1981 QP III 5 Speed and 1986 QP III Auto

Interesting stuff. I was wondering how the US emission system is 100 kgs heavy. Does the system include the air pump that EU car have? I removed the pump and mounted cats in stead of the front dampers, probably cutting altogether 10-20 kgs on my EU car. I thought Thor considered to remove the emission parts and convert to EU specs. In that case the car would loose those 100 (?) kgs. With implications for the front suspension settings.

 

It is the bumpers and related components that add the weight to the car.

 

The visual difference between US and EU bumpers is small and I know from experience that the EU ones are VERY heavy, i.p. the rear one, so I do not expect differences in the order of 100 kg there. I will look at pictures of both cars to get acquainted with the differences.

 

I spoke with David about the same thing, and we both concluded that there's no way that the US model weighs 100kg more than the Euro version. It may still require uprated dampers for whatever reason Maserati may have had (avoiding legal issues down the road, maybe thinking US versions would be run further/harder than EU ones, taking into account US obesity rates, who knows?), but the smog pump, canisters and brackets can't weigh more than 10kg all together.

The bumpers are identical, although there may be some additional impact absorbing components in the US version. Certainly not 80kg of material!

The service manual lists one kerb weight (1938kg) & tare (1975kg) only, not two.

So I think there is some other reason than front axle or total car weight for the uprated dampers.

 

That was what I wanted to suggest Thor.

 

Almost every QP3 I see has somewhat different tailpipes.

Some have quad, straight cut. Some quad are cut at an angle.

Some regular dual exhausts are straight cut, some angled, you've got an oval going on there, someone recently posted a picture of pipes with the outer (decorative) skin removed.

I wonder what was standard, or if there even was one...

Your car looks good William. I'm still waiting for an update on mine, haven't heard much since he removed all the trim.

 

This is the system I bought which is supposed to be an exact copy of the original. Normal steel. I bought it via a Maserati specialist. Quicksilver has a stainless version of the same model. The stainless on the other photo is a more fancy option but I do not remember where I found it.
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Beautiful William,

looks brand new!

As I recall, there weren't a whole lot of manual versions made, you're lucky to have found one.

What's the latest on the heads? Sourcing new ones, or having the existing ones welded up?

And have you decided on a colour for your QP3? Doesn't look like that day is too far off...

 

Great ongoing thread. Looks like an 86 QPIII might be joining our stables again! I'll keep you guys posted!

 

Wow!! Lovely shade of silver, shame about the car (prototype for a Batmobile, maybe? LOL).

It is indeed a difficult decision, there are a lot of really great colours that compliment the car nicely.

Mine is halfway down to the metal, and so far looks very solid. I'll have to update my blog and post a few more pics there.

 

William, was the housing of the ZF just cleaned/sanded or also sprayed with silver colour to get this result?

 

Do I read this correctly, that they took the initiative to get the work moving forward, without a customer basically begging and pleading with them to get off their hind end? Good show.

 

The car in the first picture here is mine. The others are yours. Easy to mix them up ;-)

Good to see progress is being made. How's the engine rebuild coming? And more importantly, have you decided on a color?

 

It's probably pretty easy for Al to get pics mixed up, they look almost identical. The main differences I see are the headlight buckets, front bumper mounting posts and of course the stance, as mine is too low due to the new dampers and yours is too high due to a missing engine.

Blu sera is a beautiful color, but I don't think the version on the 5000 will be the same as the QP3. It seems to me that the color changed between models. The 5000 blu sera seems a lot deeper and closer to black than f.x. the blu sera on my car or other Maseratis I've seen in this shade of blue.