The Restoration Starts Here: 275GTB Shortnose 07333

Hi, The fuel filter is now painted in the correct colour - thanks to FerrariChat member Alberto Guirola, who so kindly sent me a paint match card all the way from El Salvador!!!!!
You cannot beat the kindness and generosity of this great community on FChat - Thank you Alberto.

I will fit the Fispa decal as soon as I have the top Fispa ID tag engraved with the original tag numbers - supplied by Parker Hall at Kilimanjaro Designs, thanks again Parker.

More photos to follow soon.

cheers Mark
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Thanks Alberto, I have seen several pictures and actual canisters painted all over, I spoke to one Ferrari mechanic who believes that the canisters were painted all over as complete assembled unit - can anyone else cast some light?

Many thanks Mark

 

Great thanks, I will make the alterations to the two large boltheads and washers, I have the new anodized tag, just getting the correct numbers stamped on there before fitting.

Thanks again to everyone that has guide me on this little part of the project!

cheers Mark

 

Hi, and welcome to FerrariChat!

you can't leave us with a cliff-hanger like that on your first post!

please tell me more, good and bad history all greatly appreciated.

cheers Mark

 

Thank you John, love the detail and originality!

 

Many thanks - that looks like it confirm:
"the top is painted, same as the canister itself; the two larger head hex bolts are not painted"

many thanks again!

Mark

 

Hi Jeff, sorry just realized you sent me an email (which has blown me away!), I am traveling at the moment - will get back to you as soon as i can absorb all the info on a screen bigger than my Blackberry!

many thanks Mark

 

Hi, The following is an edited email from Jeff, both Jeff and myself have agreed to keep the identity of the owner private, as a mark of respect to the gentleman involved and his family.

FChat Clan - I know you all love solving a mystery, but on this occasion, please don't speculate which owner it was (I already have all the details), just enjoy the story - that would be hugely appreciated - thanks.

A big thanks to Jeff for coming forward with a great piece of 07333 history!

Enjoy - cheers Mark
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Greetings Mark,

I just joined your tread today. I found it when searching Google for the 07333 275 GTB.

I searched because I worked for someone who owned 07333 and often wondered what ever happened to the car.

I was employed by the owner in a (non-car) related business for several years. My employer noticed early on that I shared his enthusiasm for cars and encouraged me to accompany him to several historic racing events which he participated. In the beginning I helped with the transportation of cars to tracks, making sure tire pressures were correct and so on. I loved the history of these cars, the excitement of the race tracks, seeing famous drivers and the incredible sound of open megaphone exhaust of these wonderful cars.

My personal car at the time was a 240Z which I had dreams of swapping the engine to a small block V8, installing racing springs, koni’s and changing the color of the car from brown to black.

My employer was a big supporter of such a conversion and offered to let me use our production facility for the transformation. I think one reason he was excited about my project and offered his shop was because in his younger days he stuffed a V8 Buick into his AC.

I took him up on his offer to use the shop after work hours and finally completed the swap and painted my beast of a Corvette killer. This was only the second car that I’d ever painted and my employer was impressed with the outcome. So impressed that he asked me to paint one of his cars for an upcoming event….in three days!

After that, I was called upon and taken out of normal business production to fix and paint, or re-paint the rest of the historic fleet when they were in need of repair. He loved using his own employees for everything and took great pride in it. It was also very cost effective. I know you know the expense associated with repairing historic cars.

After leaving his employment for several years, my ex-employer called me out of the blue and asked if I would be interested in some side work repairing one of his cars just crashed in a racing event. It wasn’t that much money per hour, but he said there could be more auto work if I was interested. After I repaired the car he wanted me to quit my day job $3.25 an hour at a supermarket and come back to work for him for almost 3 times that and only work on his cars.

Little did I know at this time it was 07333.

So… this long story is getting interesting now huh?

Let me first say that there are very few people who knew the real story of 07333 during it’s time when owned by my employer, maybe only four or five including the owner. No one outside my employer’s business, to my knowledge, knew what was under that paint. This includes family members, friends, brokers or even the auction houses. I will say that someone had to know before my employer bought the car. Someone had to know the condition of that body.

I’m the one who created the 07333 illusion.

From brazing the over 30 holes in that body, the epoxy sealer over the bare metal, the 8 gallons of USG lightweight polyester body filling, (your paper weight) the two part epoxy primer, the applied sealer again, the red base coat and clear urethane top coat, color sanded with 1500 grit and polished.

It was me.

I apologize for contributing to your pain and deception but I needed a paycheck. I knew what I did was wrong and immoral. My only justification was that the owner was my employer. I really never thought the car would ever leave the family. My orders were; ”Just make it look straight Jeff, and paint it red…. leave the bumpers off, it looks meaner.”

The start:

The car was not straight. The body had tons of waves everywhere. The owner had another employee work on the doors to straighten out some of the bodywork. The car looked good for a while, he said, but then started waving again. He thought it was the workmanship of the other employee. It really wasn't. This is when he called me.

I started by working on the driver door. I quickly noticed where the associate had made repairs as I started sanding. Then, after sanding through the repair, I notice another body filler, nothing I’d ever seen before. It felt like clay. Trying to figure it out, I started calling restoration shops across the U.S. Everyone told me it was the original clay based filler used by the factory as a skim coat. They told me that due to age, the filler was disintegrating and the only way to make the car straight was to take it to bare metal and start again with polyester filling.

Well, this news went over real well with the owner. He knew if I took the car to metal it would cost him several hours at $10 bucks and hour but he agreed that I should strip the car to make it right. The waves were just too much for him. He seemed embarrassed for anyone to see the car.

I stripped it down to metal. What a mess, (I know you know what I’m talking about), it seems my employer had been deceived also. I knew he would be really upset seeing the car in metal and I was right. You see, the car looked exactly the way your pictures show it in bare metal. I did no drilling, pulling or hammering on this body. It was this way when my employer bought it. It looked like a slide hammer had been working overtime on this car.

When stripping, I also ran into tons of body filler on the nose, right side, below the windscreen and on the back. I tried to get the owner to replace the metal but he just wouldn’t… “Make it look straight, and paint it red Jeff.”

After stripping and cleaning the car, I coated it with a metal treatment to seal it from rust and applied an epoxy sealer. I did take off the doors, hood and rear lid but no glass.

I started body work on the driver side front fender and moved to the top, then down to the headlight buckets. I did the same on the passenger side and stopped. I couldn’t believe the “Grand Canyon” below the windshield and along the cowl and fender. I had no choice other than filler. Trying to blend the two fenders into the nose was a mess. The grill didn’t come close to fitting, the dip under the front hood opening gave me fits trying to blend the two fenders and make the grill opening work. I had only pictures of what a 275 short nose should look like to reconstruct the front.

This was pretty much the story on the whole car. Some areas had a ton of filler and some only had a (small fat mans) worth. At the time, I did the best I could do making the car appear to be visually straight per the owner’s original request, and make it red.

I have never worked as a body/ paint man at any business. Only on my employer’s personal cars which were fiberglass with very little filler.

I did take pride in the visual outcome of 07333, but never in the way it was created. I worked on the car by myself on and off for about 7 months. I left my employment soon after finishing the car and haven’t seen it since. This was also the last overall paint job I’ve done.

From the pictures in the beginning of your post and throughout, when the car was red, I don’t think anyone had touched the paint or body on the car since me. I could be wrong. The only difference looked like the installation of bumpers.

Again, I sincerely apologize for the deception while employed by the owner.

It’s wonderful to see it done right.

Jeff