I was a major Canon Camera fan. Our first digital camera was a Canon A20, 2.1 MegaPixel something. Very 2001 style. We took between 20-50 photos a day with that thing. When the flas goes off a cloud of smoke arises from the old mule. I never took a bad photo with that thing. I had some complaints, long delay from the time you push the shutter button until it actually cracks on off, and you really had to hold the thing steady when you turn off the flash.

About a year ago we bought a Canon Power Shot SD600. This camera has 7.1 MP ( not sure if this is the correct term) and video capability. Unfortunately it is like many of the cell phones that you can buy today that have all kinds of options but it seems that using it as a telephone is an afterthought.

This SD600 cannot take a good photo. The delay is just as bad as the A20 and there is no way to make a print that looks decent without tuning it up in iphoto or some other editing program. With the A20, I could make a 5 by 7 inch print that was perfect.

After one year of trying to figure this thing out I am thinking of switching brands. After a year of ownership the camera is so ancient anyway (2006.)

These are some nice photos of non-red cars in the shop the other day. They are a 1965 Ferrari 275 GTS (lt blue conv) a 1967 Ferrari 330 GTC (dark blue in corner), a 1979 Ferrari 512 BB, and a 1967 Ferrari 330 GTS (green conv).

The Dino is finally finished! One of my first posts one year ago was about the 1973 Ferrari 246 GTS Dino that we bought to freshen up and market for sale. We bought the car with the engin apart from a dropped exhaust valve so never had a chance to drive it. Not knowing what else the car needed we decide to do everything (except the suspension)

We completely overhauled the engine with new valves, forged pistons, timing chain and bearings. We overhauled the water pump, oil pump, alternator and starter. We replaced the radiator core and installed all new stainless steel coolant pipes. Every brake component is new or overhauled and the fuel system is renewed. All syncronizers are replaced along with a few bearings (diff carrier bearings) and all part were inspected.

While doing all of this work, we detailed the engine bay with many freshly plated parts and powder coated air filter housing and cold air box so the engine and engine bay look perfect. This will be a great car for someone to drive trouble free for many years or to continue the restoration by attacking the cosmetics. The chrome, paint and detailing are not terrible but are not fresh either so with all of the mechanical work done and sorted, now could be the time!

The carpets are new but the rest of the interior is nice original. The dash is in good shape and leather seats are supple and nice.

This 1973 Ferrari 246 GTS Dino is for sale for $185,000 and as far as I am concerned worth every penny of that. The serial number of the car is 07194 and it shows 40,000 KM on the odometer. This is a full European Spec car with the small side marker lights and flush mounted front turn signals. Based on how strong the car runs I am sure that the camshafts are marked to the European specification.

About 10 years ago we had a Sunbeam Alpine and I was always impressed with the little car. It seemed to have been built with some integrity, heavy front suspension, decent brakes and an engine that actually made some horsepower unlike the MGB and other anemic British competitors of that time. The car still had the simple charm of a British roadster with Smiths instruments, Lucas Wiring, and dead simple interior.

This 1967 Sunbeam Alpine is for sale after we did some work to get it safe and sound after sitting for some time. The front brake calipers were leaking so we overhauled these, replaced the brake hoses and inspected the system. We addressed some other very minor things like a sticking choke cable and new wiper blades to make this car ready to go for future driving.

When I drove the car to the alignment shop after putting on new tires I was impressed at how well the car drove. It is agile, smooth and has some decent power. What it needs for the open roads in America is a taller top gear. Even on some twisty Vermont back roads knocking the engine speed down 1500 RPM would be excellent.

This car is a genuine California “black plate” car, dead solid and complete. I am not sure if it has been painted, quite sure that it is original paint but not 100%. This Alpine offers a lot of bang for the buck.

This Lamborghini Miura engine never ran correctly. There were restoration photos showing the heads off as though it had a valve job so we assumed that the engine was healthy and some other thing like bad gas, poorly adjusted carburetors or ignition woes were causing the poor running. We did a leak down test and found a few cylinders that were weak but not so bad that the engine should run SO poorly. We looked into a few minor issues like carburetor tuning, ignition timing and bad gas but when the engine just wouldn’t run properly we decided it was time to break it down.

We pulled the engine which is extremely entertaining, you have to tilt it 90 degrees to allow the differential housing to clear the frame. What a deal! Once we removed the heads we put the pieces of the puzzle together, the reason we saw the photos with heads off is because the head gaskets were leaking and were replaced. Unfortunately the past mechanic did not notice that 4 out of 12 cylinder liners had huge pitting from water leaking into the cylinders and rusting the bore.

The engine/trans casting is a thing of beauty, such an amazing part that could only come from a company familiar with large complex castings. This part looks a lot like the tractor and industrial castings that I have seen in the past. The Lamborghini tractor influence weighs heavily on the Miura!

A Ferrari 212 Coupe came in about a month ago and we met with the owner to make a list of things that we need to address. The car ran very nicely since it has the single Weber carburetor and actually drove quite well. Unfortunately the engine smokes like crazy and has a few major oil leaks.

Among all of the things that the car needs we started on the engine as it takes so much time to schedule a machine shop and to get the parts in like new head studs and pistons made. We pulled the engine from the chassis and began the break down to see what was making this thing smoke so badly. When it was on the bench Karl did a leak down test to find that the first two cylinders that he tested had about 60% leaking past the piston rings. We only tested those two cylinders figuring that these alone necessitate an overhaul. » Continue reading “Ferrari 212 engine”

Something that makes a engine bay on a car look fresh is fresh plating on parts. There are so many parts that get a dip of Zinc, cadmium, nickel, chrome that it is sometimes hard to tell what was used from new. Some plating looks similar, Zinc looks like silver Cad except silver cad has some faint greens and yellows in it. Polished nickel look like chrome with a slight gold tint. Dull nickel has a nice soft platinum look.

I often use photos and take notes at shows and also think about what the manufacturer uses based on what is cost effective. Some uses of plating do not make sense for example, why does certain car have a silver cad door catch with black oxide screws to hold it in place? What do you do when the photos show a car to have silver cad linkage (which may be wrong) and the linkage on the carburetors has gold cad finish?

I get so nervous when I send off all of these parts for plating. What if they loose one screw or minor part? What if the delivery truck goes off the road and all the parts are strewn about the side of the road!

All the parts in these photos are going for a of gold cad or silver cad finish.

Seems like the group thinking in the human race is benefiting me. 2007 seems to be a year of selling cars in groups, not a steady stream of sales. The group thinking has kicked in and I sold 3 cars in the last few days.

The 1987 Porsche 911 Cab just sold to a man in Maine. This guy is such a character and we had a great time with him. He showed up on an extremely busy day, doing some last minute things to get a speedster delivered and loaded on a trailer, two visitors from out of state and some friends of my fathers getting a old tractor serviced. There were so many people all around the shop that Nate and Karl went home early because we were plugged! Porsche buyer bought the car that day and we delivered it to ME a few weeks later
(That same day another guy called ready to buy that car, group thinking?)

We sold the yellow 1978 Ferrari 308 GTS on Tuesday to a local man who shared my passion for the carbureted 308’s. We ordered some 16″ wheels from Maranello Auto Parts and will do some minor cosmetic work on it this winter.

I just sold the Green Austin Healy 3000 BJ8 on Thursday the 6th of December. A man who stopped in on the Healy driving tour that passed through Vermont this summer stopped in unexpectedly and saw the same value in the solid and complete condition of the car as I did. I will deliver the car this coming Tuesday. This same man is also looking for a Healy 100 if you know of anything out there.

Anyone else want to buy something?

I really like that silver 250GTE and the new owner seemed to appreciate it as much as I do. We knew that the engine smoked but as we spent some time tuning and running the car we realized that the engine was tired. It made an excessive amount of mechanical noise which came from many worn out timing chest bearings and totally worn out roller followers. We figured that the time was now, not when something breaks and chews up some castings.

With the engine out and we broke her down we saw just what we expected, stuck and broken piston rings, roller follower bearings with .020″ run-out and timing chest bearings that were nearly beyond turning. We were happy to find that there was nothing broken or in need of major repair, just replacement of numerous wear out items. We have seen so many engines with major internal issues due to sloppy workmanship from another shop that I always enjoy seeing a largely original worn out engine.

We did a engine overhaul on a 330 engine that had a number of sloppy and strange workmanship. The valve guides were hammered into the heads but the machinist did not hone them open to the proper clearance which resulted in valves sticking and eventually bending. I had to use a 3lb hammer and punch to get the vales out of the guides. This same engine had .005 shim stock only under half of the rod bearing shells. Not half as in 6 of the 12 rods but between the bearing shell and rod cap! With the heads off, the engine took double the torque to turn it over. The flywheel ring gear teeth were polished to a razor sharp edge from the starter.

We just finished painting all of the engine castings on this 250 GTE engine and soon will assemble it with all new forged pistons, re-con rods, full valve job with all new valves, guides and seats, rod and main bearings and all other necessary items. As you have seen from prior posts, we spent the requisite 6-7 hours drilling the plugs and cleaning the crankshaft oil
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