New Member- San Jose CA

[Jay]

Hello
I have an 81 Fiat Spider- silver with dark blue upholstery. Purchased the car about 6 years back and absolutely love it
The car is completely stock except for the radio and in very good condition over all- 78K miles which I think is genuine
The car is babied- lives in the garage under a cover and is used sparingly- my son who is now 16 loves going for drives in the countryside with me - good father /son bonding. Now he gets his drivers icense!

Two things I need to address /improve:

1. Passenger side rear view mirror ( mounted on door)- this is a black plastic mirror made by' Vitaloni'. Caribou imports is the only place I found this but nobody answers their phone
If anyone can suggest where I could get such a mirror, I'd appreciate it

2. Exhaust seems to have a slight leak somewhere, so the car pops under de-accelaration on the over-run
My muffler guy is slightly hard of hearing so it has been a challenge to try and fix- if anyone has suggestions- short of a fresh exhaust, I'd appreciate it
Also, if there is any suggestion on how to give it a sportier sound- new Ansa muffler?

Great to join this forum and find so many new members!
Jay

[So Cal Mark]

welcome, the car sounds like a peach! Can you post a pic of the mirror?
As for the exhaust, is the pop out the back or under the car? If it's out the back, you may have a rich running situation.

[rlux4]

Hi Jay, welcome to the forum. Did you try Bruce's for the mirror? I got mine from him and it's a very close match to the original on the driver's side. Here's his mirror page: http://www.fiatparts.com/misc.htm
Ron

[adrians]

Jay,
I also have an 81 Spider, I recently purchased a new left hand side remote mirror ( your drivers side ) and a matching manual right side mirror (your passenager side ) from Bruce's Part Bin.

Regards

Adrian

[Jay]

Hi All
Thanks for the suggestions- I will try out Bruce's for the mirror- somehow this never showed up on my Google searches
I am glad I joined this site already
As for the flatulent exhaust, the popping sound is coming from under the car- we already patched up an opening near the cat converter, but clearly the entire system isnt airtight ( so it seems like a leak vs. the timing not being right)

Jay

[mbouse]

Hi Jay, and welcome. of course, we need pictures.

Our Mr. Mark Allison is being very polite. You may want to look him up for your exhaust needs, it is what he does for a living.

I have heard that ANSA mufflers are getting hard to find, for whatever reason.

you may wanna look into http://www.funimported.com/ for a stainless muffler as well. I am using one of these on my wife's '78. we love it.

[kristoj]

Welcome to the forum. I was recently able to source an Ansa exhaust from autopartswarehouse.com. I know VickAuto also recently got some in stock.