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Does anyone have experience in getting their evaporator located under the dash, being reconditioned? I have to imagine there are none for sale or available? My car's a/c was working great but then it seems there is a leak somewhere since it started blowing warm air.... A competent, local shop in town spent many hours trying to locate the source and has now recharged it twice in 1 month but, given the condition of the car - they are hesitant to open up the dash. However, they suspect and have actually concluded that the evaporator is the cause of the leak. I have 2 parts cars and would have the evap on one of those redone so that the job would then entail swapping one for the other... Any advice or experience with this would be greatly appreciated.
I ended up instead just buying what was touted the best one around... Had a PPI done by Steve Mastroianni at Auto Turismo and he agreed it was the best he had ever seen. After a not brisk bill to essentially undertake preventative maintenance, the car ran flawlessly for the 1,000 miles I drove it in 2.5 months until the a/c took a dive last month. Thank you for the heads up as to the seats but, my 'original' car that I have owned since 2014 needed a complete restoration after the hood flew open while driving it years ago when I was leaving a 2nd shop that same morning to consider doing a restoration then... I got a parts car for the hood and windshield (and interior), although I am much happier having gotten one that's turnkey and essentially, new (sans the evaporator taking a dive, but to be expected on a 40 year old car). Link is below although the car is actually even better in person, if that's possible. https://www.classiccargallery.com/details.php?id=1546 Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
yeah best to start with a better car saves time and $. I remember that one for sale. Can you see how your vaccum pump (passenger side cylinder head) is hooked up ? I think they used them only on manual cars for the clutch booster. And used intake manifold vaccum for the brake booster. so your line might be plugged as well…. Let me know please. mine is nice on the exterior and 30000 mi. But lots of shenanigans under the hood,,,
Hello OttoB and Jeffkrell... My QP3 is a 1982 with automatic transmission. The vacuum pump located on the upper passenger side cam box supplies vacuum to my brake booster. As you will note on the pic of my intake manifold there are no ports for vacuum. I have also attached a crude drawing of the as found vacuum system on my car. It seems most of this was for emissions/evap. But it is possible Maserati changed things after 1982. You will need to verify your vacuum systems on your respective cars.. Hope this helps a bit... Mike Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
[QUOTE="Mike[/QUOTE] hello Mike, The only vacuum i use is for the brake booster and the vacuum tank, and the gauge on instrument. I don’t use the vaccum retard on the distributor. Nor all the emissions systems. You have 2 Large vacuum ports in your intake manifold circled in red. Where were they connected to? Maserati Bonnet diagram (USA) Diagram shows both go to brake booster I also read the old posts but no one covered this subject there are 3 large vacuum sources. 1 the pump and 2 are the intake manifold circled I think the pump was used only for the clutch booster… (photo below) Image Unavailable, Please Login
Look at this disaster. 4 webers is too scary for mechanics here so they slap a efi Holley kit to fix it…. Incredible. It runs and drives OK but no air filter ! Unbelievable ( not my work and I will never let someone else work on my car. It is in good hands now !) If someone wants the kit it is available. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Hello Jeff... My apologies.. There are vacuum ports on my intake manifold, but I meant to say none of those ports were applicable to the brake booster on my car... The vacuum plate you show is the same as was on my car, but when I traced the vacuum system, what I found did not agree with the plate with respect to the brake booster. Now that being said, there were changes to these cars through the production years. Since my car is an automatic, the vacuum pump was used to provide vacuum to the brake booster and the distributer. It is possible that on a manual trans car the vacuum pump was used for something different. In my opinion, the parts manual and the service manual aren't very clear nor provide an accurate diagram of the vacuum system. If you look at table 22 in the parts manual you will notice where they have the vacuum ports located on the intake manifold. That is not correct on my car. On this table as well, if you follow item 37 (hose) it seems to lead to the area item 89 is located, which I believe is the vacuum pump located on the upper passenger cam box.. On my diagram the 'T' fitting, after the vacuum pump by the brake booster, has vacuum being supplied to both the brake booster and the distributer. This seems to agree with the parts manual and to some extent the vacuum diagram plate. It may depend on the year of car as to whether the vacuum plate or the parts manual is correct with respect to the brake booster. Never a dull moment with Maserati cars... A very interesting setup with your Holley carb. Did you replace it with Webers? Mike
Hello Mike, Yes I have all the Weber carbs and will set up car original, but with US air box (i like it in case of fuel leak from carbs) but with sides groved, and no emissions flaps ect..like the car is supposed to be. as far as the vaccum it seems that over the years they needed more vacuum sources for increasingly strict emissions so..more taps here and there.. but originally probably only used the pump. I don’t like to tap any vacuum from the intake because that messes up the related carb adjustments. The QP3 intake manifold is not one plenum, (vaccum not sourced from all 8 carbs) you rob vacuum from the last carb using the taps in the back. (Or were ever it’s sourced) So one small leak and your back 2 cylinders will run lean…. Ect ect ect. Then you tweak those carbs and it creates a mess. so I hope that the pump will create enough vaccum for the brake booster, you use it that way so maybe you can tell me if the vaccum is enough for the brake booster. I will tee it into the vacuum tank with a check valve so when motor dies I have one or 2 brake applications. you don’t need the vaccum to the distributor. Above a good post it retards the timing to 4deg after top dead center warming up motor fast to heat up catalytic converter. I removed that function. It is not an advance feature like on some other cars. It’s An ON / OFF setup only used at idle stop (ON) and OFF when slightly above idle stop (the micro switch) That’s it ! it’s a very simple setup but it seems over the years it became a mess because every mechanic did something different. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Just a caveat with this ... yes it's nice to hide an minor leaking gas but If it's more than minor say a banjo bolt or gasket becomes loose you need to see that so EVERY time you take the car out you should do a look over all the fuel connections. when fuel spills from the barbs it does so down into the V and runs toward the rear where there's a drain hole drilled through the block coming out over the top of rear main seal. At lest it is on the Bora block, YMMV. So one warm day It took a friend in my Bora to Castro Valley to visit Al Burtoni (RIP). About half way there I gasped when I looked at the gas gauge which was full when we left and was now @ 1/4. I had a banjo bolt come loose and 3/4 of a tank of gas was lost that way Thank god there was no fire.
Wow now that’s a different “fuel leak” I probably meant a few drips per minute.. but you never know what happens when Enroute… The later US ones have the cake box style and I meant that one. The leak will accumulate at the bottom plate of the cake box and then I’ll attach a fuel drain line somewhere down away from the exhaust. That cake box style I will groove like this one. (I have 2, one that has already been molested so I’ll side groove that one) Image Unavailable, Please Login
Has anyone had to repair or replace the evaporator located behind the dash on their QP3? It seems mine is the culprit of a dreaded a/c leak and, rather than take mine apart and then take however long to fix or replace it - I’m hoping those with experience here in this forum can point me in the right direction? Are there any alternatives other than to attempt to repair it? I cannot imagine there being new, old stock 40 year old parts lying around that would be working as new, either. So - is there a suitable, similar evap that can be swapped in? The car without a/c here in SoFla is just not pleasant to drive around. However, I prefer having it at home versus parked outside some shop for weeks until they were to sort it out. Unsure where else to turn to for advice and thanks in advance for your input!
Hi Otto, I seriously doubt that any “shop” here in the US will be able to sort this out for you.. like you said it’s going to be yes yes yes ….but nothing will get done, and your car will sit in the rain for months. it’s probably a big deal to replace that part. It would good to see if maybe the leak is at the firewall a usually fragile section of the evaporator. Regardless you’ll probably have to take that AC pack out. It is similar to the Jaguar delanair ll but not the same. If you are sure the leak is in the evaporator coil I would take it out repair it and replace it. Then hope you AC will still respond to the controls once all put back together. parts…buy a scrap QP3 and hope those parts are ok.. or you can buy the part from Pasquale in Italy [email protected] It’s a job I’ll definitely want to do myself.
I have 2 parts cars… will be selling one soon after I ensure that the first in line as a keeper, is fully stocked. I’ve asked my mechanic to pull the evap out of the other parts car that has no engine since I don’t care about putting the dash back on that one but… looking to hear from other owners who’ve had to undertake this repair? I’m positive mine is not the first QP3 that the evap has taken a dive? The shop in town I took it to last month gladly charged me $1,000’s to investigate and put a bandaid, only for the a/c to not not blow cold after 3-4 drives. They then spent many more hours attempting to trace everything after I took it back and are convinced it’s under the dash. But, didn’t dare charge me more after the first fruitless visit and unsurprisingly, it’s stopped blowing cold again after 3-4 drives.
These boxes were put on thee QP3 cars in order to collect evaporating gas, that includes any minor leaks as well as fuel in fuel bowls of the carbs that boils off after you shutdown. It's a PITA for service and as I said it prevents early detection but they do look nice. Ask around the vintage Lamborghini crowd about the V12 engines with their DCOEs and inspecting those cars fuel delivery systems. An ounce of prevention is worth several hundred of thousands or even millions of pounds. Precious few Maseratis are worth that kind of money But if it's a car you have worked a lot on and love watching it burn is horrific.
Free to a good home. Cleaning out my parts stash of cars I don't own anymore. Image Unavailable, Please Login
