Lancia Motor Club

A new video on YouTube out today where Harry takes his 1.6 Zagato to a specialist for what looks to be a very interesting lot of work. Excellent stuff.

If anyone has a means of communicating with Harry, would you please let him know that the front sidelight/indicator units on his car have been transposed at an earlier stage in the car's life as they are handed.  The yellow part (indicators) should be inner wards and the clear part (side lights) should be to the outside.  It is purely because the indicator bulb has a little curved reflector behind it to project the light beam forward, and if the units are incorrectly transposed the beam is projected outwards, which is not desirable for an indicator.  Also, surely it is better to have a sidelight nearer to width extremity of the car?   Thank you.

Please don't post photographs of Sports with the units as Harry has them!  There are plenty of cars about with it wrong, often following restorations in Italy.

Regards -

Harry has interacted with me on Twitter so I will mention it to him that way - I guess he gets a lot of notifications though so may not see it!

Thanks Andy. 

It was interesting watching the engine being dismantled correctly, and not like in the video from a TV channel restoration!  Seeing the damage to the skew gears from the missing oiler nozzle was a concern too.

We will await the re-build, with interest.

Regards -

I opened this expecting to see something about the Harry of revered memory, and thought the references to contacting him were some sort of pleasantry suggesting clairvoyance. I now see there is another Harry, automotive influencer of the year 2020 indeed, who can be mentioned in posts on this forum without need of introduction. The passage of time bewilders.

Same here!

Personally I am very excited to see this rebuild and Harry's story around the car is very interesting. Good one Harry! I am just starting my full rebuild of a Series 1 '69 1.3 Rallye S so this kind of video provide some great inspiration.

If you've seen the second episode where they investigate the state of the lower bodywork, I keep picking up what I think are errors in the information from the workshop guys. As far as I'm aware the alloy cast uprights were originally painted black as was almost everything else on the subframe but they were saying they were supposed to be bare alloy so someone must have painted them. Similarly they keep finding odd bits of orange paint hidden under components when they remove them on the subframe and are supposing this might be the original colour. However I thought that all Fulvia's were supplied to the Zagato works as black with black front subframe and suspension, and black underbonnet area so any bits of colour under components were likely to be from aftermarket repair work in the intervening 50 years.

"As far as I'm aware the alloy cast uprights were originally painted black..." not on the S1 Zagato, verified with original cars never painted before, Andrea

Interesting comments, I don't know the original spec but the alloy castings on my subframe are definitely painted black and look quite original in that respect, as does the black paint under the bonnet.

Based on earlier videos Harry has done on his car he seems sure it was originally orange but may be picking up clues to justify his thought that aren't really clues. Is there a way to find the original car colour? I'm not sure if Lancia have an archive that can be used for that purpose.

But isn't Harry's a 1972 ish 'L-reg' Series 2?

Yes, it's an L reg, 1600 S2.

From the second video, it appears to have HF suspension fitted I’m sure 1.6 Sports had the same suspension as 1.3 coupe.

Unsure about other Zagato's (or Fulvia's) but the paint colour is identified by label in the glove box of a 1600 Sport, it certainly is on mine.
I have corresponded with Harry a few times regarding his car and it appears that both our cars were Rosso San Siro originally, his is now obviously black (although he is contemplating returning back to original) and mine was changed to Rosso Palermo in '86.

Out of interest Paul, are your uprights black or unpainted?


That is certainly what is said in the video, the wishbone lengths being mentioned in relation to the camber differences from standard. It looks like Harry's car has the 6" wide wheels so could well be the case.

If you see how some of those alloy towers corrode if unprotected then it is not surprising Lancia gave them a finish (to match the subframe).....

Any picture available for the corroded towers? That would be of general interest, Andrea

Sorry only seen from time to time on the internet and to be true it is the base where the bottom wishbone bolts on.

I think that might tend to be more from damage caused from impact than corrosion. It seems the old boy who owned mine (& had it till he was 90) probably took some short-cuts over the odd roundabout. I had to get a specialist welder to repair them, but there was zero oxidisation even around the breaks where the wishbones were hanging on by a thread.

Rather than start a new thread I thought I'd use this to ask a question.

Seeing the latest episode of Harry's Garage about the metalwork on his Zagato he mentioned that the people doing the work had said the door frames aren't strong enough to support an alloy door skin. As the Series 1 cars had alloy skins is the door frame on the S2 significantly different such that they need the skin to be steel, or are the S1 doors really flimsy?

He says he isn't too worried because they have taken about 50kg out with all the filler removed and metal where the original panels were left with new metal placed directly over the top.

In my experience S1 Zagato doors are flimsy and, after 50 years or so of slamming them shut, they do tend to open spontaneously over bumpy roads even when their frame does not suffer from rust, Andrea

I guess that explains the reluctance of the bodyshop to make them in alloy!

Has anyone dared to try to count the hours spent on that Sport so far??

The two figures that have been mentioned were 180 with Day and White - a few episodes ago - and 80-100 hours so far in the bodyshop. It's going to take a lot of YouTube views to cover the bill!!

I put the following comment on the 2nd video when only a fraction of the issues had been revealed:

sweepstake: £28,750 inc. engine rebuild, welding and paint.
Cyborg 7 5 months ago

I think I'm going to be hideously under budget. Glad it's Harry's and not my money...