re: 73 & 74 spider differences

[Scott Fisher <sfisher71@domain.elided>]

--- Keith Savage <ksavage68@domain.elided> wrote:
> 
> One thing I am sure of that wasnt mentioned
> is that on the 73 car
> the emblems on the back are "2000" on the left side
> over the taillight, and
> "Alfa Romeo" script over the right tailight. The 74
> car adds the "inezione"
> and "2000" over the left tail light.

Interesting... while it has the Alfa Romeo script over
the right tail light, my '74 Spider has only the word
"iniezione" over the left tail light ("what year
Innie-zone IS that, mister?" -- a question that
Keith's car answers!).  I'm looking at a digital photo
of the rear of the car as I write this; you can look
at it here:

http://sfisher.best.vwh.net/classics/verde/rr_alfa.jpg

Don't you just hate it when the factory puts stuff on
the cars without bothering to check whether it's
correct for that year? :-)

> Also, the location of the "fasten seat belt" warning
> lamp on the center
> console was changed in 74 to add a "exhaust temp"
> lamp.

So does my '74, but the dash and console on my car (as
well as the seats) are from a later Spider; I am
missing, for example, not only the nifty chrome trim
rings around the gas, oil pressure, and temperature
gauges, but also the Spica pressure light.  In the
other Bosch-equipped cars (none of them Spiders) that
I have owned or now own, the EXH light is actually
connected to a mileage counter, meant to remind the
owner to replace the oxygen sensor at a fixed
interval.  I don't know whether the light serves as an
exhaust-temperature light on Bosch-equipped Spiders.

> My 73 has a plain
> black shift knob with shift pattern engraved in it,
> where the 74 had a plain
> wooden knob.

Can't help.  Aftermarket knob (really nice one,
though!), held on with three tiny Allen-head grub
screws at 120-degree intervals around the base of the
shaft, with a black ABS trim ring that clips into
place to cover them.  When the shifter works slightly
loose, it vibrates at exactly 4000 RPM with a sound
roughly equivalent to bead-blasting your wisdom teeth
with a mixture of fingernails and chalkboards.  The
appropriate sized Allen wrench (I *think* it's 3mm,
but don't go buy one on my account) will now be in my
long-distance touring kit.

> both have wood steering wheels.

As the poetic Mr. Cantrell has said (now I wish I
*had* been able to meet up with him at the AROO tour
after I left the Ashland Shakespeare Festival last
October, I could truly say I'd gone from Bard to
verse...), there seem to be at least two different
colors of wood used on the otherwise similar wood
steering wheels on his '72 and my '74, with Joe's a
light red-gold like maple and mine a dark, almost
mahogany red, darker than the cherry used in my desk. 
Otherwise, the spoke shape and matte silver finish are
the same; I know my wheel has "Alfa Romeo" cast into
one of the lateral spokes, and "Personal" cast into
the other.  

> Can anyone add anything else?

Only that the door mirrors on my car are known to be
non-original, so please don't ascribe them to a
model-year variation.  One day I'll chuck them and put
on something more to my liking (Talbot racing mirrors
are at the current top of the list).  I'm also
reasonably sure that the headlamp covers in the
picture (of the rear?  Oh -- same URL as above, but
look at lf_alfa.jpg and rf_alfa.jpg) were added by a
previous owner, as U.S. cars were generally not
equipped with them, and the fixing kit that I bought
from Rainer Hurtienne's Web site recently is subtly
different from what was on the Spider when I bought
it.  Better, though, which is the point.

--Scott Fisher
  Tualatin, Oregon
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