308 GT4 - at what point whould I walk away

Bad luck Chris. Although I am not disputing the cost I don't why it should take 6 - 8 months in the shop to fix it. If my local shop that I have used for the last 10 years couldnlt it in do it in max 3 months I'd be looking for another one.

 

I wish our shops were that quick here, the sad reality is they're all back-logged. Some shops around here have a six-month waiting list just to get your car in!!

 

OK - I guess we are really lucky with all feh shoipo s wq have hfe in fhe UK, particularlyin the south east where I live. It is a real hot bed of classic car workshops and ancillary stuff.

 

Damn Chris so sorry to hear that.

 

Chris you have one of the most stunning gt4s around. Look at your options, if you sold it as is you'd get enough money to buy a used miata...not an option and you'd be forever heart broken. Do as much labor you can yourself which will reduce shop labor, ie mega bucks. I recently dug myself a huge hole. My gt4 has turned a wheel since 2009. At lime rock last year there was a gt4 there and I couldn't believe the number of people who loved gt4s. So this spurred me into getting mine going. At present it is totally apart. Yes it is slow and frustrating but when I get something done what a sense of accomplishment. Pulled my engine, yeah a lot of work, in my small garage where I put steel tubing across the roof trusses to be able to lift the engine. It's out now dissassembling...I'll get there. Probably save yourself at least a grand if you pull your engine yourself. One thing in your favor is thatvthisvis a great community of knowledge and help...and there are a lot of members in your area..a few beers and hamburgers and turn it into a group engine pull. Then mine the help and know how to reduce costs. It is just an engine. Meaning their is some old gray hair independent who can do the machine work at a fraction of the regular shop rates and of equal caliber. If all else fails sell your first born but do not get rid of that beautiful car. You'll regret it forever and especially if you see the person you sell it to drive by. All good things come in time and you'll find a way. Good luck, the shock will pass.

 

Chris,
Absolutely gutted for you as I think that would have to be my worst (automotive) nightmare too. Wish I lived closer to you so we could go out and drown your sorrows together with a little Russian River brew.....
Best of luck moving forward,
Dave

 

Sorry to hear it Chris, your car is beautiful!

There's a lot of knowledge in the 308 world, you got it! We can trade notes. I haven't announced my purchase yet, but I've got one coming my way with the engine already diassembled and machined...supposedly just have to put back together.
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sjd

 

Were they specific about what happened? From your description my guess is it broke a sodium exhaust valve.

If so, very sorry. Yes a failure like that can cause severe enough damage it gets to an expense level that keeping the car comes into question.

 

As backed up as any reasonably good shop is getting the car in to be worked on in my case would be 6 months. My machine shop will be 3 months. Job will take a year.

We are not all standing around waiting for something to do.

 

If this is a case of a broken sodium exhaust valve be warned. It could happen to any 2 valve Ferrari engine that still has Ferrari valves.
Replacing them is expensive. Not replacing them can cost you a car.

Sodium is corrosive and valves are steel. The older they get, the more brittle they get.

 

@dyerhaus That is exceptionally unfortunate. Your 308 is a lovely example and it is definitely worth spending the money on if you care about it. Was that your car that I saw up on the rack at SRE last week?

 

You have to decide if this kind of car ownership is right for you. You will break down and be stuck on the side of a road or freeway. it is a labor of love. People need to decide if the juice is worth the squeeze. For me it is. When my car breaks down, i get to learn what broke and how to fix it or possibly improve it. I know it sounds sad to some, but my car is a part my identity and a great portion of my life.

Pic in the cab of a flatbed. I am loving it - my wife not so much. We're divorced. I still have the car.

 

I posted this a few times before... My 308GT4 suffered from a sodium valve failure... it completely wiped out all the pistons and one liner on one bank. Attached is one of the pistons that did not disintegrate ... and sits on my desk as a paper weight and conversation piece.

A few of the cylinder head chambers were partially damaged as well. Thankfully the machine sourced new valve seats and the head was saved. Since I did all my own work, the overall rebuild cost was pretty reasonable at around $3K including machine shop efforts.. but this was many years ago and so replacement part prices and machine shop labor prices were less expensive than now.

Cheers,

Sam

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Likely so, that's where I had it towed, and just got it home today. It will get fixed, it'll just take some time for me to get there financially. But it'll be better than ever once it's done!

 

Yeah, my wife isn't too much of a fan of the car either—she definitely prefers things that are a bit more comfortable and don't smell only the way a carb-car can. And she's really not a fan of the cost of the repair in this case! And this is one that I will let the professionals handle, I don't have the time, knowledge, space, or tools to handle an engine rebuild.

Since this is a car I pined over for decades before I owned it, I can definitely say it's part of my identity as well. And I don't think that's a bad thing at all, everyone has something that's part of their identity and for a lot of folks that's their job. I don't know about you, but I would never want the corporate overlords to be part of my identity, I'd much rather it be a car. It's more than "just a car" for me. I think I made that pretty clear in a few blog posts on my site, in particular this most recent one about the event:

https://308gt4.com/2024/08/25/bore-score-and-35-years-ago/

 

Bit late to his thread .So sorry to hear this Chris .Especially liked your enthusiasm at car shows etc .

Did the endoscope show a dropped valve ? They should have seen it ? Pretty obvious.You haven’t reported it as such .

Otherwise I wonder what’s caused the “ bore scoring “ ? Maybe corrosion when it was inactive ? Damp air getting in through open valves , you see this kinda thing in marine diesels.
After a lay up it’s amazing how the oil film disappears, sinks down to the sump .

Then there’s the oil .Not wanting to reignite an oil thread do you mind telling us what you have been using ?

 

It doesn't appear the valves are to blame, no sign of that and we're uncertain if they are the original sodium valves or not (probably are, but no way to verify that). The uncertainty arises because a lot of work was done to this car between 2014 and 2020 before I owned it, and a lot was performed by the owner at the time. There's no record of the sodium valves ever having been replaced.

As I've been looking through its service history since 2014 (when the car was bought from storage after 25 years), I've noticed that some of the things that it had been taken in for, and some that had been repaired, were issues I experienced during my time with the car as well. This tells me old issues were reoccurring (things like carbs not responding, excessive gas/exhaust smells, etc.). I feel if "uncommon" issues keep reoccurring, then there's a deeper problem going on. Again, this points to the issue being ultimately caused by the car sitting neglected for 25 years. Perhaps damp air, but I noticed a note on one of the receipts about the possibility of dirt being in the carbs, which would mean it's in the engine, and I have found deposits of dirt on the exterior of the headers before but didn't think much of it because I drove it regularly.

As far as oil, I'm using Valvoline VR1 20W-50 for Racing and Classic cars.

 

Jesse and Rick are great techs. Hopefully it will be on the road sooner rather than later!

 

Thx for the reply .

Let’s put the sodium thingy to bed .It’s doesn’t happen in the U.K. and the valves are on 246. 512 , 365, 400 and 400 i s as well as 2V 3#8 series .There are a lot of cars circulating in the EU with sodium exhaust valves .From reading up in the States the consensus seems to be your air injection gets them hotter AND obviously the timing or setting up on belt changes maybe knocking them or something . The proportion of DIYers in the EU is vastly lower as usually a “ shop “ within under a 100 miles so guys tend to farm out the belt changes .
Also any survivors out there are likely to stay survivors.Having said this obviously re sodium exhaust valves multiple hitting redlines constantly working up to redline is courting trouble .

Back on scoring .
If it wasn’t a compromise due to sitting corrosion ( would effect a few cylinders more than one I suspect ? ) and it’s lingering after effect , and you say “ carb issues “ then all I can think of bearing in mind there are effectively one barrel sitting over each cylinder is the carb running cylinder 5 the scored one was over rich .

So much so enriched it diluted the oil film in that cylinder down to dangerously low levels and over time this has caught up .
Masked by the other presumably in spec 7 cylinders .Some fault in that carb washing the cylinder with fuel .

You need to know the aetiology ( medical term for what caused it ) before the treatment - understand the disease - rather than simply rebuild / fix it up do a engine rebuild with a lot of “ while we are in there “ adding in

I am sure your guys will find out?

Otherwise if it’s a carb issue and they are bolted back on ………

 

Yep, air injection on 250s caused a lot of broken valves.

 

If valves are ruled out then something must have been determined?

 

Any mechanic can replace, a good mechanic can actually fix something, the best mechanic figures out the root cause before doing any big fix to make sure it won't happen again (like this guy ⬆️ ). Why did the piston ring fail? There is a story of what happened inside that block that has to do with temp, lubrication, debris, maintenance, etc. See if you can get a oil analysis from Blackstone Labs.

 

Blackstone test means nothing. You have a broken engine. That tells you what happened.

Broken rings dont stop engines. What makes you think a ring is at issue?
I am genuinely curious and have seen no mention of rings.

 

Something to note: To fully understand exactly what happened would require them to tear down the engine. I opted NOT to do this because what they found just using their scope warranted a repair "North of $30,000" (exact quote) - and would likely be higher based on what they might find after the engined was removed and torn down. This is why I didn't go further and have them tear the engine down as I already knew $30,000 was too much for me right now, so no point in paying a HUGE labor/diagnostic fee until I'm ready to have the work performed. Otherwise, they would tear it down, give me excellent details, and then put it all back together unfixed and I'd owe several thousand for that. I've already got over $1300 in this due to towing (from break-down location to shop, then from shop to my home) and the diagnostic they did perform.

That being said, and for those interested, here's the exact notes from the diagnostic invoice (all caps because that's how they wrote it):

AFTER SITTING OVER NIGHT NOW ABLE TO START VEHICLE. REMOVED AIR FILTER AND CHECKED ACCELERATOR PUMPS FOR FUEL. REMOVED DISTRIBUTOR CAP AND INSPECTED CAPS AND ROTORS AND IGNITION POINTS. FOUND TO BE ACCEPTABLE. IGNITION POINTS PITTED. REASSEMBLED AND STARTED ENGINE. WHILE IDLING NOTICED METALLIC NOISE ON BANK 2. SAW METALLIC FLAKES ON LOWER AIR FILTER HOUSING. USED STETHOSCOPE TO PINPOINT TO CYLINDER 5. NOISE INCREASES OVER TIME. SHUT OFF CAR. REMOVED SPARK PLUG 5. USED SCOPE TO INSPECT. FOUND CYLINDER WALL SEVERELY SCORED. RECOMMEND ENGINE TEAR DOWN TO DETERMINE CAUSE AND SEVERITY OF DAMAGE.
​

Notably missing from that description is the failed Piston Ring. This is something they told me verbally over the phone. Again, knowing it was going to cost a minimum of $30,000 based on their initial findings and that I couldn't afford that at this time, it didn't make financial sense to spend thousands more and have them go further and tear it all apart and put it back together again still broken.

For those of who say I should rebuild it myself and save tens of thousands… you're right! That would be amazing! And, I'm flattered that you have that much confidence in me. But the reality for me is that just can't happen. Here's why:

1. Lack of space - I simply don't have the room to remove an engine and leave it out of the car (I have a small one-car garage).
2. Lack of tools - I don't have things like engine and engine hoist, nor do I have the space to keep one around. I have a few hand tools, that's it.
3. Lack of time - I work full time (as I'm sure a lot of us do), but after a full day of work the last thing I want to do is more work.
4. Lack of knowledge - I simply don't know how to do it. Sure, I could read manuals, instructions, past threads, and ask dozens of questions and get excellent answers from this community, but I would have to pause at literally every single step to do that. And if I did get the engine out and disassembled, I wouldn't know what I'm looking at! There could be something else amiss staring me in the face that I wouldn't even think to think might be an issue as I have no concept of that kind of thing. Guys, I've never even rebuilt a lawnmower engine—I've never rebuilt anything in my life. There's some things I feel are best left to professionals, and for me, this is one of them.
5. Lack of patience - As long as it would take me to do this, I would just get frustrated and the car would end up sitting there disassembled until the day I die (I know myself well enough to know that's what would happen). Then my wife would kill me again because I left that mess for her.
6. Lack of confidence - Since I don't know what I'm doing, if I were to do this on my own (even if I had someone physically with me every step of the way), I would constantly doubt myself at every step. Then when it was done, up and running, I'd constantly be thinking I missed something and it's all going to happen again on the next drive I take!

The "Lack of space" isn't just my imagination—so if all the other things weren't an issue, I'd still by physically prevented from the ability to do the work unless I had a different place to keep the car. That said, I do have a friend who has a garage bigger than most folks homes, he also has the tools. The problem is I'd have to actually get my car there and that would be a huge transport bill as he lives about three hours away. Then, at any time I'd want to work on it, I'd have to coordinate with him to make sure he's there and willing to help as there's no way I could even remotely do the work myself, and I'd have a six hour round trip every single time. Not to mention my car would live in his garage until the project was complete. As good as my car looks, I don't think he'd want it sitting there for years!

Yes, I do wish I could do it myself and save tens of thousands of dollars, I just don't see how that's in the cards for me. I'd rather pay an exuberant amount of money and rest assured the car was repaired correctly by professionals with decades of experience under their belts and have the car back on the road in (my estimate) about three years. If I went the DIY route, it would likely never be on the road again, and if it was, it would be at least a decade (likely longer). I'm being very honest with myself here.

I like driving my car, and want the time away from that to be as minimal as possible. I didn't spend 35 years pining for this car to watch it deteriorate in my garage. I seriously applaud those who have the wherewithal to tackle a project like this, you guys have my respect and envy without question!! To have the time, space, tools, talent, patience, and confidence required to do this is an incredible thing and I really wish I had all that too. Alas, I've lived with myself for almost 55 years and I know my limits. I can change oil and other fluids, I can replace hoses and filters, and I'm fairly good at minor interior cosmetic stuff, but anything more complex than that simply isn't in my wheelhouse.

 

I understand. But I usually find out a great deal more prior to tear down. It helps with decision making.

Whatever you decide, good luck with it.