9/28/11
2259 Drive line and Leather Cleaning

This week, we’re working on the GTE drive line. The drive shaft and associated parts need to be sent out for balancing, and it began with removing the old paint from the drive shaft.

Written in Crayon was “Visconti,” or “Nisconti” on the drive shaft. I have no idea what this means, but I figured I would take a picture of it before I took the paint off.

The u-joint showed damage on the bearing surface, so we had to replace it.  Luckily I had a good u-joint to replace the worn or damaged pieces, but we kept the old parts. The surface of this u-joint can be repaired with hard chrome, but only when we run out of good spare parts!

I started taking some of the panels out of the car to thoroughly clean them and moisturize the leather. Horizontal surfaces like this rear package shelf had a lot of dust settling onto the leather and it really needed to be cleaned.

I inspected the defroster holes cut into the leather panel to make some notes on how it was done. The holes are remarkably straight. The leather where the holes were cut is also very thin. It looks like the leather in this area was skived thin before the holes were cut with some kind of template.

I was looking for a spot for rear seat belt mounts at the request of the owner when I saw how dirty some of the rear panels were. The foam underneath these panels was also crumbling away and needed replacing.

The leather pieces are in very good shape despite the desperate need for some cleaning.

A soft brush and leather cleaner took out a lot of the dirt trapped in the grain of the leather. The left side is the panel I cleaned.

The transmission was pulled out for inspection and light service. I began by checking the condition of the shifter bushing and the electrical switches. The overdrive safety, and back up light switch all checked out, but one cover needed to be fabricated to make the switch weather proof again.

With the inspection cover off, we took a look at the gear sets. Everything looked nice and clean, with no broken gears or excessively worn synchronizers. The gear oil, although over  forty years old, drained out nice an clear.

The two outside oil seals on this transmission were hard as a rock so replacements are on order.

The internal number on the transmission case is easiest to see when the transmission is out of the car, and this one reads “40 E”

Reminder: If you have a Ferrari related project, car, or idea you’d like to explore, I’d love to talk to you. I can also help if you’re thinking of buying or selling. This website represents what I love to do, and now it’s how I make a living, so if you’d like to do something together, let me know. It all begins with an e-mail!

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