Returning 1961 Vignale spyder 1341 to the road

Thanks John. Spoke to Matteo and he has an aluminum extrusion that I think will work. Aluminum will be easier to bend than stainless and can be polished.
I've asked a couple of Vignale spyder owners for the width and length of their trim.
Luckily this car has been mostly "all there" and there has not been too much need to be hunting and fabricating parts.

Ivan

 

Good suggestion on the marine grade stainless fasteners.

Ivan

 

Excellent. That will be easier to drill too

 

Marine fastener info jclarkemarine.com/pages/fitting-guides-and-info

 

Ivan, that is a challenging task.
Missing chrome trim for the soft top of Jaguar E-type roadsters is a common issue. Fortunately, because of the relative high number of such roadsters, there are suppliers of replacement chrome trims.
It turns out however that it is very difficult to adjust the supplied chrome trim to the exact profile of the car's body, because each car is different, because the trim has a 3D shape as you describe it (domed top, flat bottom) and because the material is rather hard to work out.
In my opinion, the best material would be copper that you could easily chrome after final shaping.
Aluminium would be an alternative but not as nice.

 

Thanks to Ferraripilot I now have what is perhaps the best solution; taking into account time and money. He was able to locate a marine rub rail with the same width and thickness as the original trim at West Marine. It comes in 12 foot lengths and is polished anodized aluminum. Best of all, it comes pre-drilled! I immediately ordered the rail and had it shipped to a West Marine store located 30 minutes from my house. I picked it up yesterday and bending the rail to fit in the back of my truck was easy. I have yet to fit it to the car.

Ivan
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Well done!

 

The gearbox is a bit stiff when cold. Has anyone used Redline synthetic oil in this gearbox?

Ivan

 

Again, not on a Maserati but on early Jaguar E-types with the (in)famous Moss box: my use of synthetic Redline MTL considerably improves the gearchanges.
With no leaks.

 

Redline lists 75W90NS GL-5 oil for the S5-325 found on the Ghibli. It is what I have in my Ghibli with good results. No gear oil is listed for the S5-17 found in the 3500GT. I wonder what other 3500GT owners are using.

Ivan

 

That looks spot on doesn't it. Very glad that was located!

 

Good score on the trim Ivan. When I worked with ZF Classiche for my S-5 17, they warned against any of the synthetics. It's dinasour juice for me on this application.

 

Hello redfred84....

I too have an s5-17 gearbox for my Mistral... Do you have any more info on why ZF Classiche indicated NOT to use a synthetic? Did they give
you any recommendations on what to use?

Thanks in advance...

Mike

 

Synthetic oils are much "slicker" than conventional oils. As a result, the synchros cannot get as good a grip on the hubs to match gear speeds. Penn Grade 80-90 GL4 vastly improved my ZF shifting in an Alfa Montreal.

 

does that gearbox have an ‘yellow’ synchros inside? If so, a GL4 will work best and is actually what’s recommended for those.

 

It took two days but now the rear trim has been shaped and installed.

Ivan

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Must have been a very scary job on freshly painted car!!!!!!!!!!! Is that Alex's old 3500 in the back? It was a goodie.

 

Nice fit!
Must have been tricky to bend as it had to be curved in several dimensions with no kinks, still keeping the flat base on the bottom.

 

Yes, that is Alex ‘s ex-car. Very honest 3500GT. Having some interior work done.

Ivan

 

Anybody have experience converting the Marelli generator to an alternator and keeping the look of the generator? I know there are companies that sell Lucas alternators that look like the original generators but I have not found one for Marelli.

Ivan

 

Are you familiar with Dave North? He's in North NJ. He's a long time Ferrari guy and now provides a Marelli dizzy rebuild service. He might know where to look.

 

I know ave well. He recently rebuilt the distributors of the two 3500GT.

Ivan

 

https://ejwhitneyco.com/automotive.html Not JC Whitney!

 

I'll ask them. Although sending them my working generator makes me nervous.

Ivan

 

Would anyone have ready to go converted generator?
So I think all vendors are going to be like that.
I'm guessing that you'd like a cosmetic restoration as well ... but maybe you could do that part yourself once they return a working, converted generator?