Mandarano Vintage Photos

1986

 

Here are a couple photos showing the carports when I owned MIE and after.
The old photo was taken in the mid 1990's and the newer one a couple years ago.
Note the old asphalt is gone and new concrete installed. Gone are all the old parts cars and now it is just covered parking.
It was home to MIE from 1991 to 2002.

Ciao,
FGM
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Well, we can go back to the late 70's and have a look at the kind of cars we were servicing and restoring.
The 3500 in for restoration is #1802 currently owned by Doug Magnon. The covered headlite Mistral is 057, which was owned by me at the time.
Ciao,
FGM
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Good eye. Yes that is 1120 when I owned it. Lovely car, silver Black with a 5 speed.
Bought it in Berkley from a premier restoration guru. The car was purchased at a substantial discount due to the loud metallic noise coming from the engine which frightened everyone who got near it.
After I bought it, I sprayed some WD40 on the Gates polyflex water pump belt and bingo noise gone. A simple case of poor belt alignment. I learned a very big lesson that afternoon.
Ciao
FGM

 

I was there that fateful day.
it was Monday, June 30, 1997, the day that has become known to many as the “change over day". The day the British handed over Hong Kong to the Red Chinese. On this particular Monday, Janet and I were invited to join Ing. Alzati for lunch at the Lauro restaurant in Modena . Little did we know that, in addition to it being Ing. Alzati’s (62nd) birthday, it was the hand over date for Maserati, as well. With a touch of sadness we watched Hong Kong’s pageantry on television, witnessing the sorrow and uncertainty in the faces of the British as they sailed out of the Harbor.

Ironically, we had experienced similar feelings at lunch that afternoon. It was clear that Ing. Alzati was being replaced and on his birthday to boot. He was very animated as he spoke openly from the heart. He reminded me of a courageous General who had been asked to take early retirement when he still had the fire in his belly for one more battle.

Ing. Alzati was quick to explain that he was not retiring and that he had merely completed his job at Maserati, a job he had been hand picked to do. Maserati was bleeding profusely when he took over in May 1993. Sales were off dramatically, quality was down, and the red ink was flowing like a swollen river after a Monsoon thunderstorm.
Ing. Alzati was the right man, for the right job, at the right time. He brought stability to a company that was unstable. He brought a friendliness to the staff that they had not known in nearly 20 years. In contrast to the DeTomaso style of total autocratic management, Ing. Alzati’s philosophy of “let the Managers manage and the Engineers engineer” was totally refreshing. Within weeks he had unified the employees, within months he had stabilized the company’s condition – albeit it was still losing money, but not quite as fast.
He began a dialogue with the suppliers and dealers, based on honesty and trust, gaining their support and respect. Looking back over the past four years (hindsight is always 20/20), mistakes were made, but who among us could have done any better? The biggest mistake, perhaps, was too much control by the parent company, Fiat. A company that is very good at building thousands of cars per day may not understand the complexities and idiosyncrasies of producing two to three cars per day. This requires a mentality completely unlike that of Fiat who's revenues last year exceeded 62 billion dollars.

So it was that on June 30th, 1997, Ferrari took complete control of their old arch rival, Maserati. On one hand, the Ferrari team could be viewed as conquering generals, on the other, as saviors. It is pretty certain that, without this change, Maserati would surely have ended up under the auctioneer’s gavel, like so many other automobile manufacturers before them. The most recent example being Bugatti.

I hope you have enjoyed this look back at Maserati history. I was very fortunate to have been there at that time, and to have known Sig Alzati.
Ciao,
FGM
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It is one of my photos taken that same day.
FGM

 

To clarify, the photo was taken the same day I took the Shamal photo which was not taken on June 30th as evident by the coats the guys are wearing.
FGM

 

Here in the photo is a Sebring Interior all laid out.
The photo taken by me in the mid 1980's at MIE.

This is a test to see how alert your are.

Can you tell whats unusual about this interior?
Winner receives an extra fruit cup for dinner.
Ciao,
FGM
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Winner!!!
What gave it away for you?
FGM