[alfa] valve adjustment woes

[Scott Johnson <scott@xxxxxxxx>]

Well, now that winter seems to have settled in in earnest around here, I 
decided to check the valve clearances on the ol' 71 spider. The last 
valve adjustment was 7 years (but only ~ 25k miles) ago, so I figured it 
was probably due. Sure enough, out-of-bounds:

Intake:
.014
.015
.016
.013

Exhaust
.017
.016
.016
.016

Worse, the main link on the cam chain (gah... whatever it's actually 
called) doesn't show up when the motor is TDC. Not *particuarly* 
surprising, since the PO of the car left out such "extras" as the lock 
tabs on the cam sprockets (discovered during the last valve adjustment).

Also, I'm a little confused about the cam timing.. When the disty is 
pointing at #1, the pointer on the crank pulley is pointing at an "M" 
mark (I hope that means "maximo" or something... can't find my stupid 
reference book), and both valves are closed the cam lobes are nowhere 
near to pointing straight out. This may just be the way an injected 1750 
is supposed to be, since the timing marks are awfully close at this point.

Anyway: is there a "right" way to get the main link back to TDC where 
it's supposed to be? Does it matter that much?

Finally, when I pulled the radiator out much to my surprise the bottom 
1/3rd of the radiator shroud was just gone. It *looked* cut, but I 
wanted to ask you folks if this was stock or perhaps some sort of mod to 
make it easier to R&R. Certainly the bottom 2 nuts on the shroud were a 
bear to get at.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give! :)

Scott Johnson
71 1750 Spider
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