Stumbled across this 250GTO restoration

3527GT.

 

Short of actually being there this is about as good as it gets. Not quite up to what Mr G gives us but still very good. An important part of my file on this car. tongascrew

 

omg did I spot an english wheel being used, thats it, only worth scrap value now!

 

I guess it matters to what standard you aspire to.

Some people may put ford taillights on a GTO and be cool with it.

I'd rather it was built the way it was built, personally.

Funny how it seems to matter in a concourse if you have the wrong ash tray but to you such a thing as how the car is constructed doesn't matter?

Your car. Your decisions.

 

What's interesting is that English Wheel fabricated panels are being used to restore a Traditional Hammered body.

Beautiful seats (Graber style?) on this GTO.

 

There is definitely great skill in using the english wheel and beautiful results come out of it with a skilled craftsmen but I believe restoration is about building the car as it left the factory.

My guess is anyone of us would love a authentic GTO with an english wheel body. But to me the benchmark restoration is one where the car is restored as built originally. No more. No less.

 

My point was that the end result and finish must be very much the same. If it wasn't the body wouldn't look right with sections of it being made up of panels with both methods of construction. Is that an English Wheel made nose that's going to be welded to a Hammered front end? Hmm, perhaps not.
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My guess is that leading or filler would erase any difference as far as the looks of the two.

 

Yes I often wonder how many "less desirable ferrari's" are restored with such techniques, and nobody gives a crap. How on earth did the XKE get to be so beautiful!!!!

 

Just wondering: Between hammer and wheel, the *way* the metal is shaped is obviously very different but are the actual results all that dissimilar? Does one require more filler than the other? Is one "too perfect"? Or is the difference a case of honest hair splitting?

I've always wanted to shape metal (and weld it) so any thoughts on this are appreciated!

 

Why do they do this (use the wheel) when it's so wrong ? I wish these guys would use the correct methods.

 

I'm more worried about the measuring device, pictured, are they making sure each side is symmetrical? If so that would be very un-original..... As everybody knows These cars are hand made, by the human eye, the human hand. They are never symmetrical..... And when made so - they never look right... It's called over restoration!
Hopefully they are not doing that here......

 

The wheel will give more perfect smoother results. The hammer method will leave more low spots etc. If you look at a wheeled body versus a hammered you can see the difference.

The hammered body would take more lead or bondo type filler to smooth these spots.

If you were to paint both without fillers the hammered would be rougher.

With enough surfacing it would be hard to tell which is which.

 

The wheel seems to be the more modern way of doing things. The art of hand hammering bodies is a dieing art. I'd have to think there are many more people able to english wheel bodies these days then hammering and therefore it's more accessible and I'd believe economical to do it this way.

I'd have to guess most people dropping their car off to be restored are not aware of how it's being done or that their is a difference at all. With surfacing the results will be similar and pretty untraceable for most.

 

I'm sorry but I'd think you'd do a bit of research (or pay someone to do it, more likely) if you are restoring something that is worth over $30 million. Would you let your Van Gogh be restored using acrylic paint if the original is oil???

You can still get your car done the way it was done back in the day, an English wheel is not a necessity. Take for instance the work done in Brandoli's shop, fantastic work.


Onno

 

Onno, I was going to use the van Gogh analogy as I was reading along, but you beat me to it. That is the essence of what is done. To the eye it may look right, but it really is not.

Also a panel has 2 sides: The outside gets painted and whatever goes on before the paint may or may not mask a lot of how the work was done, but the inside of the panel tells the truth.

Best,

Jack.

 

Many GTO's have been restored with the English wheel, complete 'rolled' bodies or partly.
Just look in the books or google and you find the s/n's

e.g. 3757, 3527 3505 etc etc

4091GT has a US body, most probably a rolled / power hammered body as well. In the US they use big power hammers, planishing hammers and english wheels.

Scaglietti and other tradiotional Italian coachbuilders used: maglio's and hammering machines 'eckold-type', only Italian makes.

See photo for the maglio type

And the final result is not the same! (bare alloy body)
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If they were restoring a $100,000 car with the incorrect method of panel shaping I suppose 'most' would be OK with them doing this.

The insane prices of the GTO and the fact that there is less than 40 of them in the world you would hope the owner didn't consider themselves in the category of 'most' nor happy with a restoration getting something so fundamental wrong.

In this ultra exclusive club of GTO ownership, cheap, convenient and quick should not be words used when doing a restoration.

 

+1

Given the pre-restoration photos I am also struggling to understand why so much of the original aluminium was cut and replaced

 

don't understand what all the fuss is about... it's damaged goods if it needs a new body, then what else has been replaced, it has been thoroughly molested, it's no longer as it left the factory... it's not being recreated by the factory, it's being recreated by foreigners on foreign soil... at this point the tools used to replaced the damage become moot as long as the result is in the image of the original... it's beyond repairing a damaged area to match... it's recreating what has been lost... virginity cannot be replaced, a bell cannot be un rung... are the materials used the same, did they come from the same foundry / source, are the formulations the same etc... there is a lot more change than the technique and tools used... it's about recreating in the original image...

 

That's the point. English wheeling a body will not produce an an image of what is original. Sure the painted surface will look the same.

The fact is that the results of a wheel and hammering do not leave the same image. It is the leading, fillers, and primers that surface them to look the same.

Do I think the car is an atrocity if not done this way? Nope, would love to have it. But if people are so worried these days of using the correct color from the build sheet so a car can be considered original I'd personally be more concerned about the body that holds that paint being formed as it was.

I feel what matters is keeping the history of the car. How it was built by the people that built them. Whether it was by the people that built them or modern craftsmen that are practicing the correct techniques to build the car as it was.

This is not to say that the english wheel craftsmen aren't very skilled, they are. English wheeled bodies done correctly are beautiful works of art. It's just not the way they were done.

 

With the greatest respect to all on here a car is only original once. Any subsequent restoration work can only at best be a best guess facsimile. Many of these cars were crashed in period and had major work done. At what point do you restore back too, the day it left the factory or the day after it won LeMans, which is more important?

The vast majority of restorations now have the car looking better than it ever did on the day it left the factory, should restorers deliberately produce inferior work to better replicate originality? I think not.

And at the end of the day will a GTO be worth any less if not hammer formed rather than using an English wheel? The market I suspect does not care

 

This thread shows why some GTO's are more valuable than others. (and not from a monetary point of view!)

There are only a few cars in good condition, because they are preserved with Original parts, most were partly damnaged or overrestored.

Over-restauration is a bigger NONO than crashing a GTO,but its like cosmetic surgery.. some people love it, some hate it..

Me, I am not a Pebble Beach kind of person.. I cherish the old warhorses with the patina they got over the years, a dent, a scratch or a worn down interior are scars of battle, and should be preserved.

This pre-restaurationbody wasn't that bad, from what we see here, it should never have been replaced.

These are old warhorses and should be appreciated as such!
Whats the point in making it better (different) than it ever was, other than for showpurposes they were never intended for.

Had the privillige of seeing mr. Kroymans race his GTO several times. Simply mindblowing hearing that car roar down the Zandvoort-straight. Thats what they were made for, making them showqueens is like killing the beast..

please preserve the few Original cars, and stop making them look into something they were never intended for, no matter how much you pay, or how much you put into them, it has to do with respect.
Respect for the men that built them, and respect for the men that raced them.