Newman: Hey, I'm new here, but find your project very interesting and its nice of you to keep posting all the info. I did a complete tr6 (triumph) restore about a year ago and so its nice to see someone else this crazy. I had mine completely frame off - blasted everything etc. One thing I noticed in one of the posts was a reference to blasting the undercoating or sound deadening material. I just wanted to share my experience that this stuff is nearly impossible to sandblast. Sandblasting works great on hard parts and not at all on soft parts - In my case I used a grinder brush wheel - big one on right angle drive - not the little gizmo you put on the end of a 3/8 drill from the hardware store. It worked but was a lot of work, and needed some hand scraping in the tricky nooks etc. Also, someone made reference to warping with sandblasting, but this is generally just the result of excessive air pressure from big commercial units and very heavy sand spray (lot of heat generated). Warping is a result of the commando approach get it done in five minutes with maximum power. The commercial guys will often do this because it means a quick job, not a good job. Effective if you're refinishing army tanks. A lighter unit with a only as necessary approach will work awesome, and I also found that the very finest sand cut quicker and left a better surface than the coarser sand. Anyway, something i wish someone would have told me when I was getting started, not to pretend to know better here. Thanks again and good luck
Thanks for the input, Ill still stick with blasting the structure rather than the panels just to be safe. Besides, Ill be outside (in the middle of winter) freezing my butt off so time is an issue.
Today i removed the lower quarter boxes on both sides. Ill be removing all of the sheet metal boxed sections in the trunk area to allow for the lower trunk of the euro cars. The euro tail panel will replace the boxes in one piece and line up with the lower trunk floor. They were held in with rivets, seam sealer, bolts, undercoating and dum-dum. Image Unavailable, Please Login
The tin pan hanging in mid air will also be removed. The euro valance has trunk space right down to the bottom of the box behind the wheels. All this extra US stuff will be tossed and Ill be improving the look of the car and shedding unwanted weight. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Here are a couple of shots of the Euro valance I bought from ferrari UK this week. My main reason for the change was the 2 exhaust cutouts and no muffler cover. Yes, I could have made a piece of sheet metal to bridge the gap in the center but you dont get the same look and its one piece. Ill be removing the unwanted metal tomorrow and tackling the rust on the quarters as well as eliminating the marker light holes. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Paul Thanks for continuing to post the pics. It provides a great insight into the challenge of the work you are doing. Great stuff. Keep it up! Philip
Newman, this is one of the best threads i have ever seen. i am in the market for a 308 and i cant thank you enough for all the insight and help you have provided. just think this will be preserved by Rob for all time( well a long time anyway). thanks so much for taking the time to document all of this and share it with the world. and yes you are nuts!!!!!!!!!! LOL! michael
Newman, How did they ship that stuff to you from the UK? How much did the shipping cost? Thanks, Stacy
Thanks Guys, I figure you have to be a little nuts to go this far but I want it to look new everywhere. I purchased all the emblems/badges for the car, step plates, lights, many switches and warning lights. I still have many things to buy but the major stuff is here on the shelf waiting to be installed. Ill turn my attention to the engine (making some upgrades) after the major body work is out of the way. One thing to watch out for on these US 308s is the rust in the quarters. If you have bubbles outside, a nightmare awaits you inside. All the stuff Im eliminating in the trunk area is rusty to some extent and you cant see it unless you gut the trunk. Thats something you cant do prior to buying a car. I knew there was rust and that its usually worse than it looks and that was the case here. Anyone buying a 308 should at least look behind the side carpets inside the trunk before buying even if it looks all glossy outside, that will tell you how clean the car really was/is.
Stacy, the box was 7 feet long at least 2x2 square and mounted on a skid. It weighed 45lbs and cost 260.00GBP to ship. Everything arrived quickly and undamaged through norman shipping. Ive used them 3 times now from ferrari UK and the service is great. It arrived via air canada.
Paul, how do you figure the trunks of GTB/S' get so rusty? I know at least on my GT4, with the U.S. bumpers, the side caps cover two unused mounting holes of some-sorts and that at least, caused water to enter my trunk and rust the Hell out of it. Anything like that on yours?
Hi Peter, on the gtb/s, US spec only, they fabricated the rear boxed frame sections surrounding the tube chassis and packed them with insulation. Thats fine if they made an effort to seal the boxed sections but they didnt. They start at the rear firewall (they actually protrude into the engine compartment) and run to the rear bumper but are open at the engine compartment end. When you wash the car, water runs past the engine louvers and down the rear wall to the open ended box. It then gets to the insulation an keeps it wet. Any piece of steel so far that Ive disturbed is untreated metal. The only way it wont rust is if its oiled and rarely washed. If you drive in the rain, water will find its way there too, its very close to the rear tire. Bad design no matter how you look at it.
Today I cut out all the unwanted US crap in the trunk floor. This allowed me to lower the floor to the original height that the euro cars came with prior to conforming to US crash specs. So, yes my car is weaker in the rear but i figure I have the engine to absorb all that impact if I get hit. Chances are I wont want the car fixed if it gets hit anyway so off come the heavy US bumpers as well. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Here I placed the new forward trunk wall I made to replace the original. It is 3 inches deeper and considering the fiberglass subfloor I also removed, i gained at least 4 inches of trunk depth and more at the sides. While I cut out the verticle brace from the rear swaybar, I was surprised to see black water pi$$ing out of it. The car hasnt seeing water since october, isnt that nice to know your rails can be holding water. They both were. The 2 rear frame rails you see angled also will be coming out. There will be a brace across below the forward trunk wall, from that 2 new rails will be mounted straight above the lower angled brace that comes off the rear bar bracket. The final brace will be below the tail panel connecting the two new rear rails. That is how the Euro cars are, much simpler and lighter. The trunk floor will be supported by one fore and aft channel in the center. Ill also be fitting the new Euro QV tail panle at this time. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Very impressive, I wish I had the ambition to do 1/10th what you are undertaking. When I replaced the carpet in my 78 308 gts I found rust under most of the carpet, I wondered if someone had shampooed the carpet or is there another culprit. Just wondering if you found any cancer under your carpet?
I find these 308 resto photos very interesting, but in an ominous fashion. There seems to be alot of hidden rust EVERYWHERE in old cars, and not just picking on Ferrari 308s. It definately makes me think twice about paying any serious money for a car like a 308, especially when you consider how much rust and potential repair work remains hidden from the eye underneath a beautiful paint job. It would seem that the only way to "get your money's worth" when buying a 308 would be to buy a garage queen that never got rusty in the first place. At least that way, you could concentrate your restoration efforts on purely mechanical things like timing belts and water pumps. (And of course, nagging electrical problems.) But it seems that Ferraris are just like Detroit iron in one respect; the factory could have made the cars last YEARS longer if they had just put a little more effort into painting hidden metalwork with a quality paint or epoxy coating. It's really sad to see just how much WORK is really necessary to prevent a car from being a rust bucket under the skin. The Tin Worm never sleeps.
I didnt find any rust under the carpet, most of the floor is fiberglass but the trunk floor was another story. I found rust under the dash and rear package tray(under the back window). It was just surface under the dash but under the right quarter glass it was rough. ive seen it like that on others as well, you just dont know until to rip it apart whats hiding inside. The worst part was the trunk pan and the extra sheet metal for the insulation in the rear. One other thing i discovered was the rear tubes for the chassis (the actual frame tubes!) in the trunk are also packed with insulation before they weld them together. who would have guessed?
You're right horsefly, the garage queen thing isnt a bad idea but another thing I discovered when i first rebuilt the gearbox a year ago was evidence of rust on needle bearings and shafts. This is because my car sat for 8 years unused so the oil that circulates eventually all ends up in the pan and bare metal machined surfaces start to stain. i could see stains from the needles on the bearing surfaces from being stationary. A problem that ford is having right now in the rear differentials running synthetic lube is rust on the gears, and they get used daily. I think its a synthetic thing, some sort of hydroscopic characteristic perhaps. Synthetic oil is the choice for ferrari gearboxes. I have no regrets doing what I am to this 308, its alot of fun and Ill know 308's inside out when Im done but the next ferrari will be chosen very very carefully. No a garage queen, but low K's and original paint even if its all cracked bearing in mind a proper repaint on a 308 is a major big dollar undertaking.
