GTV-Spyder - Shake, Rattle and Roll

[jamieboy]

There's a Spider buyer's guide over on alfaowner.com.

It's not been updated for a while but worth a look, even if only to check the spelling...

[combine]

My brother has just bought a '91 Alfa spyder , in green , his third , also has a gtv 2 litre . In San Fran.

[wadgebeast]

That's a good price for a car with quite a low mileage. I paid more for mine with 62k on it, but it's a 99 so the interior is nicer and better specced.

Check the rear suspension for knocking as the bushes wear out relatively quickly and very expensively. apart from that, as long as it's had the cambelt changed recently you shouldn't have any major problems apart from ubiquitous italian electrics.

[jimmyjam]

Come on chaps.....Its Spider, not Spyder!

[P700DEE]

Had a 96 for five years. Watch for rear suspension bushes and make sure the CAM belt is changed
Are you asking about original (The Graduate Spider)or the later cars which ran from 95-03 (?) Sportsalfa.com is the place for info.

[herbialfa]

Front Upper & lower strut braces will help remove a lot of the niggles!

[RichB]

herbialfa said:

Front Upper & lower strut braces will help remove a lot of the niggles!

Lower strut brace? Where does that fit?
p.s. Here's mine, a 3.0 V6

LA the best advice I can give is to get onto the SportsAlfa chat forum, there are several P’Headers on there but of course, it’s all Alfa GTV, Spider, GT and recently Brera. There’s archives full of stuff about strut braces, sports exhausts, lowering springs, trick induction kits (they have a tendency to kill the AFM) and other tuning stuff plus stuff on how to improve the stereo and a gallery etc. The 2.0 is one of the best rev’ing 4 pot I’ve ever driven so don’t be shy to rev it hard in each gear and it will reward you with the most glorious engine note. The V6 is significantly quicker and I managed to surprise a 911 on our convoy down to Le Mans last year when I took Boris instead of the Griff. The only Achilles heel with each of mine has been the servo for the electric hood which is amusing since the parts are Bosch not Italian yet the still manage to fail. Rgds Rich…

Edited by RichB on Thursday 13th December 07:36

[pdV6]

euroboy said:

It seems most of the questionable parts on the Spider are Bosch!! (AFM etc)

It does seem that way.

euroboy said:

The other thing to watch (through personal experience) is the immobiliser/ECU. I had to replace mine earlier in the year; not only did I have to wait 3 months for the parts from Alfa I had to pay the thick end of 1k for the priviledge

That sounds more like bad luck than anything; most of the replacement ECUs you hear about are because the owner's lost the master key and then subsequently lost the 'normal' key too and can't get replacements cut.

euroboy said:

I still stand by the statement that they are great cars though!

+1,000,000

[RichB]

Los Angeles said:

their new sparkling showroom opened in Colinton, Edinburgh.

So... you back in the UK? Didn't you have a Griff?

[herbialfa]

RichB I have them fitted to my 156 2L

Maybe the configuration on the 3.0L V6 is different.

strutbracer.co.uk is the best place for them!

[herbialfa]

remove the undertray ... if one is fitted.

if you look at the lower wishbone mounting points .... it goes between the FRONT mounting point ...stops them from flexing ..... i found i had to remove ONE washer from each bolt in order to get enough thread

[pdV6]

Have a look at the classifieds on SportsAlfa.com; cherished examples often pop up on there.

[pdV6]

Los Angeles said:

Must find one with glass sunroof. (Yanks often call'em moon roofs.)

Don't know how tall you are, but I've driven one with a sunroof and wouldn't be able to live with the reduced headroom for more than a few miles (I'm 6'2&quot