...a real classic Maserati!

Very sorry but this subject is very complicated for a simple country boy who grew up playing with tractors in Ferndale Washington.

OK, I think i get it now, 2057 is sitting on chassis number 2070 but what about the engine number? is is it 2057 or another number?
And last question. is there someone else who claims to have this number?
It is very confusing when there are so many copies running around.
From Modena.
Ciao,
FGM

 

In a rush. In and out with some visitors. I will get back on this thread as soon as possible.
Franco Lombardi

 

#2057 was renumbered #2086 in 1955 after Palmieri replaced the Berlinetta body by a Fiandri barchetta body late 1954. Car is part of the Artom collection/Milano.

 

The car now has the body of #2057 sitting on chassis #2070 and has engine #2080.

 

Frank,

It is not as if you have not caused a few confusions yourself!

John de Boer

 

True, but always in the pursuit of the truth. if your not causing some dust, your not going anywhere.
However I never mistake movement, for accomplishment.

Just curious but do you agree with Boudewijn that 2057 is sitting on the original A6GCS chassis #2070 and currently running with engine #2080?
Is there another car with engine #2080? I am not suggesting there is another, just asking.
Ciao,
FGM

 

Frank,

I appreciate the fact that a lot of your work has helped all of us in our studies. That is all very much appreciated. But ...

Your explanation does not quite jive with what I have found in at least two A6 & A6G instances where you were involved as an owner of cars that were sold with confusions present in their numbering. "Truth" was obscured for a good long time in the case of A6GCS N. 2053's "original engine" being reunited with the car ... when the original engine is still sitting in chassis 2052 even today. Then there is the A6G engine originally numbered "2022" that became "2030" and therefor "numbers matching" for a sale of that car even though those who were paying attention knew that engine 2030 had been sitting in A6-1500 N. 084 for many years. That's merely what comes to mind off the top of my head. Lots of hours spent trying to detemine the truth and explain it ... with some uncertainties remaining, including the actual motivations.

About 2057 et al ...

I do not agree with the wording of saying that "2057 is sitting on the original A6GCS chassis #2070" for the simple reason that it seems that it was chassis 2057 that was apparently renumbered with another number (2086?) after the engine was apparently rebuilt or renumbered and fitted to yet another car (2076?) before its delivery as a new car. SO, it may be that "2057 is sitting under chassis "2086"? I have no reason to disagree with the idea that the original Pinin Farina body from 2057 was fitted eventually to chassis 2070. And, just because history tells us that there are many reasons to not simply trust that all is as simple as certain people say ... does not mean that this is not precisely what happened in this instance. The same is true of the engine that is fitted. No reason to disbelieve it but there is also no reason to proclaim it as some indelible truth either, so far as I know. We know that engine 2080 has been missing from its chassis for many years. Franco has told us where the engine is today. Why should we doubt this? Having asked this semi-rhetorical question, I have to acknowledge that I've witnessed Franco believe something incorrect on more than one occasion. Still, I have no reason to doubt this particular belief.

I've seen the body from 2057 only once, from behind a rope at a show in Genova where it looked quite lovely. I did not get to look at the chassis nor the engine at the time and might not have been able to come to a meaningful conclusion under those circumstances in any case? In those situations I am collecting general data on hundreds of cars and am not trying to come to conclusions about any of them. Impressions come later, after additional study ... when I always wish that I'd taken additional photos, wish that the photos I'd taken were clearer, and wish I'd thought to find someone to open this lid or that so that some more detail could be observed and photographed. Or another story heard. Usually I wish simply that there was more time to "do it all".

I have no crystal ball. Just a lot of incomplete notes collected over more than thirty years. Some notes have come from some folks who had paid some level of attention before I began but it is clear that what used to be a relatively casual interest has become "important enough" that all individual car studies really should begin from a new start without assumptions of any kind ... if it is the truth that is sought. A consensus here based on inadequate data might "feel good" in some ways, but only has a marginal chance at being indicative of any science having been applied.

This case is like many. Not unusual in the case of Maserati racing cars. We must really study the histories of five or more individual cars in order to fully understand the history of one ... as much as possible. It seems that the original chassis, engine and body of 2057 went three different directions over time. The other cars that became involved with those components also had complex lives of their own. Maserati build sheets and test notes give us hints but do not tell the whole story ... and are open to some interpretation. And, it seems clear that some of the documents we have available to us today superceded others, so the "original" build sheets and test notes are not always available to us no matter how good the files seem to be.

It would be nice to learn the Pinin Farina body numbers of these cars so that they could be shown in relation to each other (and some other cars) in the portion of the build process that happened away from Maserati, but whether any meaningful lessons would be learned is uncertain.

It is even more unlikely that we will learn much from collecting Weber carburetor serial numbers. If we can believe what too many replica ID plates tell us! ZF gearboxes, Cottino fuel tanks and radiators have unique numbers. Marelli electrical components can be numbered as well. Many Borrani splined hubs (the part on the car) have markings. Many do not. At this late date, it seems that there has been too much shuffling of components for these "accessories" to have any real meaning for us. But, if we don't pay some attention to those numbers, we will certainly never know what they might infer to a thorough study of all of the cars ... or of any one car.

John

 

John,
As the famous captain Marko Ramius proclaimed in the Hunt for Red October regarding Ryans book on Admiral Halsey "I know this book." "Your conclusions are all wrong"

2030 was found by me in San Francisco over 25 years ago and restored by MIE while under my management.
The engine #2022 & 2017 along with one other was purchased by me in Padova on a wild midnight ride with Gianni Torelli of Modena. Even the Italians were scared out of their minds at the way Gianni was driving. 2030 was sold to italy with engine 2022 or 2017 not sure which.
I never had possession of engine #2030.
I do not know for sure what happened later.
It was my understanding that the owner of the 2030 engine made a trade in order to get 2022 or 2017 which was the car he owned.

As to 2053. The car was never represented by me as having the original engine.

When I sold the car for a number close to $300,000, I lost a lot of $$$ on the deal. The price did not reflect that of a matching number car.
End of story.
Ciao,
FGM
PS
I always enjoy your excellent observations on the subject.
FGM

 

Many thanks for the various contributions to this thread.
Let me confirm that chassis 2057 was presumably renumbered by the factory into 2086 when (early 1955?) rebodied into a standard sports spider for Centro-Sud (although the scheda di montaggio shows No. 2074 corrected in 2086!). The number we found on the chassis I got from Cupellini in 1977 was later found to be 2070 and the engine he gave me was No. 2080.
I wish I could say that chassis 2057 might have been renumbered 2070, but I do not think so. That chassis was bought by Cupellini around 1976 from Marc Nicolosi in France. Clearly a different provenance.
To the best of my knowledge, nobody claim ownership of chassis 2070 and/or engine 2080. On the other hand, as John de Boer is suggesting and as mentioned by Joel Finn in his masterly book, there are several cases of Maserati chassis or engines showing the same number, apparently correctly stamped by the factory. As we all know, there was a bit of confusion in the records at the time or there was sometimes the need to help good customers to sort custom paperwork…
In any case you have here at the bottom a few photos of my berlinetta as collected by Cupellini on 7 October 1977. You may also appreciate the modification to the rear suspension on my chassis before its restoration. Hard to think that anybody might contemplate making replicas in 1976/77 and even more difficult to think that somebody might have conceived a replica chassis with the wrong rear suspension…
To sum up what I know (and I think I there is a fairly good amount of good researching here), let me offer again a short story of the four berlinettas Pinin Farina. More or less the same I wrote for an earlier thread (“…is this the sexiest Maserati ever?”).

A SHORT NOTE ON THE MASERATI A6GCS PININ FARINA BERLINETTAS

The four Maserati A6G CS berlinettas, 2056, 2057, 2059 and 2060 were bodied in Turin in 1954 by Pinin Farina for Guglielmo “Mimmo” Dei, Maserati and Pinin Farina dealer in Rome. Only one of them, 2057, was bodied with a lower roof, in a “low drag” configuration.
After having been a regular supplier to Maserati with the A6G 1500 and 2000, at that time Pinin Farina was quickly becoming a sort of preferred coachbuilder for Ferrari and therefore Maserati was not happy at all with Dei’s initiative.
This perfect example of pure, clean lines does not hide the full racing character of the celebrated 6-cylinder 2-litre Maserati chassis. As a matter of fact they were called “berlinetta MM” in the official works assembly sheets. After the torrential rain of the 1953 edition, several drivers planned to enter the 1954 Mille Miglia with closed cars. Not the best possible choice, at least for our cars, as the heat inside them would quickly transform these berlinettas into uncomfortable saunas, covering the inside of the windshield with moisture during heavy rains.
In any case, they were too hot and noisy for the long distance competitions of the day and did not seem to have much good luck in racing. This explains why two of our cars – 2057 and 2060 – were almost immediately rebodied as a standard Fantuzzi-Fiandri A6GCS open sports cars and carried on their future lives with their original bodies being placed aside. Mimmo Dei quickly realized the limited racing potential of the four cars but he was also immediately conscious of their esthetic appeal: already in 1954 he won his class with 2059 at the Pincio Concours of Elegance in Rome.
Having set the general picture, let’s go now into each car’s individual history.
Chassis 2056 was sold (or delivered) to Mimmo Dei on 18 December 1953 and was immediately sent to Turin for bodying. Subsequently sold to Sicilian Marquis Paolo Gravina and finished in a light shade of red (a bit on the orange side), it had a serious accident at the 1954 Giro di Sicilia (4 April 1954), killing its co-driver. After this crash, it was returned to the factory and when its owner refused to pay a shocking figure to rebody and recondition the car, it ended up being dumped in a corner, until the early 1990s. At that time De Tomaso authotized its restoration (although fitted with a longer and lower nose than original and a with a sort of luxurious but somewhat incongruous “GT” interior). Since 1996 this car has been in the Panini collection in Modena. 2056 is fitted with a correct engine, but not its original one, Maserati probably having used the original during the years when the car lay “abandoned” at the factory.
Chassis 2057 was sold to Guglielmo Dei on 12 January 1954. The finished car with its unusual and spectacular two-tone blue Pinin Farina body was presented at the Turin Show (21 April – 2 May) where it created quite a stir. This car is somewhat different from its three siblings, being about one inch lower, having a split windshield and a different, round treatment of the rear (similar to the later Ferrari 250 SWB) rather than the two small fins which characterized the rear ends of the other berlinettas. Piero Palmieri, its first owner, was responsible for the radical choice of having a lower and more penetrating car than the others. Sergio Pininfarina, interviewed at Turin in May of 1999 during a photo session of the newly restored car, had a clear memory of that choice. “Palmieri was a little man, and he kept saying he wanted the car as low as possible. This explains the astonishing lines of the car making a real masterpiece of it.”
It is hard to disagree with Signor Pininfarina: the car is a rare example of smooth equilibrium in a radical design kept so simple by the lack of any openings, inlets, outlets, etc. altering its pure shape. Moreover its unique round back treatment is a further sign of distinction.
In the hands of the Roman gentleman driver Piero Palmieri, this berlinetta ended up 7th at the ’54 Giro dell’Umbria (2 June 1954) and though in the starting list (No 518), it did not show up at that year’s 1000 Miglia. There was no further racing, as Palmieri lost interest. He thereupon asked Dei to replace the original closed body with a standard open spider body. This body swap probably occurred toward the end of 1954 and from that date until the 1970’s this beautiful berlinetta body sat unceremoniously in a corner of Mimmo Dei’s shop (later Scuderia Centro Sud).
The re-bodied chassis – renumbered 2086 (on 27 June 1955?) – was kept by the Centro Sud and later on was used by the driving school established there and directed by Piero Taruffi. In the early 1970s the Milanese collector, Edoardo Tenconi, bought at the bankruptcy sale of Centro Sud’s assets a few cars along with tons of spares, bits and pieces, including car 2086 which was soon sold to the Artom family of Milan. Having been correctly restored a few years ago, 2086 – presumably rebodied as a standard open sports car in 1955 by Fiandri – is still part of the important Artom collection and is regularly used in historic events.
The original berlinetta body, unspoiled in its two tones of blue Turin Show livery and never butchered or modified, was sold in 1976 to Corrado Cupellini. Franco Lombardi bought it from him on 7 October 1977 together with an original A6G CS chassis and engine No. 2080 in a crate. Cupellini had bought that chassis in France from Marc Nicolosi, the original organizer of Retromobile. At the time of the purchase from Cupellini, no identification number was apparent but many years later while sandblasting the chassis during the restoration at Giordanengo’s premises, no. 2070 was found properly stamped in the correct place and in the original font.
On that same day of 1977, Lombardi, after collecting the car from Cupellini in Bergamo, drove directly to Modena to have the chassis, the body and the various bits and pieced inspected by the factory, receiving assistance and advive from Guerino, Tino and Aurelio Bertocchi and from Ermanno Cozza. As suggested by the factory, in that afternoon he was introduced to Omer Orsi, operating then from his wharehouse at “Torrazzi”, in order to check various bits needed for a future restoration and to ask advice.
The chassis had a modified rear suspension with a transverse tube holding a set of coil springs in place of the original semi elliptic leaves. Wheelbase, front and rear tracks, front suspension, rear axle, wheels, brakes, steering, etc. were all correct and the whole unit was obviously a rusty original A6GCS chassis.
The blue berlinetta spent almost 20 years “sitting” on that chassis and collecting dust in Lombardi’s garage, until – in 1994 – it was delivered to Giovanni Giordanengo’s premises in Boves, for a total restoration, which was completed in 1997.
The third and fourth cars in the series, 2059 and 2060, exhibit remarkable similarities. Not only were they built – as was 2056 – in high roof configuration, but they were both fitted with a hood scoop, a feature not utilized on 2056 and 2057. They both appear to have been delivered to Dei on 28 September 1954.
2059 was shown at the Concorso d’Eleganza of Pincio, in Rome, on 13 and 14 June 1954 in its original dark red livery with a white center racing stripe. One might be surprised to learn that the car was already fully completed and ready for show far in advance of what the official Maserati records suggest. Not that surprising really since probably the sale was recorded when the final payment was received – in September. Official records do offer interesting and important indications, but, both in Ferrari and Maserati matters, they cannot be taken for absolute truth! Entered in the Concorso by Guglielmo Dei with No. 83, it easily won class XXI for closed sporting cars.
On 7 October 1954, 2059 was presented at the 41st Paris Show (Mondiale de l’Automobile). Although in the same livery, this berlinetta was now fitted with an unusual air inlet at the top of each of its rear fenders. It is worth mentioning that an original rendering by Aldo Brovarone, the berlinettas’s designer at Pinin Farina, shows this solution which was also occasionally used by Pinin Farina on other racing cars of this same era.
Originally owned by Count Alberto Magi Diligenti, of Florence, on 5 May 1955 the car was entered in the Mille Miglia (No. 643). He raced the car in a white livery together with Ilfo Minzoni without much success: 13th in class and 109th overall. By the way, the Milano road plates fitted to the car at that time belonged to a Fiat 1100! They just grabbed something handy in order to reach Brescia on the road, a not unusual practice in those days. In a letter to the organizers, Magi Diligenti wrote: “our car received nevertheless more applause then any other entry”.
The car later turned up in the States with well-known ferrarista Stan Novak. This berlinetta had at that time a modified A6GCM engine from a Formula 2 monoposto. 2059 was sold back to Italy through Cupellini where Giuseppe Lucchini of Brescia kept it in remarkably pristine condition. Later sold to David Sydorick of Beverly Hills, it was shown with its delightful original patina at Pebble Beach in 1999 and then again, in restored form, in 2000. After that it was sold in Switzerland to Eric Traber and most recently it was sold again in Europe.
Let’s come now to 2060 which was originally painted in a fairly similar red livery with a light blue (celeste) central stripe. This is a modestly documented car. Only one photo, to the best of my knowledge, shows the last of the berlinettas in its original form. Presumably, there was no racing activity for this car before its having been transformed into a standard open sports car and kept by Dei and the Scuderia Centro Sud for long time. We only know that the original body, which had been left in a corner of the modenese Scuderia, was later used to body chassis 2089.
This car was a well-known standard Fantuzzi/Fiandri-bodied open sports A6GCS originally sold to Francesco Giardini on 19 March 1955 and raced very successfully at the Mille Miglia in that same year: a fourth place overall and a class victory was the final, excellent result for this 2-litre sports car.
After a subsequent accident, Giardini sent his car to the factory for major bodywork. The very high estimate rendered by Maserati to rebody his car persuaded Giardini to look for a different solution. Whether he knew of the available coupé and approached Dei, or Dei approached Giardini is not known. In any case the original berlinetta body of 2060 ended up later (when?) on the Giardini chassis (2089). We know for sure that in 1967 a gentleman from Ancona called Gianfranco Carisdeo, contacted Maserati to get some spares and information about his A6GCS, a berlinetta Pinin Farina No. 2089. They answered on 24 November 1967 that “in our archives this should be a sports racing car with open body”. A period photo of the car shows a completely white livery, the presence of front and rear bumpers, rear road lights with turn indicators and two air openings on the sides, probably not original but elegantly done. The white livery has possibly caused some to confuse 2059 and 2060 in their early lives in 1955.
In any case 2089 – apparently with engine No. 2060 – found its way to the States where it was owned by Boris Subbotin, of Tarzana, California. Boris did a sympathetic restoration, painting the car in a dark red colour but he did not eliminate the road conversion elements present on the car (including a totally non original set of instruments). It was nevertheless honored on the cover of Road & Track magazine. The car was then sold to his present owner in the States who put David Carte in charge of a full restoration. 2089/2060 is now back to its former glory, although still with its presumably non-original side outlets.
To sum up we have four original cars with two of them having early on lost their original bodies in favor of standard open sports car bodies. Both the original coupé bodies subsequently found good homes on two original Maserati A6GCS chassis.
To complicate matters further, in the recent years the well-known German collector and enthusiast, Hubertus Donhoff, owner of chassis 2060, had a berlinetta body made (in England) with a peculiar tilting “sun-roof” and a silver paint job. Then, Giordanengo has also produced at least two copies of Lombardi’s berlinetta with new chassis and mechanicals. Apparently one is the dark blue car now in Belgium with a well-known local collector, while the second should now be in Germany in final detailing (can you tell us a bit more, Walter?). Finally, in a recent thread Francis Mandarano informs us that in Parana, Argentina, a company called Pur Sang is making more copies (or just one?) of the “low drag” berlinetta, apparently having bought a shell from Giordanengo.
It is hard to say, therefore, how many copies are now with us and how many there might be in the future. As I said dealing with the Argentine product, personally I would not buy one, but I do not have strong feelings about them. They all look like nice, very good copies of the original low roof body and I do not have anything against them. The original histories of the real cars are now quite well-known and documented and I do not think that anybody will ever claim in the future that there was an original fifth berlinetta…
Surprisingly, each of the copies duplicates the “low drag” body of my car. This does make sense for the ones originating from Giordanengo, but it is a bit surprising for the body fitted to chassis 2060. Personally, I would have made a copy of the original high-roof body fitted to that car. I am confident that the owners of the other high-roof cars would have offered assistance to duplicate their body. But then, again, this is just a matter of personal taste and everyone is entitled to follow his or her preferences. Apparently the low roof design is more appealing to the copyists.
Speaking of the modern bodies fitted to these cars, I have to agree with Walter who pointed out how somehow only the silver gray replica body fitted to 2060 shows the fully correct front grill. On the other hand, if you compare the original shape of the round tail of 2057 both in the original Turin Show photos and in my car today, you will notice that the shape of the rear lid opening and – most of all – the way in which the rear fenders blend into the tail are rather different, being less sharp and a lot softer in the original car. Moreover, the frontal area of the roof in the German silver car seems a bit higher then necessary, when compared with the Pinin Farina original.
In any case, we are talking of beautiful cars and of a real Pinin Farina masterpiece.
Let me thank my friend David Walmsley from whose article “A Further Look at 2057, the Turin Show Car”, appeared at p. 77 of Viale Ciro Menotti No. 83 I have taken some bits for this note.
I’ll be grateful for any comment on my notes and for any further detail made available.

Franco Lombardi

A final word, Frank: I have always appreciated good honest country boys. Nevertheless, I am a bit puzzled.
Either you do not remember David Walmsley’s article published at p. 76 of VCM 83 – and particularly your initial apologetic note there – or you are in possession of different evidence. This “I am simply asking…” innuendo does not lead to anywhere, as indicated by other fellow-chatters.

Franco Lombardi

 

Walter,
Please understand, I never found engine #2030 nor did i ever have possession of it.
I purchased the engines from Dino coglalato in Padova. Can't remember the number details, sorry.
Would need to check my archives.
Ciao,
FGM

 

Walter,
I reread your post and noticed that you are thinking I found the 2030 engine in San Francisco. I did NOT find the engine, I found the car.

Please understand, I never found engine #2030 nor did i ever have possession of it.
I purchased the engines from Dino coglalato in Padova. Can't remember the number details, sorry.
Would need to check my archives.
Ciao,
FGM

 

Franco,
Thank you for your post which seems to be very complete and informative.
Ciao,
FGM

 

Frank,

If you rode with Gianni Torelli while collecting Maserati parts from various and sundry locations, then there are surely those who would say, "All is forgiven!". in a few years, I might be among them.

Chissa'?!?

John

 

Janet and I, along with two Italians were never so happy to be out of a car!!
The drive to Padova from Modena was nothing short of hair raising!
Walter, yes, I have as found photos of 2030 and will post them.
Ciao,
FGM

 

and here it is in blue! what truly beautiful cars!

(picture taken from http://www.maserati.org.au/gallery/MASERATI/RACE_Cars/A6GCS53_gallery.html )
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Herr Baeumer,....where is the photo of you driving #2059 ?????

We don't believe you!

~Trev

 

That would be Sig. Lombardi's #2057-2070 "Mimmo" Dei's, a very different car. Different body etc.

A good read would be VCM's issue #83, March 2003, which has an extensive history.

~Ciao

 

Or, Sig. Lombardi's post!!!