Alfa A/C (longish)

[Bill Bain <BBain@domain.elided>]

I have toyed with the idea of a Berlina with A/C.  The SPICA equipped cars
hung the A/C compressor above the alternator using a very crude bar stock
bracket that was mounted to two large studs that were added to the front of
the timing cover.  It makes the front of the engine bay very crowded,
especially in a Spider.  The original A/C compressors were piston units
(York?) and were originally designed for big old low RPM American iron.  At
least in the last year of the SPICA Spider the Sanden rotary compressor was
used with some aluminum and rubber isolation brackets bolted to the plate
that the York compressor would normally bolt to.  The Sanden compressor has
"ears" that the bolt goes through in the direction of the compressor shaft
and the brackets take the bolt and then bolt to the plate.  Because they're
aluminum and rubber they tend to break.  I had to have new ones made by a
friend in our machine shop and their observation was that Alfa used aluminum
because the originals were cast and the tooling costs for casting steel are
10x the cost for aluminum and for 4K cars, it would not be worth it,
particularly since by 1981 Alfa knew they were going to the Bosch FI system
anyway.  The original Alfa bracket and A/C arrangement is pretty kludgy and
the York compressors have, I understand, a less than sterling longevity
because they were not designed for high RPM.  If I've gotten any of this
wrong, more knowledgeable folks feel free to jump in.

It's my understanding that until 1983, all Alfa A/C was dealer installed.
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but my experience has been that
dealer-installed anything varies widely in quality and finding the "kit" to
install a dealer installed option might be hard.  That being the case, I
think a more elegant solution would be as follows:
1.	Replace the SPICA with carbs and use a later timing cover from a
Bosch injected Spider that has the "ears" for mounting the A/C on the intake
side of the engine.  The Bosch timing covers don't have the holes for the
SPICA pump.  Normally I wouldn't recommend replacing the SPICA with carbs,
but desperate times require desperate measures!  Also you can then use a GTA
airbox   I'm assuming that there's nothing in the GTV's body work or
suspension that would get in the way.  :-)
2.	The Sanden rotary compressor was/is widely used on other cars
besides Alfas (Volvos?), so rebuilds (or new, I suppose) should be pretty
easy to find and service.
3.	Aftermarket underdash A/C evaporators, etc. were pretty commonly
available in the late 60s and early 70s and can probably be found at most
American old car shows.  JC Whitney may even still hve them :-)  They would
look right for the period.
4.	Get a qualified auto A/C shop to plumb the whole thing.  Might as
well go for R134a.

The advantage of doing it this way is that if you keep the parts you took
off, the car hasn't been trashed for restoration purposes later if needed.

My $0.02!


Bill Bain

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