OH MY...look what happened to my GT4..HORRORS

One thing I like about F-chat is that there is always someone that has messed up their car more than your own.

Looks like the rain got your whole car...too bad At least I can now say I am not as bad off as someone else.

What happened was the other day my lawn sprinkler system came on while I was out in the testarossa, and it sprinkled the side of the car a little on my way back into the garage.

I don't know how many of you follow the Boxer/TR posts, but this kind of catastrophy in a car than needs belt service, pretty much DOES make it a parts car in that sub-forum...
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My God - if it wasn't bad enough getting it wet you have those horrible wooden Eagle tires. Why don't you just go ahead and put Lambo doors on it as well...

$15.5K cash today since I've been outbid on the GT/4 by those folk that are loose with their money...

 

Oh yes..I forgot it needs new tires...most certainly a parts car now. Though, maybe I can just trade the whole testarossa for a owner's manual pouch for the GT4....or I could just use the testarossa chassis as the basis for a Mitsubishi 3000 'tribute/replica'...

 

This picture would make a great book cover! Or even a nice avatar.

 

I guess you guys wouldn't be too pleased then to hear that last year I did an entire track day event in the rain. Sure taught me a lot about feeling the dynamics of the car. Just make sure you use RainX or something to give the wipers a rest, they aren't too swift.

Gerrit
http://dino308gt4.com

 

Next thing you know somone is going to post about taking a leisurely drive in the rain!!!
Sorry to hear about your rust... LOL!

 

You know when Jim's car met with trouble all of you asked if he was ok...........you said you felt bad for him........gave him great words of hope.

When my car gets totalled by acid rain and turns into a rotting hulk in my own driveway.....do you sympathize (sp?)?..............do you tell me you're glad I'm unhurt?............do you ask if there is anything you can do?

NO!

You vultures jump on the corroding mess I have in my front yard.
The least you could do is understand what a huge loss I've incurred. I mean come on fellas, think about it.....
I've lost my transportation and the verification of my manhood. Its July in Houston anybody can drive a car with a/c that actually cools a car, but only a real man would drive a GT4 here in July.

 

You're right -- we need to be more compassionate, supportive and saint-like.
$12,660.00

 

Great picture......I still get crap to this day for driving my newly purchased 1989 328 GTB 3K mile garage queen on 18 year belts to pass California SMOG (which it did first try) and DMV tags...in a deluge of a Northern California rain storm.......with Global Warming we now get Seattle weather in California....god I wish I had a camera that day.....the 328 was so rained on..and it performed fantastic!

 

You're a man? uh... I thought Stacy was a girls name.

Well there go....<shudder> No. Bad joke. Don't go there....

$12,660.10.

Gerritv,

I think I can work you a deal on those wipers.

After the sale of course

 

Yes it would, but Brian Harper thought of it first.

Drive a Ferrari in the RAIN?
BAWAHAHAHA oh STOP it I'm laughing so hard I'm going to piss.

No kidding on the pouch. The series 1 pouch is the same as a 246. Really expensive.
Have you seen what tool kits are going for? Mama mia.



I spent a bit of time going over my GT4 today. I inspected it very carefully and made two plesant discoveries....
1) If you look on the right side of the steering wheel you'll see a stalk sticking out. Flip it and the wipers move the water off the windshield. It does it in typical Italian fashion. There are 2 speeds; slow and real slow.
2) All of the body panels on my car are still intact! WOO HOO! Yesterday I inspected it for rust each time my glass was empty. Kind of funny how by the time my glass was empty for the 4th time the car appeared to be moving when it wasn't even runnng. It must have something to do with how acid rain affects the paint. I don't know, still a bit puzzled about that.

Thanks for all the advice; I didn't move it while the roads were still wet so I think I minimised the damage to the underside and the tires.
I think if I'm VERY careful I might be able to save it. I'd hate to see it being parted out although the VERY generous offers you all made really tempted me .
Remind me in the future anytime I want to sell something to check its value with you guys first. Fcaht what a great place with very helpful people.

Saving my car will be a long and drawn out process. The length will depend on how many beers I consume during the initial washing. Too many and the post wash wax job always gets put off until the next day.
I'll let you know.

 

I like the way you think...

 

Remember Dave to have a once over with the wife's hair dryer to get it all dry again. And no cheating!!! Or those places will rust out on the spot.

I've heard rumors of people taking paint stripper heat guns to hand, in case a hair dryer doesn't prove powerful enough.

Funny, I've never heard any comments on the long-term effects of the heat gun approach....

And yes, aren't those windshield wipers fabulous? Mine reach to just below eye height to boost.. wonderful!

(and yet I drive the bugger in the rain all the time - we have a particularly crappy summer this year, and I want to DRIVE!! 5000 miles in 5 months of ownership now....)

Hans

 

I don't know, I would take rain over my entire car rather than hard water from a sprikler any day, might as well spray it with acid on top of that it is black car...parts car for sure

As you can see my car bit the dust this weekend too...
http://ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=159945

 

"just BELOW eye height......."
Oh now THATS funny (wish I'd thought of it first) Good one Hans

Oh yea, lets be honest, my car is pretty bad.....but that black TR is a piece of junk. Hit with city water? Man that stuff has clorine and who knows what else in it. No doubt trashed the paint right through to the metal.
Crush it and it'll make a good paperweight at best.

 

Heh heh, NOW we know where Verell got his paperweights from....

 

Well fellow GT4 guys, lots of hilarity about Gt4s in the rain. But lets get a bit more serious about it, like the RUST issues. The following is from direct experience on Tweety, my yellow '75 GT4. Tweety is a very nice car and the issues I descibe below have been carefully addressed.

The door windows have a "brush" type seal where the window meets the body. Unlike modern rubber squeagy type window seals, this brush does prevent water from going into the door internals. It accumlates in the bottom of the outer door skin "fold" (shaped like a trough) wherein the "drain holes" are not the lowest point and are often plugged up, and thus rusting occurs. Interestingly on my RHS this trough was carefully filled with some kind of mastic at the factory and is still in cgood condition. But in the LH door in '74/75 Luigi must have been having a bad day, the water got underneath the mastic, and as a result I have had to perform a (thankfully small) rust repair in the RH lower door skin.

It is nice that the the GT4 has a seperate lockable trunk. But you open the trunk, and there are deep pockets on either side. And when the trunk lid rubber seals get old guess where the water goes? In those deep pockets which are nicely carpeted and hold water just fine. More rust, especially in the panel between said pocket and rear wheel well.

The rear "fenders" or wheel well, has an outer skin and an inner skin,within about 2mm of each other. Really hard to get to (except for water). In those days almost no one used pre-galvanized sheet metal for the car body stampings.

Back to the trunk. It is sort of a seperate "bucket" that sits inside of a sheet metal rear engine bulkhead with some sort of "horse hair" insulation in between. Check out the lower section of the sheet metal bulkhead. Now back to the leaking hardened rubber seals.

With respect to the potential for sheet metal rust areas, my California car is realy no different than most cars of that era. Early pre '76 Porsche 911s are the same. In contrast, the suspension bolting etc on my car shows no signs of corrosion, and bolts and nuts come apart very easily. This baby has not been in a road salt or similar inviroment. All indications are that is has been and continues to be a California car. Has it been garaged throughout it's life? Probably not. But even in California it (occasionally) rains.

But I never take my car out in the rain and I never wash it with water. I clean it with McQuires instant detailer.
Martin

PS: I wish F-chat had spell check.