Last week I visited a friend and drove this amazing 1971 Ferrari 356 GTB/4 Daytona around town and was blown away at how nicely it performed. The odometer shows around 20,000 miles and based on the overall condition of the number of original components, I believe it. Since the car has had one conscientious owner for over 30 years it has a complete handbook set and full tool roll and has been serviced to make sure its in top condition at all times. Most Daytona’s are missing the original Magnetti-Marelli ignition boxes or Digi-Plex units but this car has them fitted on the front wheel arches in the engine bay.  My friend is selling the car so if you are interested let me know and I can make arrangements to have available for viewing.

Daytona

We took a Bentley 4 1/2 Litre Tourer down the road to listen to the gears – and it happened to be a splendid day to make a video. It amazes me that a pre-war car can drive so fast and so smoothly – though still being a good bit of work to drive.

Reversing direction of Jaguar XKE cooling fan motors

With a test light and a few long leads, I can diagnose most electrical problems on old cars without too much drama since they have very basic relays, lighting systems and motors. Figuring out electrical problems empowers me since there aren’t many places for gremlins to hide. This keeps me feeling productive.

A 1968 Jaguar XKE came in with worn out radiator cooling fan motors so I sent the old motors to a supplier as cores and they promptly sent me a pair of overhauled ones. When we plugged them in, they turned the wrong way. So, I called the supplier who apologized for the error and then regretfully informed me that the correct rotation motors are on back-order for months or more! The owner wanted the car ready for a show in a few days so we switched the wires thinking that they would turn counter-clockwise rather than clockwise but they didn’t! I disassembled the motors thinking that if I changed the magnet, maybe I would get the favorable result but it isn’t a permanent magnet, its an electro-magnet, the motor continued to spin clockwise.

After some head scratching, I realized that I had to reverse the wires internally to send current both through the armature and the magnet in the same direction. This got me out of hot water by cooling the old cat’s engine just the way she likes it. It took me some time to find the solution because I couldn’t believe that a simple motor like this needed internal modifications to change direction. Learning all the time…

Partial line-up outside Middlebury's Breadloaf Campus - p: D. Adolphous

A few weeks ago a few customers gathered at the shop for some coffee, a couple of donuts, and a good chat before heading out onto some beautiful Vermont roads. We headed westward with 15 cars toward Chimney Point and then east over McCullough Turnpike (App. Gap as we call it). We had lunch in Waitsfield, met with some additional drivers and their cars, and headed down Rt. 100 and over Middlebury gap and back to the shop. On the road we had a 512BB, XK-120, XK-150, XK-E, a pair of 330′s, a pair of 250′s, a 308, and Porsches from 356 through a few generations of 911′s – and a few others I am surely forgetting. The drive however was unforgettable.

David Adolphous from Hemmings came up, enjoyed the drive, and left with some great images in his camera. Now those images are available to see on his flickr account, here.

We are working on a little experiment here at RPM. I have the Ferraricraft blog linked to the Restoration & Performance Motorcars Facebook page. Now when we post to the blog, it should appear in your news feed on Facebook. You guessed it, this is a blog post to test out the system. Thanks for being our guineapig.

The owner’s handbook for an Alfa Romeo. Typically, these pages are missing or damaged. This is a 1986 handbook but the earlier ones feature a different model – even more lovely!

Hand Book for Alfa Spyder

For a Porsche 911T in 1972. The radio was 3% of the cost of the car, do radios still cost that much? I heard that the reason sunroofs are so rare on these Porsches is because they were something like an $800 option or 10% of the cost of the car – something few people would pony up for.

Invoice for a 1972 Porsche 911T