[alfa] New milano, old milano

[Carson or Wendy <dammwood@xxxxxxx>]

Well, I finally got my hands on a 3 liter milano. It was an adventure, 
starting with Ebay.... :-) I laugh at myself for this. Randomly came 
across a listing that just said "Alfa Milano" and was already in Canada 
but it had the serial number which from one of J.H.'s long ago posts 
told me this car was once a verde. Using good old Ebay stratagy I didn't 
bid until the last minute... This of course was after having a brief 
conversation with the darlink wif about the possible benifits of 
combining the parts of two cars (my plat and this verde) to make one 
really good milano??? Bless her she didn't say no, well she didn't say 
anything.... I won the auction, I was actually the only one to bid, how 
come no bidding wars on old mystery milano's.... Talked with the seller, 
he was kind enough to answer some of my previous questions five hours 
after the auction ended and he had a feedback of 0 even though he had 
been a member for over a year.... Was able to pay with plastic as he is 
a business owner in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Remarkably he did a good job 
of being a seller, got some quotes for shipping and dropping it of 
within 12 hours of me making my decision on which way to go. Excellent 
shipper, used L. Hansens, was able to track it online across the 
country. Had it delivered to the italian car place in Edmonton and went 
and picked it up just yesterday. In my plan for the 2 car to one theory 
the ebay car would be a bit of a clunker, all I really wanted was the 
engine with associated bits plus the seats. Unfortunately it is in 
fairly good condition, and it's black :-) with no rust in the rear wheel 
arches, under the tail lights or on the trunk lid. Unfortunately too is 
the transaxle is fantastic, shifts smooth and the LSD works as 
advertized. Both ABS lights work too. :-0 There is some rust underneath 
but it's out of sight, attack that with a welder later. The great guys 
at Ital motors in Edmonton whipped it up on the hoist, pointed out a few 
things then off we were back home. It's 500km from edmonton to here. 
Wasn't feeling too good about it in the beginning, the hood wouldn't 
latch well and the oil pressure indicator was lacking life. Fixed the 
hood thing on the side of the road, turns out it was just the arrow head 
thing needed to be turned in a whole bunch. First time I have driven a 3 
liter, man is it ever geared tall. The throttle was all screwed up too. 
There was a whole bunch of freeplay in the travel and no power. Somebody 
put the spring clip on the wrong side of the bracket so the whole outer 
shieth was moving about, fixed that on the side of the road too. Sure 
was nice to see that "3.0" casting on the back of the pass side head. I 
never know until then if it actually had a 3 liter engine in it, I had 
thoughts of a 2.5 being stuffed in after a timing belt incident. Going 
to load in one of my daughters and go give it a bath after it's trip 
accross the country, besides right now I am a pretty happy camper.
--
Carson Damm
Ft. McMurray, AB
Canada

04 Volvo V70R
88 Alfa Milano Verde
87 Alfa Milano Platinum
81 Fiat X1/9
77 Alfa Spider
61 Alfa Giulietta spider
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