Classic Fiat 500 upgrade part 1. Engine gets removed but what horrors are hiding inside?

Well welcome to a new Harry's Garage video and yes we are not in a garage we are just up the road from King's Cross right in the centre of London because I'm at Arpareti Limited who specialised in Fiat 500s, classic Fiat 500s and if you might have watched one of my videos earlier just before Christmas where we tried to get the engine going on our classic Fiat 500 I mentioned then I'm going to have an engine change on it and have a fettle of that car in 2024 and that's about what we're going to do. The car came down here a couple of days ago. Steph Peretti is behind in the workshop here this is a very busy workshop it took months to get this car booked in and you'll see why how much work is happening behind this curtain when we go through there and yesterday he gave me a call he's got the engine out and there's a few surprises that we're going to discuss so in this video we're going to have a look at that discuss what we're going to do with the car just get a sense of the magic at this plate. Next year is their 60th anniversary of being on this site fettling classic Fiat 500s but also Fulvias they got into Lancia Integrales all sorts of things right in the centre of London let's go inside. Steph thank you for the invite what a place this is so many things to see and look at it's one of these yeah charging mirror we just don't see them do so this is a this is a sort of Fiat 500 is like mine today oh it's gone it's an early one then they're all suicidal oh are they yeah right right to the end yeah so this is the practical one with lots of space in it isn't it this is the estate version yeah so to make it useful yeah they made the engine flat yeah and that's still a 500cc yeah it's still 500cc they didn't uprate it even though it's a bit bigger and things no no it's a heavier vehicle yeah so yeah it's slower um and very noisy right is it i have to say when i was at primary school there was a mum who delivered the kids in one of these yeah yeah i used to see it outside she's a big lady as well well you look big in one of these anyway don't know because they're tiny but yeah i want to see how you've been getting on yeah quite busy haven't you yeah good progress it sort of looks normal this is this is so annoying on mine i would because it hasn't got the handle so no isn't it yeah but uh the engine is missing oh looks i have to say it's quite tidy that it's no oil leaks coming off the oh that's loose is it no that's normal yeah that is normal i mean it'll be worth what while we have it out it'll be worth changing the oil seal yes right put shaft seal there yeah while we're there and it's straightforward coming out was it yeah it was pretty pretty yeah pretty i can't say i can't say there were any difficulties taking it out no you've done a few haven't you just a few yeah so yeah just a little bit of history to what happens here then it was set up by your father yeah my dad um he set it up in 1965 on these premises yeah um didn't have a the yard at the time but just had the workshop so now he's got the yard and he's been doing fits since well since he was a kid so that was yeah they when these were new they were like yeah 500 pounds weren't they i seem to remember that's all yeah they were and there were a few around and i was always surprised how many he saw obviously initially they were just everywhere yeah but no he's i mean he always had he always had a client list of 500 600s much rarer yeah yeah and then you got into other few other cars temptation of other things wasn't there you did yeah um bit of abarth racing and yeah 600 abarth thousand tc yeah did some racing um but uh yeah it's really the our heart is with the with the classic 500s yeah yeah well that's why i came here because yeah i just thought this is a great place to do and i just wanted to enhance the engine slightly and uh yeah 595 competition so you're doing modern fiats here as well though yeah we do we just love the brand i i just dropped by here the other day you're saying you you are the only people who can service fiat inside london now which not the only people but we seem to be them yeah there's not many there's no dealers anymore i can't believe that because they were everywhere there's a twin air engine down there isn't there just yeah yeah really clever engine they are that one they are when they work when they work well yeah well i love this and a gtv of 1600 is it 17 gt junior 1600 1600 with the engine just hanging there so you know where it is yeah anyway oily bits yeah here it is all in pieces it doesn't take long really we're 500 no but no yeah it's just yeah if you know how to do it it's it's fairly quick yeah so air cool so there's all the colors over there yeah it's almost i always think motorbike like very yeah very similar now when i put it on the trailer i noticed it was dripping petrol and it was all very odd i mean this this is more like fuel than oil that is yeah so some that came out the sump so that yeah that's not good fortunately it has not run we did start in the garage but very quickly didn't do anything but that's caused by the carburetor sort of overflown i think yeah just it's been siphoning through not good but luckily didn't it wasn't run with it no so no damage that i could see it's a funny engine it's because when i bought this is the original i bought it at auction 14th of october 2015 gosh it was the general police of palermo who had this car and um personally account of the current total mileage of 30 000 kilometers so i i have no idea if any of this is true but we'll go into other details how much wear was on this engine what you've seen so far well i mean the evidence is it's been rebuilt so which is so it's so it's impossible to tell no well if i go through the video sorry go through the auction description the other bit was the vendor a friend of the general of police um never doing it it could the car has lived among the general's collection of some 250 specialist vehicles what sort of general police has a 250 specialist vehicles and among his 30 strong staff i engineers with 50 years of experience of the model and in recent times it's had plenty of attention so we do wonder if they've someone has obviously fettled this engine without a doubt without a doubt which i sort of well yeah we ought to explain yeah viewers what what you've discovered so what we've discovered is it's not a fiat 500 engine yeah um the the uh the block is right um but what they've done is they've put new liners in and new pistons so they've gone up to 594 cc 594 right cc right because i was coming in that was the conversion i hoped you were going to do on it well yeah we discussed yeah but we're already there indeed and how new are the pistons and how long has that been in there do you think well i think it's been in there quite a while but i don't think it's covered that many miles it's got this one i mean that's i've just cleaned the top of that this one has got some carbon build-up yeah uh but i haven't measured the wear yet um there aren't any score mark or not nothing to really worry about but the yeah we have got some sort of water staining inside oh yeah where well we were in the budget to replace them anyway yeah i'm intrigued by this because the one surprise when i bought this car home and we used to go out in it it would get to 70 75 just easy just it was it's not i can't say it was quick but it wasn't as slow as i remember them being on the outside there was no hint that anything had been done there's nothing in the description there was no trick exhaust on it but it always went really rather well yeah yeah so that sort of explains it indeed yeah so the um and also it's got it's got a non-standard cam in it right um but interestingly um when they when they do wear they lose all pressure through the cam bearing yes which is part of the block so this one's had a replacement oh right um got a collar put here so i would assume that this engine did previously have quite a bit of wear in it so yes i think the 30 000 is yeah the description could be 130 could be much closer than probably 130 because it's old isn't it's 1972 yeah one and the crank how's that the crank um the crank looks nice but um i did have a quick measure up and i think it's going to have to have it's a standard um cut on it right i think it's going to probably have to definitely have a first cut on on the mains yeah um and then the big ends will double check but i think the big engine might might go standard again right um you see the core plug yes trying to force its way out what's doing that um usually when usually high oil pressure um will do that if the if the pressure relief valve is stuck right um or just simply vibration that does that right so nothing particularly scary what we got no no so we got uh i mean the cylinder head uh obviously we'll strip that down and check the valve guides uh because they do tend to wear valve guides on these right but um it's i mean we will measure the volumes there but i think we're going to end up skimming that because it looks like it does it has quite low compression right um so it has not been skimmed it hasn't been skimmed but this again is not a standard head it's um not a standard head well no it's not a 500 head i should say right it's it looks like a 500r head that's a later it's a later head yeah right which of course they were made this the 500r was made in sicily right uh and with it being based in palermo yeah but that engine number is a 500 engine number right yeah well and the other thing in it so you got a 126 engine not a 126 engine no it's definitely 500 yeah engine the numbers are 500 okay yeah what's over there that's your oil filter centrifugal oil filter which is full of gunge i don't like those i just don't like the idea of them yeah yeah i mean and there so you can i don't know if you can so instead of having a paper filter or a cartridge this this car it basically spins out the dirt outside yeah see this one yeah has got quite a lot oh god that's the crud yeah so that's not 30 000 kilometers no no isn't it odd how they've changed some bits and haven't looked at that yeah it is isn't it yeah these 30 strong people doing maintenance all experts in the car don't you like auction descriptions yeah yeah buyer beware yeah very much so um and then it'll need a new chain and uh and gears because they were worn right um what else we got here carburettor carburettor it's got a a 126 carburettor on it or 650 style carb 28 28 imb yeah um and on the 126 they have a return but you should never block them off like that they need to be either have a proper return or block them off um we we basically drill them tap them and put a um a bolt right on them to to blank them off so that is not a sign of good mechanicing no it's just you know you've got you've got the fuel's just going to seep through the threads yeah on that yeah and it's yeah we've seen too many of these uh come off and then the cars catch fire yeah um okay yeah but modded yeah a bigger carburettor as well to go with a bigger cc yeah so that will work nicely with that um obviously it's got a defect which we need to work out yes the float isn't doing its job is indeed yeah okay distributor yeah distributor um just standard 500 distributor which is the same on the 500r right um so that will just get an overhaul but um can't see anything untoward with that okay i thought you might upgrade that but to electronic well you can do yeah um well we'll discuss yeah we can do is there anything else here worth looking at we're just going to have a look at the yeah the fun bits that we're going to fit to this engine going to look next door yeah sure oh the toy shop see if i go around this way yeah this is where you keep all the goodies yes and do the sort of final engine build bits that's right yeah it all happens my mine isn't clean enough to come in here quite yet not yet but there are some bits in here that you've done isn't it that's that's the first bit we're going to change isn't it this yeah we're going to have similar sump to this which is a larger capacity sort of a bar style yeah sump does it say it ever this one oh it does yeah right and that you sort of see when you follow a bit of under and you see one of those oh hello yeah yeah yeah it's got something indeed in this engine i think that makes sense because it hasn't got a huge amount of oil capacity anyways no no it's aids the cooling and we like if if the engine's a little bit hotter then it stiffens the block right um so yeah all makes sense so yeah yes this is a fast road cam uh when they say fast road yes in the world of 500 it's a fast road cam yes um so that just increases uh obviously power but also you get more torque from this oh good so it's quite a nice cam i mean they're really mild it's a standard setup isn't it the standard setup is so mild yeah yeah so we're not talking craziness we're not adding wear by adding giant lift or not at all you don't have to do it with this type of lift you don't have to modify anything at all we like you need to increase the compression ratio right to get the cam to work otherwise it's you know it's pointless i can't remember what do you know roughly what the standard compression is roughly seven and a half seven point six to one and you go up to try to go nearer to 10 as we can right okay yeah right because the standard 500 is 17 18 horse wasn't it something mad 18 19 something i know i can't remember just nothing yeah yeah so is it yeah anyway we're not trying to build a hot rod you know we're not going down a gordon murray higher busser in the back or yeah nothing so we're going to the original plan was 595 504 yeah um and as we've discovered that's what we've already got so we're going to stay with that yeah yeah absolutely because we've got you've got this as a temptation haven't you yeah i was trying to tempt people with it because it was a nice i mean it's a lot more work a lot more modifying yeah it's got these lovely oh look at those looks like 9 11 stuff isn't it yeah and that looks lovely yeah no stop oh short skirts teflon coated pistons yeah what cc we have to do with this then those are 695 oh i see so it's hardly got any cooling but you you rely on the aluminium being a bit aluminium is a better cooler you know depends how hot you go as to if you add an oil cooler or not right um but generally uh oh you need an oil cooler once you go to if you start really yeah yeah and where's the oil cooler go is that uh there's lots of different ways of doing it um but traditionally they use the timing chain cover oh where the oil pump's built into there yeah no you have the outlet from there and then you put a radiator somewhere in the engine compartment okay ideally on the cool side which is is this where you start seeing the yeah propped open yeah i mean that's when you're talking about going racing my sort of mantra of this car uh mrs m really likes this car and i've sort of wanted not to notice that anything's particularly happened okay so i don't yeah that's why we're not going too crazy no i see yeah exhaust the exhaust is going to be a troublesome one because you've got that quite sexy thing hanging up there but uh very rare i think the exhaust has to change from standard doesn't it is that what would you fit a standard exhaust on this is there anything to be gained i would definitely go with a slightly better exhaust and standard there is enough to be gained from a from a decent exhaust but it doesn't have to be loud okay i'd like it to have that standard look about it apart from the extended sump that yeah that would be my yeah happy place the cylinder head you're going to do things with that aren't you yeah yeah this one this one's just a standard 500 right um which has got slightly increased compression yeah that's had a skim yeah it's had it has had a skim um but normally on the head i'll have to measure the volumes but on the head that you've got we might end up taking as much as two mil off the head really yeah right okay um and you're only going to have a single carb on this one because you do a 40 conversion yeah there's twin 40s up there you can do that's overkill because it's only got a single inlet yeah it's got a single inlet on the top it breathes through that so you are restricted with that yeah but you do a bit of gas flowing or something on here yeah we'll do a bit of gas flowing um we'll do a bit of work on the valves just to get a much better flow just flow so we're not changing it up in the size of the valves it's literally head work it's head work yeah from however many years decades of experience now yeah yeah that's excellent right okay so that's that's i think that's all engine bits we're going to do isn't it yeah yeah i mean the only thing yeah just yeah that is a that's one of the yeah that's that one two three one two three programmable yeah which i've had not so good experience with maybe just do another conversion on it because you're saying the thing about distributor on a 500 it gets hot isn't it being right above the exhaust right so we just have a quick look back at the car just see if there's any other stuff we need to do so your next plans with this then tidy it all up decrease it yeah get it all cleaned some careful measuring careful measuring to see what needs machining so the crank does look as if a little grind on there yep here's we're going to do block just needs proper degreasing um cylinder well we're going to change piston cylinders for new yeah then we'll get all the bits blasted and powder coated then the car what we're going to do with this is there's things you've seen with this that we ought to do um to be honest i haven't really gone through it properly um i mean just on first impressions it looks like a nice usable car it's not not been over restored just check the wiring on it and lights i'd like if there's an upgrade on lights that would be good okay um and what's the braking system like well the brakes are on this on drum brakes but the brakes were never an issue yeah and i did try it once we got it started and it pulled up straight all seemed to be fine yeah what have we got and hiding under there i don't think there's anything scary in there no it looks quite tidy yeah i think it's had a new wiring loom in it certainly the wires look fresh yeah i think it's had a replacement yeah it's got looks like it's got some nice wax oil going around it yeah so nothing too scary there but yeah just if there's a way of upping the candle power of the headlights that would be nice you can certainly do that have a look and the quarter light on that side is a pain but i don't know why on the door yeah they're not unfortunately they're then they're never very good and the replacement ones are even worse are they so well although yeah this needs they're frustrated because quarter lights are really nice i always think there's a vent system but it just so someone has replaced it already with one of the duff oh right but they haven't they haven't yeah yeah they haven't done it well either so i would love that to be done yeah that i'm sure we can we'll be able to improve that okay um i've noticed the time it is two minutes past one yeah and there's a bit of a tradition that happens in this workshop isn't there at lunchtime yeah it's pasta time pasta time so italian that the whole place stops for its own pasta yeah no visiting anywhere else it's here so i think i can see it steaming over there yeah you're going to join us yeah i think i will so i'll come back in a few weeks to see how this all is going i hope you enjoy this video on what's happening with the fiat 500 and it's going to get this fantastic engine build in this workshop that have done it so many times before we're going to follow the journey i'm off to have some pasta if you like this video keep watching keep subscribing more videos coming on very soon yeah i know italian plates as well just need a glass of wine yeah peroni or something like that do anything for a free lunch