Re: alfa-digest V9 #429

[Iopsycheng@xxxxxxx]

Dean and John,
I've got a news flash for you two... I'm not defending the mechanic who 
claimed an Alfa spider jumped the timing chain but I can tell you from 
personal experience that losing the timing belt in a 2.5 liter GTV-6 at 6250 
RPM will NOT necessarily destroy the entire engine. At 53,000 miles I 
stripped 50% of the cogs off of the timing belt while charging up an on ramp. 
I had just hit the rev limiter when the failure took place... The engine died 
immediately. I tore the heads down and sent them off to Sperry for an 
upgrade. As a professional machinist I have access to any precision measuring 
and testing equipment imaginable and I and a qualified NDT inspector. The 
only damage to the engine was three bent intake valves and a minor nick in 
the top of #4 piston. ALL other reciprocating and rotating parts were 
undamaged! I reassembled the engine using the original pistons, liners, 
pushrods, connecting rods and cam followers. Currently the engine has over 
100,000 miles and you can ask anyone in the Mid-Atlantic Alfa Club's 
Tidewater branch or Georgian Gaz and they will tell you my GTV-6 runs just 
fine and will still turn to the limit any and every time I so desire. It does 
now wear a mechanical belt tensioner and the belt gets swapped yearly... 
Cheaper that way!
Thomas Gonnella
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