11/28/09
Painting the Radiator, and Lusso Metalwork

With my newly cored radiator ready to go back into my 330 America, I needed to get a few coats of paint on the tanks. They make a radiator paint that is supposed to go on thinner than normal paint, but I just put very light coats of paint on the core, and painted the top and bottom tanks normally. Unfortunately, in the Northeast, the weather this time of the year is changeable, so I only managed to get a couple of coats on before the rain and wind set in.

With some time on my hands, I decided to give my grille a quick polish. With it out of the car, it was much easer to polish on the work bench, and I could even reach the places I couldn’t when it was mounted to the car.

Last week, I stopped by The Panel Shop  to see what was going on with a Ferrari Lusso they’re working on for Francois’ shop. On the workbench was a pretty twisted piece of steel that Mark had fabricated. When I asked what part it was replacing, he explained it was for the Lusso!

With the rocker panels removed on this car, I naively assumed they were straight and simple like most rocker panels, but it’s not so with a Ferrari!

Mark took the piece off the workbench to show me how it fit into the left side of the car.

Once the rocker was set in place, I could now see how much of a bend and twist there was and a lot more involved than regular rocker panels. As always, there’s more to it with these Ferraris than than is what is apparent!

Mark also showed me the inner fender panel on the rear of the car. Although not readily seen from the outside of the car, these inner fenders were rusting away, trapping moisture and falling apart behind the outer fender skins. It was decided to fabricate a new inner fender patch with new steel to eliminate the possibility of this corrosion from spreading. With new steel and modern sealers, this fender should last quite a long time.

I showed this picture already, but I wanted to point something else out. You can just make out the rear jack receiver welded to the rocker. There’s not much material holding the tube to the rocker, and it reaffirms my warning to never use the jack holes for actually jacking up a Ferrari! When these cars were new, these jack points were strong, but without knowing the structural integrity of your rockers, you risk deforming the rocker when these tubes bend. The Panel Shop reinforces this area before they weld the new rocker skin in place just in case someone wants to use this jack point, but there are plenty of other places to lift a Ferrari without risk of body damage!

There are a couple more pictures of the Lusso’s doors on The Panel Shop Website from a blog I write for them, and there are plenty of other projects and cars worth looking at, and it’s always neat stuff.

Just a reminder, I’m looking for a new Vintage Ferrari Project. If you have, or know of a restoration project, please let me know. It would be great to restore another car on this website! My E-mail.

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