Beta 2000 crankshaft - compatability with other Fiat/Lancia

[AndriyM]

Hi, that's my first post here :)

I bought a severely tortured Beta HPE 2000 a week ago. Mismaintainance and neglection of "Italians" are the common feature in this part of the world. What was really bad news is that crankshaft needs replacement.

I asked our spare parts shops for a new one (waiting for the info on availability and... price 8O ) but there is a ray of hope from the scrapeyards to the south of our country. I don't think they might have Betas there but maybe the crankshaft from the other Fiat/Lancia engines will do?

[omicron]

What is wrong with your crank.

I have two cranks which can be used.

Andrew

[Hamish]

I'm not too sure on this one..... if the crank is goosed it's a fair chance the oil pump is too :evil: and they are both expensive and hard to find these days 8O

I think you can fit the Strada/Ritmo 125 or 130 TC crank to a Beta with minima modification but I'm not 100% sure.... that said there are enough Beta engines still around that someone somewhere - like Andrew for example - will be able to do you an affordable deal on a secondhand crank.

Although there are strong similarities between the Fiat/Lancia twincam, the Lancia development of the Fiat unit is sufficiently different to make 'swaps' of internal 'organs' tricky.
There's an idea... someone should produce a guide of exactly what you can take from one Fiat/Lancia engine and fit to another :idea:

[rossocorsa]

I suspect you would have more success trying to find one in Germany or maybe Poland, I've been to Ukraine a few times and wherever I am I always look out for Italian cars, never seen much in the way of lancia or Fiat of this sort of age although I've seen quite a few more modern ones (lybra, ypsilon, zeta etc)

[andybeta]

Can't you use a Fiat 131 or 132 crank as a substitute as I have been told all 2 litre cranks are essentially the same.

Andy

[AndriyM]

What is wrong with your crank.

I have two cranks which can be used.

Andrew
My crank is worn beyond repair sizes and bended. I just bought this car and immediatly started repair - it had bad times here.

How much are the cranks? :wink:

I also found a crank from Lancia Scorpion - but it is in the US and delivery costs more than crank itself :lol:

2 rossocorsa: Yes, we do not have vintage Lancia's here - mine would be the first in the city :wink: . Vast majority are though Themas, Dedras and Prismas. A month ago I have seen 3 Integrales - one is surely Evo3 Martini. There is also a Beta Coupe'75 in the second largest city of Ukraine. It belonged to - Brezhnev (head of USSR in 64-81)!

[AndriyM]

BTW, a friend of mine got a Guy Croft's "Modifying and tuning Fiat/Lancia twin-cam engines". It says that the crankshaft is the same for 2-liter 131/132/Beta :!:

[rossocorsa]

2 rossocorsa: Yes, we do not have vintage Lancia's here - mine would be the first in the city :wink: . Vast majority are though Themas, Dedras and Prismas. A month ago I have seen 3 Integrales - one is surely Evo3 Martini. There is also a Beta Coupe'75 in the second largest city of Ukraine. It belonged to - Brezhnev (head of USSR in 64-81)!

I am told that there's a Thesis in Lvov.

With regards to the crank second hand should not be expensive but even in europe shipping will be expensive due to the weight involved

[SubGothius]

I have to wonder if you might find a compatible crankshaft from a Lada -- the Soviet-era Russian clone of the FIAT 124 sedan -- but then again, I don't know if any of those even used the DOHC engine (let alone the 1995cc variety!), or if all/most Ladas used the older 124s' pushrod engine design... Something to investigate, at least!

Incidentally, the Lada is why early Betas (along with many FIATs) had unibody panels made of that rust-prone soft steel; FIAT apparently got that sheetmetal cheaply as part of the deal licensing the 124 sedan design to the Soviets and helping them set up the factory to build them.

Speaking of Russian clones, I sure wish I could afford to buy a Ural (or Dnepr!) motorcycle with sidecar -- it's essentially a Weimar-era BMW boxer-twin design cloned by the Russians to counter the Nazis' motorbike advantage during WWII, then continuously produced and refined for both military and civilian use over the following decades! :twisted:

[AndriyM]

I have to wonder if you might find a compatible crankshaft from a Lada -- the Soviet-era Russian clone of the FIAT 124 sedan -- but then again, I don't know if any of those even used the DOHC engine (let alone the 1995cc variety!), or if all/most Ladas used the older 124s' pushrod engine design... Something to investigate, at least!

No-no, Lada's were 1600cc max:wink: . Though, unlike old 124 engines, they are OHC, no push-rods. No DOHC was produced by Russans in XX century - only some new Lada's have 16-valve heads :lol: The crank from Lada would have been a VERY easy and cheap solution, but it is not :wink:

Ural and Dnepr are VERY poor in quality, I tell you. Would suit just as a decoration of a biker's of WWII enthusiast's house :lol:

[A1.6HPE]

Hello AndriyM,
A company in Turkey (Tofas or something like that) have only recently stopped making Fiat 131s - perhaps some of these found their way across the Black Sea. I believe that the crankshaft from the later Fiat/Lancia 4 cylinder engines also fit the earlier ones. So if you can find any car with a 2 litre twin cam then you will be ok. The later ones have a left-hand thread bolt to hold on the crankshaft pulley instead of the nut.

Best bet would be to come to the UK for a holiday and get a crankshaft from Omicron (or even buy a nice Lancia and drive it home).

Leo

[rossocorsa]

Best bet would be to come to the UK for a holiday and get a crankshaft from Omicron (or even buy a nice Lancia and drive it home).

Leo

Leo it's not so easy for ukranian nationals to get visas to the UK and they have stupid rules that forbid importing cars over 7 years old if I remember right. Keeps plenty of 20 to 30 year old moskvich and lada on the road over there because they can't buy a cheap old second hand car from Germany

[AndriyM]

Leo it's not so easy for ukranian nationals to get visas to the UK and they have stupid rules that forbid importing cars over 7 years old if I remember right. Keeps plenty of 20 to 30 year old moskvich and lada on the road over there because they can't buy a cheap old second hand car from Germany
Yep, it's true. I have been two times to London, both on the business trip. But that times I drove a BMW :wink: And we really have this stupid rule - only 8 year old cars or fresher are permitted for imports :evil:

[Pope1]

Bit off-topic, but now in Barbados we can only import cars that are 4years or less and they have to have new tyres as well. It's one way to cure the Lancia bug - I no longer look through the club magazine and wonder whether I should get another :o . At the same time, I've given up any aspirations of ever owning a Porsche 911 unless I return to the UK. Over here, the duty and import taxes on cars over 1800cc amounts to about 200%. No I don't mean 20%, yes it really is 200% duty when you add up all the bits and pieces.

[AndriyM]

The situation resolved 2 weeks ago - I bought a complete engine with wire and ECU, gearbox and fsuspension from a '82 HPE 2000ie right HERE in Ukraine. Sounds like a miracle. And the camshaft there is in good condition. So we get down to restoration :wink:

[Pope1]

Excellent news! Good luck with the restoration and don't throw ANYTHING away if possible. If you live far away from sources of spares, you never know when you might have to restore something that you don't need today.

[A1.6HPE]

Excellent news! Keep us posted with news of the transplant. Are you going to install the IE engine or just use its crankshaft? I once put an IE engine into a carburettor car. Only real problem was that I had to replace the fuel return pipe as that is a larger diamter on the IE cars. However the carburettor car was also a S3 car so it had the wiring in place for the fuel pump. You will have to make that up.

Leo

[AndriyM]

Excellent news! Keep us posted with news of the transplant. Are you going to install the IE engine or just use its crankshaft? I once put an IE engine into a carburettor car. Only real problem was that I had to replace the fuel return pipe as that is a larger diamter on the IE cars. However the carburettor car was also a S3 car so it had the wiring in place for the fuel pump. You will have to make that up.

Leo
Thanks. Yep, that's an issue. I am going to the repair works tomorrow to check what we have got in the big cardboard box :wink: I am more biased towards i.E. but who knows - maybe I won't like the cost of this update. The Weber carb is OK and it was running when I bought the car so maybe I will start with carb and put off the i.E. decision.