Re: alfa-digest V7 #1156 Weber vs. Spica

[Scott Fisher <sefisher@domain.elided>]

Grinch once again writes (in response to my original comments in
quotes):

> "Alfa (or at least Autodelta) certainly believed in Spica; starting in
> March 1968, all the 105 racing coupes went over to Spica, dropping the
> twin Webers in favor of the more precise fuel metering that the
> mechanical fuel injection offered..." is (again) absurdly incorrect.

I'm home now, and have located the source of this absurdity: John
Tipler's book "Giulia Coupe GT & GTA" (Veloce Publishing, 1992; ISBN
1-874105-71-5).  On page 51, in Chapter III: "GTA, The Racer's Coupe,"
he writes:

  The GTAm, an American tale

  The version known as the GTAm was brought out in 1970, based 
  directly on the US-spec 1750 GTV.  There is a little confusion
  over what GTAm stands for; some would have it that the "m"
  stands for "maggiore," or greater, which is to say, enlarged.
  However, the official version, which can be found in the Alfa
  magazine _Il Quadrifoglio_, October 1969, and indeed the
  contemporary homologation papers, is that the "Am" part is
  an abbreviation for "America," because the car used a version
  of the Spica fuel injection fitted to US-specification cars.
  Autodelta GTAs had been using fuel injection since March 1968.

On the following page, there's a photograph with the caption on p. 52:

  The GTA's twin-plug head endowed it with 115 bhp at 6000 RPM
  in standard trim; an Autodelta-tuned engine was good for
  175bhp.  This unit has fuel injection which Autodelta used from
  March 1968.

Page 71, "1968: mixed fortunes and strong competition," describes the
1968 Monza 4 Hours race, calling it the "season opener":

  ...The works GTAs, on the other hand, now with fuel injection,
  looked better bets for reliability and drivability over a 
  long-distance race.  And so it worked out for, despite leading
  much of the first two hours, Bianchi [in a GTA-SA--sf] 
  retired with a broken throttle linkage [...] Nevertheless,
  there were sufficient GTAs left for Alfa to take the first
  three places.

Later, on pages 148-151, the book reprints the original FIA homologation
papers for the GTAm.  The first page of the homologation papers says,
"La costruzione del modello descritta nella presente scheda e iniziata
il [left blank-sf] 19 [blank-sf] e la serie minima di 1000 esemplari
identici e conformi alle caratteristiche qui riportate, e stati
raggiunta il 31 Iuglio [sic] 1969.  Omologazione valida dal 1.10 1969
Lista 69/7."  (My Italian, which is very passable in cookbooks, menus
and musical scores, gives an approximate translation of this as: "The
construction of the model described in this present sheet [?] was begun
on [date left blank], 19[blank], is the minimum series of 1000 identical
examples, conforming to the characteristics reported here, and was
rejoined [?] on July 31 1969."  (I've indicated by question marks the
places where I *KNOW* I'm not sure of the translation; I'm reasonably
sure I've botched "raggiunta," for example, and would gratefully accept
a closer translation from someone more Italophonic than I.)

On page 150 of Tipler's book (page 7 of the homologation papers), he
includes the following section which pertains to this discussion:

  INIEZIONE (se prevista):
    220.  Marca pompa        SPICA
    221.  Numero stantuffi     4
    222.  Modello e tipo pompa  AIBB.4C.S.75 a stantuffi a 
             portata variabile [on single line in orig. -sf]
    223.  Numero totale iniettori   4
    224.  Sistemazione iniettori     nei condotti di aspirazione
    225.  Diametro condotto d'alimentazione nel punto di
             sezione minima    32mm     1,259 in

So a closer reading of the documents leaves us with January 10, 1969 as
the initial homologation date of at least some of the Spica-equipped
GTAm cars, with two assertions in the body of the text that Spica was
used by Autodelta the preceding March and one reference to the
Monza-winning GTAs as using fuel injection.

So there's certainly ample documentation for my comment to Les about
racing applications of the Spica beginning with Autodelta in the late
1960s.  Tipler could well be wrong; I know I've found errors of fact in
marque histories (don't get me started on how many coffee-table books
reprint the old lie about Cecil Kimber's 1924 Land's End trial car being
"the first production MG [sic];" it is, of course, neither a production
car, an M.G., nor the first.  But I digress.)  But I would think that
Ford, BMW, and the other competitors at the time would have had
something to say had the cars not shown up in homologated form.

> The first Autodelta-prepared cars using fuel injection systems 
> didn't use the Spica system either; they used modified Lucas
> rotary-distribution pumps as fitted (for example) on the Tipo 33
> entries at Sebring and Daytona in 1969. I was there. 

You have me there.  In 1969 I merely knew I would one day have an Alfa
coupe; I had no idea it would cause such international controversy...
:-)  

Thanks very much for encouraging accuracy on the Digest -- and please,
*do* tell us your stories!

- --Scott Fisher

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