1979 308 GT4

These posts are all just notes to myself on what I did to the car (so I am not recommending anything here...). I don't know if Thread Locker is the way to go on these nuts, but I already lost one and lucky for me, my dad had one spare that he did not need (his 77 308GTB has slightly different air cleaner nuts).
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The parts manual actually shows a bracket that looks like it supports the above mentioned coolant tube. However, I cannot see where this bracket would attach. Perhaps to an intake manifold stud. Well, it did not look to me like those intake manifold nuts were going to come off without taking off the carbs and taking off that fast-idle manifold.

I wonder if anyone actually still has this bracket on the car. It is #33 on Tav.16 of the 1979 308GT4 parts manual.
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Runs GREAT!

 

You know...the longer I stay on this site the more I yearn for cars I never appreciated before... I now lust for Beta Scorpions car...

 

Yes me too. Especially when you see all the wonderful care and attention to detail he has put into to car to make everything look and function as it should. All these "little things" put right make one huge difference in how the car presents itself and drives in the end.

 

This is such a beautiful car - I mean really. So elegantly simple that it to me is a true mechanical work of art. Congrats on such a pretty and well done car.
It's what I am striving for as I am doing mine

I had to smile when I saw your idle jet 'remover' - I had to make one on short notice one time as you simly cannot do it with a screwdriver.

 

My front and rear bumpers show signs of being 'refinished' with some kind of bumper black. The finish is cracked and looks pretty bad from up close. From a distance, after an application of Armour All, they don't look too bad.

I was able to restore my Beta Scorpion's bumpers by just taking all the old 'bumper black' off and the natural rubber was still in very good shape.

I tried this on a corner of the bumper in the back and it is WHITE under the 'bumper black!'

Perhaps this is some filler from a prior repair?

Anyway, these are the USA series II/III bumpers that are not fiberglass, they are thick rubber.

So, I guess I will take the bumper off and re-finish it.
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The bumper is held on with four 17mm locking nuts. They are a little hard to remove. One required an open-ended wrench, moving 'one flat at a time.'

After bumper removal, I noticed that there is no connector on the reverse light wire!

It looks like on the inside of the car, the wire goes right into the wiring harness.

As long as I have a plan, things will be OK with this. The plan is to remove and save the two metal ends that connect to the reverse light (one goes to the socked and the other goes to the light's ground) and solder a 'pull through' wire to the wires. Then I will pull the 'pull through' wire and leave that in place while I work on the bumper. When I am done I will re-solder the 'pull through' wire to the cars wires and pull them back through and re-solder the two metal ends on the wire.
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The reverse light bulb does not work (it is burned out) but it also does not seem to fit snuggly in the socket. I had tried to get the reverse light apart, but I am glad I did not force it, as it is held together with two 8mm nuts that are only accessable from under this 'protector' shield. The reverse light 'protector' sheild is held on to the bumper with two 8mm bolts with washers and locking washers.
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Just to emphasize again that these 308gt4 Series II/III bumpers are pliable rubber, and not fiberglass. There was a thread a while back on birdman's Mondial bumper, which was white under the black, but he seemed to indicate the bumper was very firm, not soft rubber (http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?p=136378345#post136378345).

I took some more of the 'bumper black' off and, indeed, the white area is a localized area of repair. The rest of the bumper is black rubber. Unfortunatly, the rubber's surface has some irregularities, and that combined with the white repair area, means I need to repaint the whole thing.

I was lookinig again at my Scorpion's bumpers which have very good looking rubber. Way back in the 80s I took lacqer thinner to the bumpers and removed all the 'bumper black' and the rubber underneath was in excellent shape. Too bad this did not work out this way with the GT4.

 

So it is clear now that I need to refinish the bumpers. A search on the internet and on F-chat revealed SEM Flexible Bumper Coater to be a product of choice. I am going to a paint distributor today to order some. I will get the quart, and plan on spraying it with the gun, rather than use the spray cans.

 

Getting the old finish off the bumper was a pain. I used that whole can of paint remover, but still needed to go over it with laquer thinner.

The rubber underneath the finish has some scratches, gouges and cracks. I probably needs some kind of primer to fill all that in before I spray the black finish.

I soldered a pull through wire that can be left in place while I work on the bumper.

I also got some undercairrage paint in silver and semigloss black that I can brush on.
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On inspection of the reverse light I found that there was corrosion on the inner part, where the base of the bulb sits. This froze up the little springy part the keeps the bulb snug in the socket.

Well, someone forced a bulb in there and it just pushed the plastic end-piece about 3 mm back, and this removed any spring tension on the bulb; therefore giving a poor connection.

I was able to free up the springy thing and then force the plastic end piece back to its designated position. This fixed it up just fine. Now the bulb bayonets in and stays like it should.

The mounting bracket has some rust, and this needs to be addressed before re-painting. The rest of the parts are in good condition.
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I really hate overspray! I had to use paint stripper to get the overspray off the rubber grommets that go around the bumper shocks.

Just about ready to start brush painting the silver and black.
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Got the bumper almost totally stripped. The rubber is not in great shape. There are a number of scrapes and scratches in the rubber surface. Looks like I am going to have to prime this to fill it in a little prior to painting.
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The above is a quote from this thread (http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showpost.php?p=136368125&postcount=62). Unfortunatly the thread degenerated into a 'euro bumper conversion' thread. But the above was the best post I could find on actual rubber bumper restoration.

Again I think rubber should be left as bare rubber, but, short of getting a new bumper, I need to cover a large repair area and multiple scratches.

I spoke with the SEM rep on the phone and told him that I am painting a real RUBBER bumper, not some polycarbonate bumper shell, that contemporary cars have. He told me that by using the steps outlined here on the SEM site(http://www.sem.ws/tech_sheet/rab-2.pdf), I can expect good adhesion. He said that some bikers have been painting logos and such on the rubber drive belts, using SEM products and have had good success. The main difference is the use of an adhesion promotor which was not mentioned above. I was not shure if I needed the adhesion promotor, that I why I called the SEM rep. Basically he said if the bumper is real flexible rubber, I need to do all the steps too make shure it does not chip off in a few years.
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Probably the most important functional aspect of the 'rear bumper project' is the working light

The next picture shows that the mounting bracket was re-painted semi-gloss black and it if fitted with a reproduction lens.
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Beta a few things;My compliments to all the work you have done to your car and to getting it looking in pristine condition and thanks for all the informative detailed posts as well.Regarding your reverse lights,are they the original ones or have you bought aftermarket ones from Superfomance.Only asking because I cant seem to see the Carello writing on the lense and the condition of them looks like new.If they are the original how did you get them to look so shiny?

 

The light in the above photograph is actually up-side-down, but it has all the correct lettering. The lettering is not as pronounced because this IS a reproduction lens. I think it is from Superperformance. The rest of the light is orignial and cleaned up fine.

 

Beta,

I don't see the metal (stainless or aluminum) heatshield with the heat resistant material glued to it that clips vertically to the back bracket and then horizontally under the bumper (kind of an L shape pretty much the length of the middle section of the bumper). My '79 GT4 has it, and I was afraid to remove it when I did my bumper modification.

Just curious.

John

 

I took the bumper end off and examined it carefully. It is painted on one side only. I stripped the exterior side and saw that it had been sanded prior to painting. To try and re-create the natural rubber finish I used some 600 sandpaper and then some polishing compound.

It looks like the rubber is very porous and, without any coating, does not look that good. Perhaps these rubber parts were painted originally? Either way, it will look a lot better with the black rubber paint covering the rubber.

This picture shows the bumper end after sanding and polising the central portion.
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Reverse light shield painted and ready to go.
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Silver paint on left side, under bumper.
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Silver paint on right side, under bumper.
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Can you post a picture?

Although #14582 is mostly original, it has been fitted with the european exhaust manifolds. It also, has an ANSA exhaust. The car came to me without heat shields on the manifolds, but I was able to get reproductions from superperformance UK (I needed the european ones to fit the european manifolds).

So, there may indeed be some heat shielding missing in the area you described.