yep. you got it. 40th grand prix de Monaco. but you have it labeled unknown car too. I know the prior Chad's copper car was talked about extensively. not sure this one came up
I was going to start my own thread on the restoration of my dashboard. I didn't want to be disorganized with the sequence of my photos so I'll do a little bit of it here, post a thread when I'm done. My picture taking is not nearly as nice as Raymond's, however I'm going to share something that may happen to someone else and document exactly how I'm going about a perm.fix. I spoke to Tony Ierardi on Thurs and asked him what was the best leather to use, as there much debate here on F-chat. Tony said to use a good quality leather that's all. I went with a leather called "so-ho" which is a flat black almost no grain and as dead to factory as you could possibly get. I bought 2 full black hides so I could have perfect pieces to work with and one tan hide which I dyed to that yellowish color to match. I also told Tony that I suspected my friend (previous owner) took a fist and punched the dash pod slightly right of center. To my surprise Tony said he had a few (maybe 5 or so Countach) that had the same exact problem. He explained that when the leather shrunk ever so slightly it caused the fiberglass to basically buckle. Here's a couple of pictures of the underside of my gauge pod. As you can see it's not in very good shape. I spent a couple of hours grinding down the copper rivets and drilling them out. Those rivets are tough as nails. I'm going to go with the same exact copper rivets with the brass nails. Tomorrow, I'm going to cut out all the bent fiberglass and fabricate a piece of firm aluminum to go across the entire bottom of the gauge pod then layer very thin fiberglass until I get it to the original thickness. I can assure you that problem will never happen again to my car. If anyone else has had their gauge pod do what mine has done please post. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Hello Triple X I had the same problem with shrinking leather but it twisted the gauge pod rather than buckling it. I have noticed the same droop in old photos of the cars when they were nearly new. My solution was to completely strip it down like you did (and it is a slow job with all of those rivets) then reshape the pod by heating it to 70 degrees Celcius in a composites curing oven. I screwed it down using the rivet holes and placed weights on it so that as it softened it would return to the correct shape. Once it was back in shape I hosed it with water. You could use a heat gun and some patience to get the same result. I poured in some hard 2 part foam mix into the front of the pod for reinforcement. It went from being easily twisted to very rigid wih this mod. The fiberglass also needed some careful shaping that should have been done at the factory in 1984. I was able to use the original leather with new foam underneath as it had not pulled like your photos show. The whole interior resoration was a winter project that took many hours but the results were worth it. PF
Now that I can post pictures again, I got some picts of my car I just found out about last week from the last show I did. Credit goes to Conceptcarz. Keys were left on the dash for anyone with the urge for a little spin.. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
I will. When I'm all done I'm going to show before during and after. I'm just under the gun right now I want to have the car ready for festival in 3 weeks.
perhaps - i don't know them well enough to know but heard the passenger walking away saying it was a '79.
The Countach has to share the garage with another Italian Stallion. Mary had "Mario" (FIAT 500) out and about, otherwise he would have been in the shot too. Mike Image Unavailable, Please Login
Credit to seriouswheel . com, here is a picture of a gem in the rough. This appears tobe an S2 with an exquisite wool lamb seat cover amongst other things. I beleive I saw this car around 2002 but I am not sure. I did not forget because of its "striking " look. Anyone know it? Image Unavailable, Please Login
Thanks Joe. Its funny when Mary has her FIAT in the garage. My gosh, its such a short, stubby little car! Even sitting next to the Countach! Mike
Was your Countach ever in Bob Wallace's shop in Phoenix Arizona? (see behind the Miura engine with Wallace transfer gear oilers installed). Image Unavailable, Please Login