Old Sheet metal Ferrari

Grille Ferrari Classic

This is the body that was on the Ferrari 212 that we located in a barn 5 years ago. Eben is in the building next door getting this body built up so we can paint it as a static display. Most of the aluminum is foil thin and work hardened but the objective is to save as much of the original material as possible and Eben has been successful in doing this.

Can you believe how much labor went into building this dash? I would guess that the bulk of the piece was hammered out to fit a profile but the stepped bores for the gauges were made from a two piece press die, simply and amazing number of hours to fabricate this piece.

This piece had so many layers of primer, filler and paint that it has taken about 8 hours to strip it down to bare aluminum and will take another 20 hours to re-finish it in the dark blue color that it was originally. There are more man hours in this dash than goes into assembling a new Pontiac!

166 Touring dash panel

Touring berlinetta

We are really cracking away at the restoration of the 1950 Ferrari 166 Berlinetta and at this point, I am fitting and re-fitting and adjusting and fitting again all of the parts to this car. Nothing worked or fit very well from new as you may have seen from an earlier post on welding up brass trim caps and since then I have learned that the window regulators would bind up because they were miss-aligned and the side glass fit terribly but with tons of time and effort, everything is working and looking great.

These are the door handles that I have sent off to be chrome plated. Notice the detail in the “scrapings” and in the “sunburst” at the release button? When you depress this button the handle pops out allowing you to pull the handle which releases the door catch followed by pulling open the door.

This detail will be eliminated in the re-chrome plating process but with modern technology, we can recreate the detail easily right down to the minor imperfections.

Touring Door handles

Brass is a pain in the neck to weld, it doesn’t give you any clues as to its melting point like other metals. Steel gets shiny and looks like flowing liquid while aluminum gets super shiny and puffs up slightly which tells you when you can add the filler rod.

Brass just gets dark so you have to poke the area with the filler rod and hope it sticks even though it often just spatters and makes a mess. Unlike aluminum or steel, it is easy to build up brass on an edge of sheet metal like I am doing in these photos. What I found is that you have to keep the material extra clean with a stainless steel brush and glass bead blasting it when the piece gets black and nasty.

These photos are of little trim pieces on a Ferrari 166 Touring bodied Berlinetta that I am restoring. These pieces didn’t fit well from new,  I think my 6 year old daughter could have made them fit better. I have spent lots time welding on new material and filing it down to fit around the trim and re-locate the holes so the screws actually thread into something.

The reason Touring used brass is because it takes chrome nicely without any extra material like nickel or copper and is relatively easy to shape.

Brass Heli-arc

Tungston Inert Gas Brass

Brass trim welded and fitting

Car Show Classics also put together this engine bay porn from Mille Miglia. It’s a lot of detail.

Car Show Classic did a piece with Marcel Massini on the 212 at Mille Miglia. This is a great description of the history of the car from the master himself.

See http://carshowclassic.com/car-models/classic-car/146 for more.

I have seen this style final drive differential on later Ferraris like Lusso’s but didn’t realize that early cars like the 212 had this odd arrangement. Instead of spider gears and side gears, the car has these “chicklet” metal tabs that are forced between the axle drive hub and the outer case of the differential carrier. The inside “hub” has a different number of relief cuts in comparison to the outside case of the carrier so there is always pressure to make the car go forward while acting as a limited slip mechanism. You will have to study the photos carefully, we didn’t take great pictures of it all together so let your imagination do the work to understand the process

Ferrari attempt differential

Limited slip Differential

Ferrari 212 differential

Ferrari 212 throttle steers out of a hairpin at Virginia International Raceway test

We tested the Ferrari 212 at Virginia International Raceway about a month ago to prepare for the 83rd running of the Mille Miglia in Italy this May. The Osca came along to the track as a benchmark of performance as it was accepted to run the Mille just a few years ago. The testing went very well, with the 212 making enough power to warrant upgrading the tires to Avon vintage racing tires like the Osca. It is amazing the difference a few years makes, the OSCA is 5 years newer than the Ferrari and handles so much better. It is deserving of the Ferraris V-12 engine rather than the 1500cc 4 cylinder mill.

Casey and Peter remove the hood of the 212 while a pack of track marshals look on like wolves

For the first time in over 50 years, these former Marzotto team cars are sitting side by side,  prepared once again to compete in the Mille Miglia.  Are these cars like working dogs, border collies or sled dogs who are anxious to work almost to their own demise or are they dreading the stress of the event?

The lighter red car is a Ferrari 340 America serial number 0030MT that belonged to my father, Peter Markowski for 35 years. He bought it as a worn out race car when he was in his late teens and restored over the course of many years then driving it for close to 100,000 miles. In the late 90′s our shop restored it again, overhauling the engine, transmission, brakes and other components. We performed a flawless pant job on the car and Peter sold it shortly after all that work was completed because he was not comfortable driving the car with reckless abandon as he used to.

The car sold to its current owner in Europe who disliked the perfection so performed some magic to make the car look more original followed by competing in many driving events which added some true “battle scars”.  My father was probably quite emotional seeing this old piece of his history next to a car that he and his sons built from the ground up.

A well known Ferrari historian is working to make arrangements to have the two cars shipped to the home of  Giannino Marzotto at Lake Como for a photo shoot and possible magazine article.  I hope this works out as Signior Marzotto may have some incredible stories of racing these cars in the early 50′s.

Ferrari Marzotto 340

Marzotto Team cars 212, 340 Ferrari