101 1300 rebuild part #11: Marelli Veloce distributor set up

You may remember I earlier wrote about distributors and what I should do for one for this engine rebuild. I had the Lucas unit that was originally in this car in a box so I assumed I would just get it re-bushed, put new points, condenser etc in it and use it. I dropped it off a Jaan’s shop and a few days later he called me to tell me the shaft and drive section was all home-made and that it would not be cost effective to fix it, and that at its best it still wouldn’t be as good as a Bosch or Marelli unit. The next day I started pulling the 1600 apart that is going in the SS and I realized the Marelli distributor installed on it would be perfect for the 1300 rebuild, especially if I ever went with a Veloce spec conversion as it is a 750/101 spec unit.

Here it is, fresh off the 00121 engine I am going to start rebuilding soon for the SS. It doesn’t look like much but the shaft spins nicely without having any side to side play. I am told these are pretty hard to find and expensive, so I will be careful.

I took this picture so I could orient the shaft clamp roughly where it was originally when I put it back together. I’m not sure what the knurled knob on the side, seen here pointing roughly at 10 o’clock is for, but I imagine a light read of one of my manuals will enlighten me.

Fresh out of the swamp. Another shot to help me figure out where stuff goes if I forget. Notice the ‘e’ clip on the end of the points pivot shaft is missing. Also note how cruddy it is in this thing!

Curious as always, I decided I had to go as deeply into this thing as I could to get it nice and clean and understand how it goes together and works. That spring is part of the advance system. How primitive.

Here it is after the points mount plate has been removed and the guts washed out with white gas. The mechanism still spins freely without any undo slop so I am confident it will work. I am thinking of getting the advance mechanism ‘recurved’ but I want to see how it runs before I go to those lengths.

Viola! $150 worth of points, condenser, cap and rotor are finally getting put to use. Glenn gave me an ‘e’ clip since I didn’t have one and with the points pivot mechanism all set up correctly I was able to gap the points. The original parts are going to get cleaned up, the points refaced and put in a bag and tossed in the glove box just in case.

Home again, home again jiggity jig. I still need to set the timing, but I am going to do that after double checking the cam timing tomorrow. Doesn’t look too bad. I was picking up the old bits and found the original ‘e’ clip in the crud that fell out of it when I was cleaning it. I guess I’ll install the original tomorrow.

This marks another small though time consuming job finished. Tomorrow I plan on taking a pair of side draft 40DCOE2’s by to get Glenn’s opinion and if they pass muster I may decide to use them instead of the down draft Solex. I have the new exhaust front section in the entry way of my house so I need to get a gasket for it too tomorrow. Good thing I’m off work this week so it can’t get in my way.

Still to do: wiring, fan belt, throttle linkage, shift lever reassembly, upper radiator hose, fuel line/filter, flywheel cover, exhaust, clutch rod and more. Will it ever get done? I hope so. Once this is all done I still have to convert back to drum brakes, replace the 105 rear end with a 101, install new weather stripping, a heater valve, fix shorts in the turn signal and wiper circuits and I’m sure more before this car is ‘done’. Stay tuned.

Click here to go to Part #12.