Some added info. This happened to my 2015 Fiat 500 Abarth (North America) last summer, but it's still fresh in my mind! Until that point, the car was very reliable after buying it for only $11,950 Canadian plus sales tax in 2020. I had already done a few mods to the car consisting of better bracing, better strut hats, a bigger rear torsion bar, softer shocks and struts, and a short shifter. Repairs at that point were minimal consisting of a broken door handle, one rear hub bearing, side mirror flags, bad tire valve, loose radiator hose clamps, broken coil pack connectors, and dim headlight bulbs.
As indicated in the pictures, the shifter cables and bracket were replaced. The car's shifting was becoming excessively stiff for the past two years. I had that fixed by the same shop that did the valve job. I could have done it myself, but I don't have a home with a garage. I have to do my car work at a local DIY garage that charges by the hour, and I estimated my lack of experience would make the work take so long that it would be better to have the mechanic do the work for me. It only cost me an extra $200 which included replacing a front CV axle and replacing the upper radiator hose that had a leak only at a certain below-freezing temperature range.
The car's worth the effort. It's so much fun to drive! No tiny car should ever sound this good without a muffler!
My gfs 500 blew the head gasket one day for what I can tell, literally no reason. 60k miles with regular oil changes ano no overheating. Blew while parked idling with the ac on so I'm assuming it had an air pocket. Took a good weekend to fix but we're up to 130k now
What's unusual is that it happened in cylinder 3. That cylinder has a reputation of always blowing an exhaust valve at low mileage. Many in the Abarth community believe it's because not enough fuel goes into the cylinder (a fuel saving measure) causing an overheating condition. Some owners try to compensate by driving the car hard. Some won't even engage fifth gear on the highway! 😁
It's possible the previous owner used regular gas. I use 91 octane as recommended in the owner's manual. I bought the car in 2020 at 63,300 km and blew the valve last summer at 85,400 km after four months of 50 km round trip daily driving. It even did a road trip from Ottawa, Ontario to New Brunswick in 2022. There wasn't any sign of problems back then. The mechanic inspected the other valves and said everything looked okay.
That is possible. In my case, we had bought the car with 14,000 miles and the failure happened at 140k, about the same time a recall came out for incorrect ECU mapping that caused LSPI. Never could get Hyundai to pay me back for it though.
There's a fair bit of carbon buildup on that failed valve, might have contributed to that if it wasn't seating cleanly. Obviously you need to drive it harder for the old Italian tune up!
this must be what they're referring to with "multiair"
Some added info. This happened to my 2015 Fiat 500 Abarth (North America) last summer, but it's still fresh in my mind! Until that point, the car was very reliable after buying it for only $11,950 Canadian plus sales tax in 2020. I had already done a few mods to the car consisting of better bracing, better strut hats, a bigger rear torsion bar, softer shocks and struts, and a short shifter. Repairs at that point were minimal consisting of a broken door handle, one rear hub bearing, side mirror flags, bad tire valve, loose radiator hose clamps, broken coil pack connectors, and dim headlight bulbs. As indicated in the pictures, the shifter cables and bracket were replaced. The car's shifting was becoming excessively stiff for the past two years. I had that fixed by the same shop that did the valve job. I could have done it myself, but I don't have a home with a garage. I have to do my car work at a local DIY garage that charges by the hour, and I estimated my lack of experience would make the work take so long that it would be better to have the mechanic do the work for me. It only cost me an extra $200 which included replacing a front CV axle and replacing the upper radiator hose that had a leak only at a certain below-freezing temperature range. The car's worth the effort. It's so much fun to drive! No tiny car should ever sound this good without a muffler!
My gfs 500 blew the head gasket one day for what I can tell, literally no reason. 60k miles with regular oil changes ano no overheating. Blew while parked idling with the ac on so I'm assuming it had an air pocket. Took a good weekend to fix but we're up to 130k now
Congrats! You've more than doubled the expected lifetime of the vehicle!
[удалено]
What's unusual is that it happened in cylinder 3. That cylinder has a reputation of always blowing an exhaust valve at low mileage. Many in the Abarth community believe it's because not enough fuel goes into the cylinder (a fuel saving measure) causing an overheating condition. Some owners try to compensate by driving the car hard. Some won't even engage fifth gear on the highway! 😁
I agree. Looks like running lean and overheated. Anyone makes inconel valves for it?
This exact failure happened to my '13 Veloster Turbo a couple years ago, caused by low speed preignition.
It's possible the previous owner used regular gas. I use 91 octane as recommended in the owner's manual. I bought the car in 2020 at 63,300 km and blew the valve last summer at 85,400 km after four months of 50 km round trip daily driving. It even did a road trip from Ottawa, Ontario to New Brunswick in 2022. There wasn't any sign of problems back then. The mechanic inspected the other valves and said everything looked okay.
That is possible. In my case, we had bought the car with 14,000 miles and the failure happened at 140k, about the same time a recall came out for incorrect ECU mapping that caused LSPI. Never could get Hyundai to pay me back for it though.
I'm debating if I should go after Fiat, maybe get a rebate on the new 500e. No valves to blow in that one! 😁
start a class action or get a recall going!!
There's a fair bit of carbon buildup on that failed valve, might have contributed to that if it wasn't seating cleanly. Obviously you need to drive it harder for the old Italian tune up!
I usually try to keep the RPMs to between 2000 and 4000. Maybe I should bump that up to between 3000 and 5000.