I was heading to Colorado, so I decided to visit a shop in Erie, CO called http://scuderiarampante.com owned by Dave and Kris Helms. Dave Helms learned a lot from Francois Sicard, my boss, many years ago when he worked for Bob Bodine and he was happy to meet and talk with me about our mutual mentor.

Through the years, Dave has built a reputation in Colorado as a top Ferrari shop. He also supplies a lot of aftermarket parts for Ferraris from coolant hoses to oil fittings.

His latest endeavor has been to make a better head gasket for many of the older Ferrari engines. Several years ago, many of us in the Vintage Ferrari repair business started having issues with the water passages leaking at the head gaskets from Elring manufactured gaskets. For a time, an Australian manufacturer made a reliable gasket to alleviate this problem, but the company was recently sold, and there were no plans to continue the small production batch for the Vintage Ferrari world.

Dave Helms and scuderiarampante.com in partnership with another manufacturer developed a new head gasket improving on the original Australian gaskets. These new gaskets have been tested by Helms on several configurations without problems. He is very close to going into production, and I look forward to trying them out. The distribution rights are still in flux, but if you need a gasket, let me or Dave know!

Although scuderiarampante.com reputation is known for 308s and newer Ferraris, Dave Helms’ passion lies with the Vintage Ferraris. He had a personal four headlight car that is going to be restored and I look forward to seeing it done.

The car is not without its challenges of rotten floor pans and typical body repairs, but it’s nice to see a car like this being restored.

Dave wrote about this car on a thread on F-chat, and it’s a neat story.

The new scuderiarampante.com is much larger than the shop they were in for years, and I wish him and his family all the luck and success his hard work will bring. Thanks for the tour Dave, and I look forward to working together in the future!