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Edd couldn’t be bought. Has my respect


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Ah, I thought that looked uncannily like the old Ford V4. I had no idea Saab used those. Bloody awful engines! Paxolin timing gear that used to wear stupidly quickly, the most ridiculous distributor drive known to man that half the time ended up with the hex drive rod ending up in the sump if you had to take th dizzy out, poorly cooled cylinder heads and bad valve burn, my favourite one was the fuel pump. It sat on the very front and was driven by a cam on the front of the camwheel, meaning the lever arm on the pump was about a foot long. By the time the movement reached the pump, it was tiny, so any wear in the pivot soon ended up with no fuel delivery. Damned things used to stall all the time as a consequence. I mastered the technique of whipping out the pump and bending the lever arm just enough to get going again. Overall, a heavy, gutless, noisy unreliable clunker.

Classic dilemma for a small car manufacturer like Saab. Forced with replacing the venerable 3 cylinder two stroke power unit I imagine they chose the Taunus V4 because its small overall dimensions fitted the limited engine compartment or possibly because Ford Germany were the only company prepared to supply them.
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evidently in the search for a 4stroke engine the following prototypes were built before fixing on the ford power plant.
Three different installations were made:

- Lloyd Arabella engine of 897 cc and 45 hp. Lloyd, who had been fitted in Borgward, went bankrupt in 1961, but the car was built until 1963.

- Morris Mini Minor engine of 848 cc and 33 hp. This was a transverse installation of a complete drive assembly with gearbox mounted in the engine crankcase.



- Lancia Appia engine of 1089 cc and 48 hp The engine, which was a 10 ° V engine between the cylinder pairs, had a common cylinder head and two low-mounted camshafts. The engine was modern design with blocks, caps and oil pumps made of aluminum.

the Appia engine would have been great!
1959_LANCIA_APPIA_SEDAN_III_SERIES_60hp_ENGINE_TYPE_81400_1100cc_4.jpg


With a narrow V a single cylinder head was employed

engine%20head%20appia%201%20...-620x620.jpg

this CH design was later used by VAG in their VR5 AND VR6 models and survives in their W12 engines.
Plus ca change plus c'est la meme chose!
 
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I was going to suggest the Fulvia engine! I'm going to take a wild guess that you are a Saab fan Graeme :) I never quite made it into a Saab, although I did come close once or twice.

There was the Saab 9000/Thema/164/Tipo crossover too wasn't there. And Lancia used the PRV V6 for a while too.

Been some odd partnerships over the years.....
 
It wouldn't surprise me if Saab re-engineered a lot of the V4 engine. Just as they did with all other technologies they borrowed and shared over the years. It seems that that ethos was what contributed to their eventual downfall.

I have to respect them for that.
 
It wouldn't surprise me if Saab re-engineered a lot of the V4 engine. Just as they did with all other technologies they borrowed and shared over the years. It seems that that ethos was what contributed to their eventual downfall.

I have to respect them for that.

Given their reputation, I can't imagine they didn't do something to improve the V4 now you mention it. To be fair, it wouldn't have been hard to make it into a much better proposition.
 
I was going to suggest the Fulvia engine! I'm going to take a wild guess that you are a Saab fan Graeme :) I never quite made it into a Saab, although I did come close once or twice.

There was the Saab 9000/Thema/164/Tipo crossover too wasn't there. And Lancia used the PRV V6 for a while too.

Been some odd partnerships over the years.....
Not to be a pedant or anything, but the fourth car in the Type 4 chassis group was the Fiat Croma. If I recall correctly, all but the Alfa shared the same front doors as well as platform.

I was a Saab fan for a long time and still have an 87 900i in the drive for eventual (!!!) restoring! :D
 
Be a pedant! The internet needs more pedants I think. Apologies for the duff gen as well.

I had a couple of 164s and Themas at various times. Should have had a 9000 to complete the set ;)
 
I can't get into this series, too much seems overly staged, can't be doing with everything in USD and the endless need to explain the simplest of things.
 
I can't get into this series, too much seems overly staged, can't be doing with everything in USD and the endless need to explain the simplest of things

It is made to suit the average American IQ ;)
 
When I heard Edd saying “fenders” a little part of me died


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Why remove and replace the engine and trans but not repair the leaking manifold at the same time? Or did I miss that bit?

He slipped it in very very quickly " We replaced the gaskets cured the leak" I just caught it and thought when did he do that ? I would have liked to see the engine come out again and what he did to it?, when did they have the interior done?, I'm sure Edd made a hood lining like that once ? but nope there was a full ten minutes on stretching, shrinking and use of an English wheel they just cut to much of the nitty gritty out.

I watched the two last night desperately trying to get into it after reading this thread again, and it is now off the recording list I felt like i had just watched West Coast Customs ... Here's a car, here's fifty grands worth of parts and here is what it looks like after, look how happy Justin Bieber is.
 
Even though it did descend somewhat into featuring more of the “characters” than the engineering and craft, I enjoyed Bitchin’ Rides.

If you look really closely, you can spot all manner of things that have been done on WD that they don’t mention whatsoever. I think the cars end up being actually pretty good, but we don’t get to see the whole story as it’s deemed of no interest.
 

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