New Members from VA (78 Spider)

[MMRMVA]

After working on a Bug restoration my good friend was undertaking with my then 14 year old son Ryan, the now 16 year old (and soon to be licensed) Ryan suggested we should get a car to work on together like that. There is a very emotional story behind my friend's restoration, which in short was a project he and his son wanted to work on together, but his son passed away before they started. (Wipe tears). So I jumped on the idea. Ryan found our 1978 Spider about 1.5 hours from our home in Richmond, VA, in good running condition with relatively minor body issues. Not being a "car guy", but being generally handy and detail-oriented I thought this would be a great car for the job. My first car was a 1982 280ZX that required a decent amount of attention, so not entirely my first rodeo.

We brought her home on Nov 8th, and have been getting to know her in our garage. Our early plans are to flush all the fluids, replace hoses, distributor cap, leaking gaskets and install lap belts (Mom's orders). The previous owner installed a new carb, tires and gave it a reasonable (5' away) paint job.

We found this site and are excited to be part of the community. Mostly we will be looking to learn from your wisdom, but eventually we hope to share our experiences (maybe some knowledge) along the way.

Happy to be here!

-Matt and Ryan

[18Fiatsandcounting]

Matt/Ryan, welcome, thanks for sharing your story, and it sound like you have a good project car. One item that I would definitely add to your "To-Do" list is to change the timing belt. While doing that, it's also not a bad idea to change the timing belt tensioner bearing, and some people opt for changing out the water pump at the same time. In fact, there are even kits from the major vendors that include a new water pump, timing belt, and tensioner bearing.

Note that the timing belt, bearing and water pump are specific to certain model years, so make sure you get the right one for your engine. Speaking of which, it wouldn't hurt to verify that you do indeed have the stock engine for your '78. The easiest way is to make sure the engine serial numbers on the metal plate on the rear firewall match those on the block itself. If the former is missing, there are other ways.

-Bryan

[18Fiatsandcounting]

I forgot to add this in my above post: It's a good idea to replace the giubo (rubber donut) that connects the output of the transmission to the front driveshaft. It's not a pretty picture if this part fails catastrophically.

-Bryan

[MMRMVA]

Bryan, thank you so much for the welcome and pointers. We confirmed we do indeed have the stock engine. We've updated the to do list and are sourcing parts now. I'll report back on progress. Some of the posts here are already so helpful!

[Anbele]

Matt/Ryan…welcome indeed! This is a great forum community and you’ll get lots of excellent advice here.
You might tap also in the YouTube community. There’re a couple of YouTubers out there that have documented lots of repairs—and tribulations. Like the saying goes—sometimes—“a picture it’s worth a thousand words”.
In addition, you might want to join the DCFiats club. I know that you being in Richmond is not really around the corner, but sometime there might be an event close to your neck of the woods.

[MMRMVA]

YouTube is so amazing! We have been absorbing many videos, ELDEST Builds has some great videos for a '79, which looks pretty close to what we have with the '78. And anything else we can find.

So appreciate the kind welcome.

[Site Owner]

Hey Matt! Welcome to the forum! You may find it interesting that this forum was “born” right here in RVA 26 years ago. That’s right, 26 years online. I bought my 1983 Pininfarina in 1996 and started this web site not long after. I sold that car in 2002 and deeply regret it. That said, I still care a lot about this community that I started all those years ago and will keep this forum going for as long as I’m able to.

Evan
Owner/Founder
FiatSpider.com

[MMRMVA]

Evan, what a small world! Very cool. Thank you for keeping this going for 26 years and counting!

[MMRMVA]

* Edited - failed test to include image inside post*