Flavia Sport Zagato Resto Project [Archive]

ncundy

13th March 2010, 04:12 PM

I think it's a difficult one to offer a firm opinion on as you never see them advertised in this state. I seem to remember that "good" ones have been advertised in £15-20k range. But being complete, it looks a fantastic basis to turn into the car you want - often the "good" ones need a fair bit of work doing to them to get right (more than would be apparent on first sight).

Personally if I was looking to buy a Zagato Flavia this is exactly the type of car I would be attracted to. Affordable (if maybe over priced), complete and available. I would imagine if doing the majority of the work yourself (which I would do, and I know you can do) it is a £15-20k project over a period of say 5 years. As I love the whole restoration thing the fact that you may come out of it a bit out of pocket versus the value would be inconsequential because I would have the car I wanted and be sure of how it was put together, and personally that's worth a lot to me (as well as the experience of really getting to know the car).

I would be seriously interested and try to get the price down by about 30%. And where else would you find one like this? You could easily buy a £15k car that would need almost as much work doing to it.

As ever, an affair of the heart not the head. But I would be adding me pennies up :)

fay66

13th March 2010, 05:06 PM

I have been looking for one of these for some time and will go and see this one, what are peoples opinions on the price though?

I looked at a complete runner in Luton about 5 years ago for �6K, but the amount of work and money needed put me off.
While the mechanical bit would be straightforward, the body construction is something else and could involve serious money, and might well turn out to be a money pit.
Overall I think it's too much money for what it is, and how long it's been standing, going by the condition of the paintwork (What Paint!), a fair bit of it's time seems to have been out in the open, exposed to the elements.

I've seen one for sale in the Netherlands not too long ago for about �26k, but it was exceptional.
Malcolm Elder has had one for sale for 2-3 years, over that time it has climbed from a �12K to a �14k asking price, I believe it to be in very good condition, but it still hasn't sold, which I think is a true measure of it being over priced.
That said, it would be very near the top of my list of my dream Lancia.

Brian

1,6 HF

13th March 2010, 06:51 PM

The seller claims this to be a "very straightforward" restoration, but I'd agree with Brian that the bodywork on these is anything but very straightforward. Unlike a Zagato-built Fulvia, these really were hand built, and Zagato well deserved its reputation for questionable build quality.

Given that, Neil's probably right about the price. Even then, much depends on whether or not all of the trim is present; the safe assumption is that any missing trim is essentially unobtainable, and would have to be fabricated.

Beyond that, as Neil says, it's a matter of the heart. And if such things were purely rational, I'd now have a Fulvia 1.3S instead of a Fanalone.

fay66

13th March 2010, 07:25 PM

Just had a look at the sellers website, www.interesting-cars.com (http://www.interesting-cars.com) and they seem to do a bit of selling cars for restoration as well as some very nice cars, but for a nice little non Lancia cheap project I'd have this if I had the room, cheap cheerful and probably great fun http://www.interesting-cars.com/fordspecial.html
with Alfa overtones!
Looks like an E93a engine, so no problems there, and it even has that much missed item of essential kit, a starting handle aperture in the grille.
Brian

bruciebonuz

13th March 2010, 11:51 PM

I was quite tempted when I saw this one but I have to know my (and my wife's) limits! I spoke to Omicron who made the valid point that these cars are "marmite" cars, you either love them or hate them and that does affect the chances of the value ever being higher than the restoration costs (isnt that often the way though!) I personally do like them and did think that the car would look fantastic like this (as it doesnt have any bumpers anyway):

http://images.forum-auto.com/mesimages/336526/Lancia_Flavia_Sport_Zagato.jpg

bruciebonuz

22nd March 2010, 04:41 AM

Did anyone go and see this car?

ecoangel

27th April 2010, 03:02 PM

Try http://www.autobelle.it/modelli/lancia_flavia_sport_zagato_1_8_iniez_.php

and viva lancia website.

ecoangel

18th May 2010, 12:45 PM

RHD one on ebay with MoT but non runner:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300428921244

ncundy

18th May 2010, 12:55 PM

Now that looks a reasonable bet! Wonder what it will end up at?

fay66

18th May 2010, 01:28 PM

Now that looks a reasonable bet! Wonder what it will end up at?

In the LMC 2000 Register of owners and their cars, it belonged to a Mr J.B.Sampson of Redditch Worcestershire,
Be interesting to see what it goes for, I bet it's a lot more than �1000, I'd like it for that even if it does need a engine rebuild!

Brian

philm

18th May 2010, 01:58 PM

It was sold from a dealers in Oxfordshire earlier this year having been stood for a few years!. I had a look at it, the bodywork is not too good at all, the interior is mostly Fulvia seats and an average retrim and of course it now needs an engine rebuild.:(

1,6 HF

18th May 2010, 10:43 PM

These were never the best advertisements for Zagato's build quality. If the bodywork is as Phil describes it (along with the seller's description of bubbling on the doors) this may go cheap, but it's not likely to be a bargain.

The engine rebuild is reasonably predictable, as is the task of returning the interior to correct spec. But the body is liable to be an utter nightmare, based on a (frankly better) example I saw being worked on out here--just slightly less symmetrical than a old prize fighter's face. And the correct bumpers and other missing trim will be difficult, if not impossible to find.

IMHO, if you want one of these, pay the price to buy a much better one than this.

bruciebonuz

26th May 2010, 07:58 AM

Went for �4086 in the end....not bad.

philm

26th May 2010, 08:00 AM

Thats exactly what I thought:cheers:

bruciebonuz

26th May 2010, 08:16 AM

So you were the buyer? If so congrats and keep us all posted!

philm

26th May 2010, 08:43 AM

I was indeed the buyer, despite my initial concerns about the car when it was for sale for over �12K I thought that it offered a good solid base at �4K and I suspect the only alternatives to this are complete wrecks (of which I have assesed 3 in the last few weeks) or cars that are nearly perfect. It has a lot of needs, not least the interior and engine bay. There seems to be some mystery to the engine condition but that will all becomme apparent when I get it home, hopefully this weekend. I will though be selling my red S2 Fulvia Sport though soon:( as 4 Zagato's are too many even for me!

bruciebonuz

26th May 2010, 08:52 AM

Nice one....hope you make it look like this one.....

http://images.forum-auto.com/mesimages/336526/Lancia_Flavia_Sport_Zagato.jpg

ncundy

26th May 2010, 09:28 AM

Great stuff, I'll be very interested to hear and see what you find as I've never seen beneath the skin of one of those.

1,6 HF

26th May 2010, 10:32 AM

Phil,
Congratulations, and best of luck sorting it. I suspect you're right that it's tough to find cars that aren't either hopeless or the subject of someone else's resto efforts. This one at least looks to be a reasonably solid place to start. Well done.

philm

1st June 2010, 02:35 PM

Its here:D

Not as bad as when I last saw it to be honest. There is a bit of a mystery as to the state of the engine. The seller says it needs a rebuild as it does not run but I am not so sure. It was apparently rebuilt by Omicron and it looks like the fuel tank is full of rubbish so that may be the reason why it apparently runs so poorly. Or it may just be the fact the distributor cap is not on properly:rolleyes: Either way it looks pretty good.

More to come........

philm

15th June 2010, 02:19 PM

So I have had a little bit of look around now. The centre silencer has palm sized hole it in where a previous owner had tried to patch it up with fibreglass! so that is scrap. The rear silencer is off something other than a Flavia but does at least fit. I have removed the Fulvia seats which are perfect and now grace my red S2 Sport. Fitting the correct Flavia seats was trickier than you might think as the passenger side mountings have been moved to suit the Fulvia seat so I had to re drill the seat rails and knock up a pair of brackets. The drivers side just needed the Flavia runners re drilling. As for the engine, without a proper exhaust on it is difficult to know where I am with it. It had a �5K rebuild by Omicron which I have got hold of a copy of the report (thanks Andrew) and the work was as extensive as the price suggests. There appears to be a minor water seep from the top of the head/inlet manifold joint but other than that it looks ok but we will see after I have fitted a spare Fulvia centre silencer I have then I can really get into it.

philm

27th June 2010, 01:18 AM

So a bit more investigation and fault finding now the exhaust is somewhere close to working as it should. The car overheating would appear to be due to the water pump not pumping, I removed the bottom hose and briefly (seconds not minutes!) ran the engine was adding water into the radiator nothing was pumped out. There is no thermostat fitted either just a hose from the junction of the two return hoses from the left and right banks, there is water in the sump oil so I am suspecting a fairly significant leak across the head gasket probably on the right hand bank as it seems to be running poorly. Reading through the Omicron report the engine was running fine after the rebuild but they did report that the engine was a bit of a mish mash of 2000 and 1800 parts. The heads are 2000 as are the pistons running in overbored liners, to correct the now low compression ratio due to 2000 pistons on 1800 crank the heads were machined by 2.5mm! this gave a ratio of over 10:1 which is too high really forcing the need for octane additive or high octane pump fuel. It took a lot of work by Omicron to get the engine to run and I suspect that the chap I bought the car from suffered the water pump failure and subsequently cooked the engine. My dilema is whether I try and repair the 2000/1800 mix engine or look for a replacement 1800 unit to rebuild? I will do a compression check to determine exactly which cylinders are down first and as it appears fairly straight forward to remove the heads I will at least do an inspection and assesment. I do have a tip from the work so far; the centre section of the Flavia exhaust is the same as that on the Fulvia Coupe so much easier to find than a Flavia one!

fay66

27th June 2010, 04:09 PM

Hi Phil,
As your current engine is a bitza I would have thought it more worthwhile to get an 1800 unit to rebuild, at least that way you'd be sure of what you'd got as a solid basis for a rebuild, without having live with whatever else you might find has been done to the engine at a later date.
http://cgi.ebay.it/motore-lancia-flavia-1800-berlina-1967o-69-/140421245586?cmd=ViewItem&pt=Ricambi_automobili&hash=item20b1c22a92
Admitted not here but they are available, although it's a bit pricey.

Probably worth keeping an eye on ebay Netherlands as Flavia exhausts seem to be available http://cgi.ebay.nl/IMASAF-Auspuff-Hosenrohr-rechts-LANCIA-Flavia-1-8-NEU-/390212849886?cmd=ViewItem&pt=Autoteile_Zubeh%C3%B6r&hash=item5ada7f90de (http://cgi.ebay.nl/IMASAF-Auspuff-Hosenrohr-rechts-LANCIA-Flavia-1-8-NEU-/390212849886?cmd=ViewItem&pt=Autoteile_Zubeh%C3%B6r&hash=item5ada7f90de)
If you don't have any luck finding another engine it's probably worth speaking to the Dutch and Belgian Lancia Clubs, as I know Holland particularily have a strong Flavia Coupe following.
Brian

philm

22nd August 2010, 10:51 AM

So after a bit more investigation, the 1800/2000 engine is only running on 2 cylinders with no compression to speak of on the Nos 1 & 3 cylinders. I decided not to commit any more funds than had already been spent in the past on this hybrid engine and seek out a standard 1800 engine. I duly found someone with one for rebuild via a specialist, had it delivered and then spent a pleasant day stripping it only to find it to be a 1500......... fortuately no funds had changed hands and it seems to have been an honest mistake so a further search finally delivered up a real and complete 1800. I stripped this down and discovered water had been sat in No1 cylinder;

3000 so 3001
I have re-honed all the bores and fitted new rings and big end shells. I have to say that the Flavia engine is a delight to work on, all threads are helicoiled, copper plated head bolts along with jacking threads on the front and rear covers lovely. The rebuilt engine is due to go back in over the bank holiday weeked so fingers crossed. Here are some more images of the car;
3002300430033005

My 9 year old daughter loves it and helped repair the drivers seat squab.
http://www.lancisti.net/forum/images/misc/pencil.png

fay66

22nd August 2010, 11:44 AM

Phil,
The attachments don't work.

Brian

philm

22nd August 2010, 11:48 AM

Odd, they work for me. How should I be attaching them? I used the function in 'quick reply'. I can see them if I click on them.

fay66

22nd August 2010, 12:05 PM

Odd, they work for me. How should I be attaching them? I used the function in 'quick reply'. I can see them if I click on them.

Phil,
when I click on your attachment I get this message
"Invalid Attachment specified. If you followed a valid link, please notify the administrator (http://www.lancisti.net/forum/sendmessage.php)"
Are you using the manage attachments and the photo uploader?

Brian

philm

22nd August 2010, 01:33 PM

OK, lets try this way;

fay66

22nd August 2010, 05:54 PM

Thanks Phil,
That works for me.

Brian

philm

29th August 2010, 01:49 PM

To rebuild the 1800 engine the water damage needed cleaning up. The bore (along with the other 3) was honed and came up well except for 1 small mark. I had to have the valve seats recut to remove some pitting and re-lapped the remainder in.

The new piston rings were multi piece rings; instead of 3 single rings I had a single top ring followed by 2 cupped rings and the oil control ring comprised a stepped ring with no less than 4 single rings (2 cupped & 2 flat). I have fitted new main bearings although the removed ones were OK.

Next comes the tidying up of the ancilliaries

philm

5th December 2010, 01:56 PM

Long time since posting and a lot has gone on. Having installed the engine it stubbornly refused to start, the trials are listed in a seperate and specific thread but to sumerise I was the victim of a perfect storm of electrical mayhem>:D the spark plugs were shorting out due to having been through a parafin cleaner (my fault) with the heads. I had the distributor on 180degrees out (my fault) the I had poor leads and a failing condensor. Eventually I got it running though, after a bit of runnning the radiator burst:mad: and I had to get it recoditioned. I chose Aaron radiators in London and cannot praise them highly enough for cost, quality and speed of turnaround. Next up is carbs and cosmetics- starting with the wheels:cheers:

philm

5th December 2010, 02:07 PM

So to the wheels, getting the Wolfrace alloys off was a bit trickier than I expected as they had security wheel nuts but no adaptor or key. The security system though was pretty easy to overcome by hammering a socket on and undoing them! I managed to get hold of a set of the correct Flavia wheels and grit blasted them clean. I then sprayed them in etch primer followed by 4 coats of the correct Lancia cream or Ford Ivory as it is now called:D A set of hubcaps from eBay were sourced along with some Continental tyres with a period style tread pattern. I am still looking for a set of the chrome trims for the edge of the wheels though.

pbharcourt

5th December 2010, 03:22 PM

looking really lovely :)

fay66

5th December 2010, 04:15 PM

Pete-Bolse

5th December 2010, 04:59 PM

looking really lovely :)

X2

riczag

5th December 2010, 05:44 PM

looking really lovely :)

x3

1,6 HF

5th December 2010, 08:27 PM

perfect color for the car--stunning.

philm

8th December 2010, 02:21 PM

So, today I got notification that the Sport has been accepted for the Tour Auto 2011 in France. So the work has take on a new urgency....

ncundy

8th December 2010, 02:30 PM

Excellent, that'll be a good drive!

I was chatting to Brian Hands a couple of weeks ago - he's got plenty of Lancia experience and he was full of how his Flavia Zagato performed across Europe.

riczag

8th December 2010, 05:55 PM

So, today I got notification that the Sport has been accepted for the Tour Auto 2011 in France. So the work has take on a new urgency....

Pleased to hear that you have been accepted; as you say, this will spur you on to finnsih things.

1,6 HF

8th December 2010, 11:19 PM

So, today I got notification that the Sport has been accepted for the Tour Auto 2011 in France. So the work has take on a new urgency....

Brilliant. Congratulations!

philm

6th February 2011, 03:45 AM

Time for a bit of an update, the Sport went for it's MOT with some trepidation I must add! The work needed turned out to be pretty minor;

Headlamp out- Annoying because I had checked it the day before, turned out to be a poor connection which I then rewired back to the relay- just to be sure
Lack of a sealing filler cap- I had competely forgoten that the filler cap had been lost previously and a temporary one fitted- Soon corrected
Hand brake- Needed adjusting- Not to bad
Exhaust- Needed a rubber strap replacing.

I was pleased with the list, especially as the car had been stood for some time. So with these jobs sorted I can move on to tuning the engine properly and getting ready for the Tour Auto.