Video : Mythos Monteverdi Luxusautomobile Swiss Mad

A very nice video documentary. Unfortunately little about the Sierra though:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gTyUgM_mrw

Monteverdi Sierra press photo

I purchased this genuine press photo on Ebay

Monteverdi - Renaissance einer Legende

A small German article but with a very nice photo reportage of the museum. So just for the records:

https://www.blick.ch/auto/news_n_trends/monteverdi-renaissance-einer-legende-id2745782.html

Gas tank arrival

Jos visited the Netherlands and he brought along the gas tank. I guess some new parts are required, seals and floater unit. But I have no idea when I will find the time to get this installed. Coming weekends I'm packed ... oh well, I was never in a hurry with this project.

Maybe I first need to look into breaks so I can make an attempt to move/drive the car ... that will be another huge undertaking.

Amazing discoveries: Monteverdi Sierra + Convertible photo's

One of the sources I scavenge for information regarding items of interest is Facebook. Quite a few remarkable groups around with sometimes even more remarkable individuals on it. I guess I fit in nicely.

As such I also ended up on this page called Theo's classic cars friends. And today someone posted this unique brochure with a supporting letter in German from Peter Monteverdi. When he was a young boy he wrote them a letter and in return he got this brochure:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/515497172255683/permalink/678436449295087/

I do happen to understand a little German so I read the letter does have two color photo's about the Monteverdi Sierra enclosed. But the posting does show the Monteverdi Safari brochure instead.

As such I questioned this and after a little push these two got released:

The first one is known and used for publication. The second one however is new to me. Just did a reverse lookup but nothing is found. What  a great unique picture!

The letter is dated 4th April 1979. It was my understanding the convertible was made in 1979 but juding on the photo it's more likely autumn 1978. Difficult to asses the color of the Sierra, it looks greenish but that seems to be caused by the reflection.

Many thanks for sharing Alex, much appreciated!

Dodge Aspen Owners Manual

No time for the car today. But I did receive the Original Dodge owners manual which I ordered. Thought it might come in handy.

New belts + build up + coolant (leakage)

After last weeks success I purchased the required belts for the alternator, fan and power steering. This appeared to be quite a task as there were quite a few belt options available, for the slant-6 engine, V8 engine, with or without airco, 60A or 100A alternator and potential different size poulies used (5,2 or 5.8 Liter engine). Sigh!

But it seems like I got the right ones:

In order to fit them I had to adjust the alternator and tension it accordingly. This went pretty much ok and yes there are 2 fitted:

 The powersteering/fan belt was however a different game. In order to fit this one the tensioner bolt had to be losened up. This was another mission impossible. I used brute force and the iron bar I used last time came in handy. However this had hardly any effect. I definately did not want to damage this one. This bolt is also used to hold/tight the waterpump. I wonder if they have been using locktite on this bolt. Although I was able to make a very small movement I did not want cause any potential damage. So I left it.

 Instead I have been hitting the tensioner iron with a screwdriver and a small crowbar:

This took quite a bit of force and time but it slowly moved to the end and I was able to fit the poulie and belt. Still I sense there is too much tension on the belt but I have no further room to adjust it.

Then mounting the fan (and shroud) again. I only now noticed the strange fan blades setup, looks like one spoke is out of order?

All mounted up:

And filling up with coolant, to my surprise it seems to leak at the bottom of the radiator ????  When I had it removed it still had coolant and wasn't leaking. And when it was out I had checked it as well and all looked good (as far as I can tell).

 I had no further time to have this further inspected. And I also noticed another leakage but couldn't not spot the location - Hopefully it's not at the waterpump. Typical it leaks all spontaneous without running the engine. I was aiming to start the engine and check the powersteering functionality

Prior to this I also wanted to have the oil and filter renewed (just in case the oil is detoriated / moist and potentially cause engine damage). Something I will do in any case, I can run the engine briefly to check some functionality - in case coolant leakage is severe.

Oldtimer in Obwalden 2019

Spotted on Twitter. This is a known one. VIN 9161


https://twitter.com/LienhardRacing/status/1137724106604982273

1987 #Monteverdi Sierra
O-iO #OiO #OiOSarnen 20. Oldtimer in Obwalden 2019 pic.twitter.com/5dMDVu3o3g

— Lienhard Racing 🏁 (@LienhardRacing) 9 juni 2019

Halleluja!

Today I made another attempt to start up the engine. I still hadn't bought the "jumpstarter "(battery booster). So I used the small tractor battery which turned out to be poor again. Previous time I had tried to start it but figured the carburettor had become dirty over time. I was hoping a little new fresh benzine would have some kind of positive cleaning effect. But apparently not. So the plan was to replace the carburettor today. Some photo's I made beforehand:

Still I wanted to have a deeper inspection inside. So I removed the top but also slightly opened up the top half to check the floater (but this was only partly possible as I left al the gas-bars in place).

 All looked good and not poluted as far as I could tell. So I did put everything back. And then hooked up the battery cable to the large tractor battery. 

I also took the effort to clean the ground cable attached to the engine and mount two new battery clamps and cleaned off the corroded wires. (I also noticed another ground cable mounted between the steeringhouse and the chassis - but I did not touch that). 

The engine did turn much better now and I could see the carburettor gasket became "wet" again. Still it would not turn on somehow.

Then I recalled last week I did download the spark cable connectivity as that was something I wanted to doublecheck

And yes, it turned out that 2 & 4 were swapped but also 7 & 5 were swapped. Not sure when or who made this mistake.

When turning the ignition the engine started up in almost one go! I left it running for a few seconds only. I was baffled. After 30 years the engine ran like it was used the day before. Incredible. Hurray for robust American engines!

The following video is the 2nd start I made:

It started up so easy. And it runs so well, no hiccups or whatsoever. And to my surprise it runs idle as well. Something I never expected (all the vacuum hose rubbish is not connected or topped off - I guess I will leave it like that).

Despite the oil is/looks clean I will get it refreshed though. Also I will buy new belts for the alternator, fan and steering pump obviously. And then build it up again. I will clean the fuel line and install the gastank again (something Jos need to deliver on his next visit). Then I will try to repair the brakes as well so I can do a small test drive. Guess I will be occupied the coming months (saturdays).

And now I do have a brand new carburettor spare as well! Suppose I can reuse the gaskets at least.

For now it's time to celebrate this moment. So I will treat myself an award winning whiskey 35 YO !Sherry cask finish - by Lidl ;-)

Carburetor Carb For Dodge Chrysler 318 Engine Carter BBD Lowtop 2 Barrel V8 5.2L MB-172-HCY

Yes, the newly ordered carburettor arrived. It's an aftermarket product which fit the Chrysler 318 engines. Shipped from the US for only € 108,-  including gaskets. For this type of money I can not have the Original one overhauled. Hopefully I can mount it this weekend.

Ordered via Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075L8VKLH/ref=ppx_od_dt_b_asin_title_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Monteverdi Sierra photo's

Looks like someone took the effort to glue some photos together using photoshop. Well done:

https://en.wheelsage.org/monteverdi/sierra/8064/pictures/g76vri/

Especially these 2. The first is taken from a magazine article and consist of two parts. The other one is a scan I made from a large brochure. Both are now nicely merged together

Nailed it!

One for the memorabilia archive

Dodge Aspen : The most recalled car of all time

As known, the Monteverdi Sierra is underneath simply a Dodge Aspen / Plymouth Volare.
Till now I had only read a very few articles about it. So I extended my search a little more regarding potential problems. So I bumped into this article:

https://www.popularmechanics.com/cars/g261/4345725/?slide=5

1976 Dodge Aspen and Plymouth Volare 

Year of Recall: 1976 and 1977
There was absolutely nothing startling about how the new 1976 Dodge Aspen and Plymouth Volare twins were engineered. These compact-size coupes, sedans and wagons were strictly conventional mid-1970s cars with Chrysler's proven slant-Six or V8 engines in their noses, a unibody chassis and a strictly ordinary suspension system. But despite that, the Aspen and Volare were among the most recalled cars of all time. The 1976 versions of these two were recalled an incredible eight times by the end of 1977 by the NHTSA.

The recalls were for everything from the emissions control systems to fuel systems and seatbelt retractors. It was almost unfathomable how many screwups had been engineered into these two very ordinary cars.

Aspen and Volare owners, however, had more than just the recalls to worry about; rust was also a major problem with the twins, and various mechanical maladies seemed to strike them constantly. This was the Chrysler Corporation at its lowest ebb--the company was in danger of going bankrupt during 1978 and 1979. It was only a series of government loan guarantees, engineered by its then-new CEO Lee Iacocca, that saved Chrysler in 1979.

Or what about this review on YouTube:




“Aspen and Volaré were introduced in 1975, but they should have been delayed a full six months. The company was hungry for cash, and this time Chrysler didn't honor the normal cycle of designing, testing, and building an automobile. The customers who bought Aspens and Volarés in 1975 were  actually acting as Chrysler's development engineers. When these cars first came out, they were still in the development phase.
“Looking back over the past twenty years or so, I can't think of any cars that cased more disappointment among customers than the Aspen and the Volaré. … But the Aspen and the Volaré simply weren't well-made. The engines would stall when you stepped on the gas. The brakes would fail. The hoods would fly open. Customers complained, and more than three and a half million cars were brought back to the dealers for free repairs – free to the customer, that is. Chrysler had to foot the bill.” ---Lee Iacocca, Iacocca: An Autobiography (pg. 160) Yikes! What have we bought!? Hehe, well, let's see if we get the engine running first.

Start me up!

Well, here is the photo of the stud:

Here another photo of the starting wheel. I like the fact it also has been painted blue. I wonder why they painted the fly wheel? And perhaps difficult to see, there is this 3rd hole for another bolt. I had it removed as I mistakenly thought it was also holding the starter motor. For me it was invisible so to be sure I had it removed. So now I have put it back again. And yes, the new starter motor fits!

But first I had to test both of them. As indicated last week, looks like the old starter motor is not seized after all. And as can be seen in the video it is functioning. Although it sounded very tired:

The new one obviously worked and it was revving/whirring nicely:

But last week somehow something else must have been broken. I checked the starter motor diagram and it's very simple:

Hopefully the starter relay was not broken somehow. So I checked the fuse panel and found fuse nr 3 broken.

The description field showed many items and one of them was "ignition under the hood".
So after replacement I hooked up the new starter motor and it was whizzing!

So I mounted the new starter motor, looks a bit shiny compared with the rest:

So time for a quick test:

And yes, it's working again. So I had to put a jerrycan of gas underneath the car and put the fuelhose in it. When starting again the fuel was sucked into it, so looks like that is working as well:

The engine however would not start up and I sensed the battery used is not powerful enough. So to get the engine properly "spinning" I had all the spark plugs removed and sprayed the chambers with WD40.

I started the engine without the spark plugs and now it was revving much better.

When putting the plugs back in again, sprayed with a can of  "start pilot" into the carburettor it still didn't want to run. I checked one sparkplug and could see it gave a spark. So all ingredients are there. Not sure though about the carburettor and the mixture. Maybe something I need to look into next time. First I will purchase a proper jumpstarter for more power to start the engine.

May the force be with you!

Yes you can! I went to the DIY shop and bought this steel bar for more power:

And finally it went, the stud loosened up. Forgot to make a photo of the stud itself.

Starter finally removed and the inside of the fly wheel:

And for comparisson the old and new one next to each other. Quite a bit of difference in size. But the new one is apparently more powerful:

And it does look like it's only mounted with two screws. But I have removed in total 3 - will check it next time.

Upon checking both starters nothing happened when I hooked up the wiring of the car. UH OH!!
I suspect something else has failed. Whilst I thought the old starter motor was broken, stuck, etc I could move the little wheel, it feels it's not stuck at all. Well, I guess need to check electrics next time. On my last attempt the wiring really got hot so a lot of current must have been flowing thru it.

And earlier this week I received the following surprise. A small refund on the new starter motor! How's that!?  It costed new about € 75,- (incl. shipping from the USA to NL). But now it only costs € 62,-


We're writing to let you know we processed your refund of EUR13.08 for your Order 111-0732005-1601800 from EccppAutoParts.

This refund is for the following item(s):

    Item: Starter for Mini Mopar Dodge Plymouth 318 360 Chrysler Cordoba 5.9L Compatible with SR6504N
    Quantity: 1
    ASIN: B071L82J2T
    Reason for refund: Export fee reduced

    Here's the breakdown of your refund for this item:

        Import Fee Deposit Refund: EUR13.08

We'll apply your refund to the following payment method(s):

MasterCard Credit Card: EUR13.08