Here are some photos of V-12 Ferrari engines for Dominick.

330 engine with cylinder heads

250 GT "outside" plug engine

Underside of 330 engine

Inside plug 250

This is the final result of a year-long work up we just completed of a 1961 Ferrari 250 GTE (S/N 2567).  Except for one brief appearance in the early 90′s, it had been in storage for over 30 years before the current owner acquired it.

We rebuilt the engine, transmission, overdrive and brakes, sourcing or fabricating many hard to find parts that could not be saved.  Along the way, we were even able to salvage a block that had several cracks in it and a transmission and overdrive unit that were totally cooked. If you look at some of the archives here on my blog you will see some of the individual components being overhauled. You can perform a search on certain topics such as “transmission” or “overdrive” and see what we were up against.

GTE Ferrari Yellow

GTE 1961 2+2

We also made several improvements. We converted the rear slinger set up on the crankshaft to a 100mm lip seal to eliminate oil  leakage, increased the bore and compression ratio for better performance, reground the valves to improve flow, and adapted Spicer u-joints to the driveshaft for reduced vibration.  We also fixed some dents and rust bubbles in the body and corrected the color of some interior trim.

What made the repairs difficult was that the car looked complete and drove down the road but once we got into the project we found so many missing parts and lots of internal damage. We sourced everything from little windshield wiper post trims to Pininfarina badges to the mechanism that the heat and vent cables attach to behind the dash panel. We credit so many sub-contractors and suppliers as well as pack rats who had some of these parts used and actually knew where they were hidden!

Finally, we installed three point safety belts for both front seats by locating the inertia reel in the space between the body shell and the interior rear side panels, feeding the belts out through a slot hidden behind each rear seat armrest, and running the belts around a pivot anchored to the B pillar that we first reinforced.  They look and work great!

The owner who just received the car is absolutely thrilled with it.  We are not surprised as it is one of the smoothest running and best sounding GTE’s we have ever driven. While the exhaust wasn’t new by any stretch but we preserved the main mufflers and left the rear resonators out while installing new tips. The sound is to die for, not too loud while having a little “bark”.

250 V-12 Ferrari engine

Bruder and Buddy L

Here is the difference in toy construction from the 1960′s to current, both beautiful Mack Dump trucks but total different styles. I bought the classic steel Buddy L toy on ebay a few years ago for an embarrassing amount of money, chalk it up to my ego outrunning myself as I bid against some unknown person. It is a nice example with a gas charged cylinder that raises the dump body with authority.

The plastic truck was a Christmas gift to my son and made by Bruder in Germany. These toys are spectacular and lots of fun to play with since everything works and moves just like the real thing. Needless to say, Roman loves both of them. I happen to like the heft of the older toy and the hollow noise it makes as we play in the sand pile.

Bruder makes an amazing array of toys with incredible detail while still being tough, but I don’t think these toys will ever outlast the Buddy L especially if Roman has his way with it. Based on what the Bruder toy costs, I would like to make simple and rugged pressed steel toys that could possibly sell for a similar amount of money, is this possible? It would look so cool to make it a very simple and elegant model of a truck, not a specific brand truck but just an art deco style of  truck.

We listed a BMW 2002 on Ebay for a friend. It’s a sweet little car and mechanically sound with good compression across all cylinders. The body and cosmetics are decent, but could use some TLC to replace a trim strip here or a the back seat there. This would make a great driver or starter classic for you or someone you love.

BMW 2002 delivers some of the best value in an easy to maintain & fun to drive car that doesn’t mind being driven everyday in the rain. Sometimes I feel like everyone has driven one for a period at some point in their life, and no one ever has anything bad to say.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320605315400#v4-37

C/4 engine, 365

We are finishing up a C/4 engine, not sure when it will be done as we have a few missing parts but stay tuned for the progress and a video of it running on the test stand

Ferrari water pipes

Here is a fixture we made to duplicate the often rusty steel water pipes on Ferrari 250 engines. I make them from Stainless Steel so they should last for much longer than the originals.  I have a drawer full of the parts needed to make these such as the 2 ear flanges and the temp sensor ports as well as pre-bent tubing.

Ferrari 250 GT coolant tubing

Disc Brakes D type

XKD brakes

These are brake calipers from one of the first cars to have disc brakes, a “D” type Jaguar from 1955. The front calipers have 6 approximately 1-1/8″  pistons with a similar sized brake pads that look like hockey pucks that make the car stop on a dime. The brake master cylinder is boosted not by vacuum but by a pressure pump run off the transmission that forces brake fluid into the rear chamber to lower the pedal effort while allowing perfect modulation. What an outstanding car! Now, how do I overhaul these? Are they aircraft brakes? What kind of seals do I need to order?

Based on my experience and what I have heard on another Ferrari Message Board, the FISPA mechanical fuel pumps on Ferraris are a bit of a problem. They should be so simple and basic, identical concept and overall design as the fuel pumps on millions of industrial machines, cars, trucks and boats all over the globe, but for some reason, you put them on a Ferrari and problems arise.

I have purchased kits from different suppliers and the internal components are slightly different but I have figured out how to make them work reliably and with all kinds of different components. It would be easy to blame the ethanol fuel but so far I have not seen that to be the problem.

The camshaft that operates the fuel pump on V-12 Ferrari’s has very little lift, so the first thing I do is replace the rocker shaft pin and make sure there is no play on the mechanism. The solution to this problem is very simple but is a trade secret. Next I clean all the parts and send off the top cover and the hardware to be re-plated. I have tested the original check valves against ones sourced from a tractor parts supplier as well as the aluminum ones that come in many of the current rebuild kits for the FISPA pump and have found all to work well. To my knowledge, the original check valves no longer exist so I am happy to find that other styles work just fine. The issue I have found is that the replacement diaphragms are the source of the headache.  The diaphragm material is a black single thick layer rather than the 3 thin layers on the red original equipment stuff and in some instances it does not seem sealed properly at the head of the operating rod. Also, they seem to make too much pressure. I realize that the regulator should reduce an over-pressure situation but the red material consistently makes less than 5 psi where I have experienced  the black material making as much as 12psi! With testing the black material for leaks at pressure, I alter the return spring to get the pressure where it belongs which gives me the confidence to ship it!

FISPA Ferrari

Overhaul Fuel pump Ferrari