RE: [alfa] alfa boxer engines

[White Anthony <anthony.white@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Benjamin wrote:
"The AR boxer biggest weakness IMO is that it only has 3 bearings. I've heard
of many people spending a fortune on turbo charging only to destroy their
engine."

Here in New Zealand, the Alfa Romeo racing series in the single largest
single marque racing series (also the friendliest, and cheapest, relatively
speaking).  A slight majority of the cars racing therein are Suds and 33s --
of the four classes in the series, one class is dedicated to boxer cars.
This class allows modification of your series 1 Sud to full 1.7 8 valve 33
spec.  (16 valve engines are in the class above.)  

Consequently, there are a good many 1.7 engines in race cars here.  The major
flaw in them doesn't seem to be that the crank is a three bearing rather than
five bearing, but that the centre bearing on the 1.7 suffers oil starvation
problems.  This is due to the method in which Alfa drilled the main oil
gallery: backward from the front of the block, and forward from the rear, and
hopefully they meet in the middle.  Unfortunately, in some cases, there is a
considerable restriction where they meet, and no matter what the oil
pressure, an insufficient volume of oil is available to the centre bearing.
A number of local engine builders have devised cures for this problem, and
once such a solution is employed, bottom end failures are very rare.  

Regards,
Anthony White
Wellington, NZ
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