12/20/13
GTS Pinch Weld Trim, and 330 Engine Damage

After driving behind the 330GTS we have at the shop, I noticed it was missing a trim piece below the rear of the car. It’s a black piece of molding that finishes off the pinch weld at the bottom of the car. This piece often falls off or is discarded when a 330GTS or GTC is painted. I think this part ended up with the license plate brackets when this car was last painted!

Luckily, this trim piece has been remanufacutred exactly as the original piece and is available through the right channels. A simple piece of pinch weld molding will suffice if you don’t want to spend the $$ for the correct piece, but for a car like a 330GTS, you might as well do it right and get the right piece.  I fabricated clips to secure the ends of the molding just like the original piece. This one was a little crooked, but after a little persuasion, it sat straight.

I believe the originals were secured with a screw, although I’ve also seen pop rivets.

The disassembly process began on the broken 330 engine. The pistons were removed from the rods. Don’t worry, I didn’t use the hammer in the picture to tap out the wrist pins!

With all the parts flying around inside the engine, a lot of parts got damaged. This piston wasn’t close to the one with the broken valve, but still managed to catch some of the action. All of them were scored.

The part involved with the grand finale of engine destruction was the #3 rod that poked a hole in the cylinder liner. It’s twisted and bent beyond salvage but will either make a great paperweight or an bad reminder of a bad day.

There was a lot of cleaning to do, as bits of metal were circulated all over the engine before things stopped turning. The screen inside oil pump pickup caught the large pieces of debris, but fine pieces of metal can be seen embedded in bearings and cylinder walls.

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