could now remove the Tripode bearing, and boot, replacing with new parts.  The Tripode is held in place with a circlip and then simply slides of the drive shaft.  As I removed the boot I noted evidence of the boot being replaced previously as the old inner seal was still on the shaft and the current one simply fell out of the boot!

Boot, Retaining plate and Tripode bearing

Two old inner boot seals

The new boot was purchased from Eurosport-uk and was of a different design to the old.  It was smaller and didn't seem to have the removable seal feature of the old ones, I hope the design proves to be better at keeping the oil in the gearbox! 

New Boot (Right) and Tripode bearing

Replacement is the reverse of removal, just be careful not to damage the Tripode bearing when inserting it back into the gearbox.  The bearing only fits one way on the drive shaft and if fitted the wrong way you won't be able to install the circlip.  With the shaft installed and the hub, strut and shaft all joined back together I fitted a new axle shaft nut and replaced the brake calliper.  With the handbrake on this was torqued up to 100lbft.

The short drive shaft boot can be replaced on the car, it wasn't leaking but as I was here it was best to do both.  Same procedure except the axle nut doesn't need to be removed and access to the boot retaining plate bolts is easier.  Remove the calliper (I replaced the dust boot here as well) and disconnect the strut from the hub.  Pull the boot back and line up the Tripode to the cut outs as before.  Then push the A arm down and the shaft should pull out of the gearbox.  It's a little tight on space but the end of the driveshaft can be swung towards the rear of the car to gain access to the circlip, Tripode bearing and boot.

Reassembly is the reverse of removal again, make sure the area where the retaining plate bolts to the gearbox is clean and that no grit made its way inside or onto the Tripode bearing, it is a precision part.  Unfortunately the marks I made on the adjustable camber bolts rubbed off and I had to guess the position during reassembly!  This meant another trip to Blackboots in Chesham to check the alignment doh!  The last job was to top up the gearbox oil.   A short test drive later and no leaks where detected...so far.  I'll keep my finger crossed this is one job I don't have to revisit soon.

A long drawn out saga...

At the end of my last blog post "It started out so well..." I mentioned a concerning noise emanating from the top of the engine.  The engine was making a clack clack clack sound from the cam belt end, as if the valve clearance on one valve was way too large.  I reached out and posted a video over on the xweb forum and received a number of suggestions.

Apart from checking the valve clearances it was suggested the OEM resin cam belt wheel could be a cause, they can age and form micro fractures/cracks around the central steel bushing.  There was no easy way I could tell without removing it.

The cam shaft seal was also leaking and it was getting progressively worse and I had also been planning on fitting a longer duration cam for a bit more top end pep so I made a decision to tackle all three jobs at once.

I had already obtained a NOS Fiat 4331512 camshaft from Italy.  These where fitted to the 128 Rally Coupe and very early x1/9s.  The duration is longer than the later camshafts with slightly more exhaust valve lift.  The specs are:

4331512 = 24/68 64/28 with 9.35mm inlet lift and 9.30mm exhaust lift

Standard cam = 12/52 52/12 with 9.35mm inlet lift and 9.20mm exhaust lift

For the other parts I contacted the ever helpful Claire @ Eurosport-uk and added a steel camshaft wheel in addition to all the seals, gaskets, cam belt, tensioner etc that where required.  I also intended to replace the auxiliary and camshaft seal but the latter proved to be an issue.

The first job was to check the valve clearances. Remove the air cleaner and box, throttle linkage, the cam cover and cam belt cover.  Jack up the drivers side rear wheel, put the car in 4th gear and rotating the wheel forwards only rotate each lobe of the cam shaft so its pointing away from the valve.  You may need to remove the oil that pools in the cambox with a Turkey Baster or similar.  I didn't find any large clearances but two of the exhaust valves where on the tight side.  

Getting started

Rogue Hex head cam bolt, signs of previous work

I had been advised to aim for 0.35mm inlet and 0.45mm exhaust but not go below 0.30 and 0.40mm

Next, I set the engine to TDC on Cylinder #4 and slackend off the camshaft nut and auxiliary shaft nut.  Both are done up to 100fl-lb of torque!  The camshaft nut loosened off with a breaker bar but the aux shaft nut wouldn't budge, first there was not enough room to get a breaker bar in and secondly the aux shaft wheel jumped the cam belt when I put a 17mm spanner on it and pulled hard!

At this point a little voice whispered in my ear this was going to be one of 'those' jobs!

I removed the cam belt and tensioner.  Note:  the tensioner stud secures a plate to the engine that covers the water jacket, when you remove the tensioner it's necessary to put a socket over the stud and tighten down again, if not coolant will slowly weep out all over the floor!

I used the old cam belt to wrap around the aux wheel and secured it off on an exhaust stud using some mole grips.  Unfortunately the wheel still slipped on the belt.  There is a special Fiat locking tool for the aux shaft wheel but getting one and fitting it in the tight space was not a viable option.  I ended up refitting the tensioner and wrapping the belt around the wheel again and used the tensioner to provide....errr...extra tension on the belt.  Now the belt didn't slip but I could not generate enough force to undo the nut!  Arrrgh!

Cam belt wrapped and tied off with Mole grips

Off to eBay I went and purchased an aviation 17mm extra long spanner.  With this new super sized spanner the bolt finally relented and undid easily, phew!

I replaced the aux shaft seal, just remove the plate by undoing the three small bolts and taking care that you don't pull the aux shaft out whilst removing the plate just gently ease it off.  If the shaft pulls out too far the fuel pump rod may fall off the cam on the shaft and you will need to remove the pump to refit it.

Tap the old seal out of the plate and fit a new one, clean the block around the aux shaft, fit a new gasket and re-fit the plate, done.

Aux Plate and pulley with my new super duper spanner

Then I moved on to the camshaft itself.  I inspected the resin camshaft wheel but couldn't note any cracks or major issues other than some wear on the teeth.  Having bought a new all metal version I decided to fit it just incase, but first I had to fit the new camshaft.

Resin cam pulley

Wear on teeth

Old and new

To do this the cambox, shaft and valve buckets are all removed as a single unit.  To stop the valve buckets from falling out when the cam box is finally removed I purchased some high strength 'penny' magnets of eBay and slipped one onto each bucket in turn making sure they where in contact as best as possible.  Removal is straight forward, undo the dog bone engine mount and rear of the camshaft cover then work slowly and evenly undoing all the bolts securing the cambox to the head.  Lift of carefully making sure the buckets don't fall out the bottom of the cambox.

With the cambox on the bench remove each bucket and shim in turn noting what cylinder and what valve it belongs to, I used an old egg box (12 large eggs!) and placed the buckets and shims in the box labelling them as I went along.

Egg box!

Cambox removed

Old camshaft and cambox

Cam shaft replacement is straight forward as well, remove the end plate and gasket and slide the camshaft out.  I inspected the cam journals for scoring and perhaps should have measured them for wear but they looked fine so cleaned the box up and replaced the old shaft seal.  

Next was to work out the required shims.  The new cam has the same base circle of the old one and I was fairly confident that even with a new cambox to head gasket the clearance would come up in tolerance.  I decided to replace all the shims with new ones and aim for 0.35mm inlet and 0.45mm exhaust.  First you measure the existing shim and note the valve clearance taken previously.  If the gap is too large by say 0.10mm it means the shim needs to be 0.10mm larger and conversely if the gap is too small by 0.1mm then the shim needs to be thinner by 0.10mm.

Shims are available from Eurosport-uk sized in 0.05mm steps from 2.7mm to 5.2mm, a wide range.  With luck I managed to get all the gaps just about spot on except for one exhaust that ended up at 0.43mm.  It’s important to not go below the minimum gap especially for the exhaust valves.

I installed the new camshaft in the box using engine assembly lube on the journals and the new seal, then fitted the end plate with a new gasket making sure the end plate did not touch the end of the camshaft.

After applying assembly lube to each cam lobe and valve bucket and shim I slid the buckets and shims into the cam box.  I didn't use the penny magnets on reassembly as the assembly lube is thick enough to keep the buckets in place.  Just be watchful though incase a bucket decides to make a bid for freedom as you turn the cam box over.

As the cambox was off and knowing BART had some previous head work prior to my purchase I re-torqued the head bolts.  It is possible to do this with the cambox in place if you have the offset socket tool but I didn't so took the opportunity to do it now.  I backed them off by 1/8 of a turn and torqued to the correct spec.  The head bolts are not torque to yield types on BART.

Next I fitted a new cambox gasket and placed the cam box gently on top of the head.  Before tightening down I made sure #4 cylinder was still at TDC and fitted the new camshaft pulley finger tightening the bolt.  This allowed me to align the camshaft pulley timing mark to the engine snail mount.  This is necessary as the 1300 engine is an interference fit and I didn't want the valves to come into contact with the pistons!  I could have backed the engine off anti clockwise by 90 deg moving the pistons half way down the bore, that probably would have been better practice!

I then tightened down the cambox bolts in sequence a few turns each ensuring the cambox was secured evenly and torqued them to the correct spec.

I then refitted the old timing belt and wrapping it around the camshaft and a new auxiliary wheel in turn tightened both bolts with my new super duper aviation spanner.

Before fitting the new cam belt and tensioner I tried to remove the crank shaft nut.  The idea was to replace the crankshaft seal as I already had everything apart.  Would it move?  No it wouldn't!  No amount of heat or hammer gun persuasion would move it.  As I had been at this for a number of days I decided it was a job for another time...after all it wasn't leaking...

Applying heat

I fitted a new cam belt and tensioner, checked the cam timing and rotated the engine a few times before slackening the tensioner again and then retightening.  A quick check of the valve clearances showed them to all be in spec. and where I wanted them to be.

I fitted a new cork cambox cover gasket (don't over tighten and crush it or it won't seal) and reassembled the rest of the engine but left the cam belt cover off so I could inspect and check everything.  I retimed the car as the aux shaft had rotated a touch when fitting the new belt.  BART fired up into life, yay!  No leaks from the camshaft seal and most importantly no noise from the top of the engine, it sounded very smooth...but...the cam belt was now running in a different place than before and was worryingly running over the inside edge of the aux shaft pulley by a few mm.

Going back together

What followed was way too many days of back and forth experiments, disassembly, reassembly and measurements of pulley wheel dimensions and combinations with old and new tensioners to determine what was the cause.  Previously the belt had always rode on the outside edge of the camshaft pulley but it never overhung the edge.  The combination of new pulleys and new camshaft shifted the belt to run on the inside of the wheels.  I noted a 0.5mm offset on the new aux pulley I installed which was contributing to the overhang.  In the end with another new belt and tensioner installed I came up with a compromise to use the new all metal camshaft pulley and the old aux shaft pulley.  The belt now just rides on the edge of the aux shaft pulley with a slight overhang.  It is something I'm going to keep an eye on, do a few miles and see if it settles down or requires more attention.

Aux overhang with new pulley

Belt position with old aux pulley = better

I've only put a few miles on BART since as another issue cropped up soon after I completed all of the above!  More to follow....

Special thanks; I could not have done this without the valuable help and assistance forum SteveC 'fiatfactory' and the guys on the xweb forum, thank you!