'The Ratarossa': The Testarossa Spider Rebuild Project

Whooooooop Whoooooooop Whooooooop !!!

Only gone and managed to get the blasted wheel nut off.

Well technically the guys at my tyre garage did. They used an industrial 1inch socket breaker with solid thick bar + long extension and a load of brute force muscle ..... while I stood one the breaks . I owe them all a beer or three

The good news is they are off and for the record (and to remind me in future) all of the centre lock hubs are correct and the right direction. Copper grease now applied and hoping I don't face this again in the future.

The slightly bad news, somewhere between getting the windscreen in and trying to get this wheel off the steering column weld has broken again, so its back to the drawing board on that. 2 steps forward 1 step back as they say !
Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

I had tried this but to be honest not with a vast amount of heat as I was concerned about the chrome of the centre wheel bolt. These are becoming very rare now and expensive to replace. Lots of heat was my last resort.

 

Yes its the weld again Romano, the problem is its right at/beneath the join where the ignition barrel clamp around the column. So I cannot strengthen it with extra weld as this has to all be filed away or the barrel cannot then fit and clamp correctly around the column, remember it needs to fit perfect as it has the hole and slider for the steering lock.

You can just see in the picture the big crack. Basically this means the whole upper end of the column is very loose. the steering wheel wobbles all over and is terrible to manoeuvre, I had to drive it like this yesterday very slowly to the tyre garage to help get the wheel nut loose, fortunately it is just around the corner less than half a mile away.
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

So I think I have come up with the perfect solution and fix to this problem.

Thought about it and had learned a lot last time I had the column welded and repaired then completed the rebuild. One of the final things I was worried about was removing the bearings and the cups and keeping them intact. I was surprised how easily these knocked out. With that in mind I figured why not try and strip the spare (newer) style column, remove the parts that are different such as bearings at each end, the shaft etc and just leave the casing then replace all the inner parts from my older 86/87 column.

Before removing the broken one from the car yet AGAIN !!

I figured its probably best to see if its even possible to strip the newer spare column and keep everything intact, so far so good ...............
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Now I need to remove the old one from the car and switch over the parts (fingers crossed)

 

Yes you were totally right with the 1 inch, it needed so much strength and resistance, I looked but found it really hard to find one that was not stupidly expensive.

 

Finally having some luck with this steering column.

I have removed the old broken one again, stripped it down. A few hair-raising moments when I realised the diameter of both bearing ends was bigger (On the newer 1990 style column), this has actually proved to be an added bonus as I have used the newer style and much better bearings which fit perfectly with the old style shaft. I now have a mix match of older and newer column parts mated together and right now its actually looking like it will work

Im off to Ferrari to pick up a couple of new C-Clips to refit and then the job should be finished.
Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Still hunting down and acquiring bits for this car.

From what I can see I have every interior and trunk carpet piece needed for final touches, expect the two speaker covers under the dash (fibreglass shell and carpets). I was simply going to make them but they have the leather grill stitched into the actual carpet. Wanting to keep as much of the car as original as possible, I have purchased a set, these are red but ..... I have a plan !!

The rest of the interior is brown with the tan seats and lighter sandy coloured carpets (must look up the official colours). My plan is to simply dye these red carpets and grills a darker brown which should work and blend well as these sit straight beneath the brown dash and between the sandy carpet colour. Again its going to be rat look so doesn't need to be perfect.

As a bonus they also came with original speakers


Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Fair comment, I will try it out and see what it looks like red before dying them.

 

Got the required circlips from Maranello, wrong part number is the Testarossa parts manual but the guys there are so knowledgable they searched and found the correct ones amongst the thousands of items stocked.

Probably my cheapest invoice from Ferrari over the years
Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Agreed Romano, its was purely just quick and easy for me to pop into Ferrari to get these clips on route to collecting my daughter from school. Had I a little more time I would have got them cheaper elsewhere.... but the 0.09p luckily didn't break the bank

 

Rather happy with the result, my plan worked and the modified column is now assembled, complete with rewired ignition barrel and key.

The great thing is I don't have to ever worry about welds breaking or bearing cups causing issues, and have a lovely sturdy steering column again which brings confidence while driving.


Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Started to place the column back in the car at the same time I needed to replace the upper dash panel that was removed during the new screen installation, so it was much easier to remove the entire upper dash.

Column is now refitted and bolted back up. I was about to place the dash back in but remembered I have some parts to fit from my box of goodies all to do with the heating and aircon system, as this is right deep inside behind the dash I will leave the dash out for now allowing better access until I am ready to move onto that job.

Will also give it a nice clean up behind there at the same time, removing 30 years of dust
Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

So time to get back onto the job at hand, front passenger side suspension change to the coilover shock.
Image Unavailable, Please Login