Today we finally got the bottom end of the Alfa's pretty little engine assembled. The crank is in, the pistons are in, and the rods are hung. We used a combination of Redline Assembly lube and some special assembly oil that my machinist gave us as the engine will not be started for at least a year while the body is straightened and painted. The only tricky part of the job was the circlip installation. For some reason the AE/Borgo piston kits come with plain circlips (rather than ones which are easily installed with circlip pliers) and pressing them in without scarring up fingers and the piston skirt is a little tricky. My right thumb has nice cut on it from my first attempt prior to putting on mechanic's gloves, which of course make handling a tiny sprung piece of wire that much harder.
We got the main bearing caps torqued and the cigarette seals installed. A nice trick on the latter, which the manuals say must be installed with a special tapered factory tool, is to put them in the freezer for a few hours prior to installation. This makes the rubber hard enough that you can tap/press them in gently with a small hammer until they're all the way seated. According to the manual, it's smart to leave them a little bit higher than the surface of the block so that the oil pan will compress them in the last few millimeters.
I need to get some lock tab washers for the rear main bearing cap prior to finishing the bottom, but for now I'm pleased with the progress.
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