Maintenance

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Yale
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Location: New York City

Maintenance

Post by Yale »

The first car I ever owned was a ten year old Mercedes diesel station wagon. This car came with all the books and tools as cars often do when not subjected to the hording type dealers we come in contact with in the Ferrari world. Among those items was a book that laid out the maintenance schedule for the car and went up in intervals of 5000 to 200,000 miles. Each page told you what you were supposed to do at each mileage amount. I dream of such a thing for my 330GT. As some of you may know my car was away on a three year engine rebuild odyssey. This was part of my misguided idea that i could control engine rebuild costs if I left it up to the rebuilder as to how long they took. Tom told me "of course that idea doesn't work." I tried to explain to Tom the customers desire to get some kind of handle on Ferrari repair costs. I know many of us do this as I watch a friend of mine thinking about buying some after market parts for his new to him 360 Modena. "Todd, what would you think if you learned the guy you bought that car from installed parts that weren't really correct?" I asked. Or I watch a member here discuss and try to limit how much his 330 GT's repaint is going to cost him with 5 different painters over the last three years!

I get the car back finally, fresh engine, having to keep it under 4000 rpm for 1000 miles, and I'm not liking the car in terms of handling. In fact it felt somewhat scary to drive. I haven't driven the car in a long time so I think perhaps that the tires must be worn out. Since the tach stopped working during the time I'm putting mileage on the car, (remember whose talking here), so I later take the car up to Tom and Francois to see if they have what I think must be a missing tach drive. (As it turned out the cable had just come out.) Of course on the way up the radiator sprung a leak, (remember whose talking here), so I leave the car with them.

Now Brian who rebuilt the engine is an excellent mechanic, the radiator was newly cored from his radiator shop so he would have replaced that for free but I couldn't chance driving it over there. So while the car was at Francois I thought about how poorly I felt the car driving and decided I had to finally redo the suspension. Tom said, "Are you sure, I talked with Francois and we estimate that will be 30 hours of work."

You know while the car was at Brian Vignale's another customer of his told him that he would pay me $120,000 for my car. That certainly was a number that made me pause. The thing is if I sell the car there isn't really anything else that I would want and could afford to replace it. But at the same time there is no point keeping it if I don't enjoy driving it. So right after an expensive engine rebuild I bit the bullet and had Tom redo the suspension. Francois gave me a little box with these pieces in it (below). I wonder if they were original to the car when built? All I can say is hot damn!

The car is totally different. It just handles great and makes me an excellent candidate for those red and blue spinning lights. Along with the fresh engine it almost feels like a new car. You know when I start the car with the new engine I no longer have to pump the throttle, just turn the key and push and it starts, amazing. So glad to have this car again! But boy it would be nice to have a maintenance book. I can imagine many of us a driving what feels in some way like a cluncker, I know I was.
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Ex - 1964 330GT #6097
1963 Abarth Monomille
1970 Porsche 911S
1974 BMW 2002turbo
Lowell
Posts: 189
Joined: Sun Oct 20, 2002 1:40 am
Location: Santa Fe, NM

Re: Maintenance

Post by Lowell »

I am about to rebuild my rear suspension.

I have all the parts (having spent untold number of dollars).

I have made a spring retainer (compressor if you will).

So far, I have loosened the driver's side exhaust where it goes into the two-to-one pipe.
That side is crooked and I want to see if I can fix it.

After taking the exhaust off, I will take the two two-to-one pipes off, have some welding done, and paint them as did Kerry.

Then I will attack the spring bushings. I think that in a month or so I'll be done working three short days a week.

I would not do it if I did not have a lift, and if I were not crazy.
Lowell Brown
1966 Gold 330 2+2 Series II
Suebian330
Posts: 91
Joined: Fri Apr 25, 2008 4:10 pm
Location: Germany, Stuttgart Area

Re: Maintenance

Post by Suebian330 »

Hi Yale,

your worn out bushes did not look to bad. At least most of the rubber material was still there. I am right now rebuilding my whole rear axle and suspension too at my GT330 series 2(nearly done). I am wondering that you had 8 similar bushes. In my case upper bushes looked different than lower. The lower were identical to yours, one entire silent block. The uppers at my car seemed to be an assembly of outer metal bush, inner metal bush and some material between I could not identify because it was gone. I only found some greasy material with some crumbles. Definitely my upper bushes had some grease nipples at the bolts to supply grease to the "undefined material" unlikely for a silent block.

I now manufactured upper bushes by synthetik material (POM her in Europe called) and added some PTFE washers at the side, as also posted here in this forum. Did I a mistake?

Where there various variants built? Anybody knows?

As always I appreciate your help. Hopefully after finishing my restoration I might be able to give some hints to others.

Dieter
[b]Suebian330

#8741 330 GT2+2[/b]
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tyang
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Re: Maintenance

Post by tyang »

Suebian330 wrote:Hi Yale,

your worn out bushes did not look to bad. At least most of the rubber material was still there. I am right now rebuilding my whole rear axle and suspension too at my GT330 series 2(nearly done). I am wondering that you had 8 similar bushes. In my case upper bushes looked different than lower. The lower were identical to yours, one entire silent block. The uppers at my car seemed to be an assembly of outer metal bush, inner metal bush and some material between I could not identify because it was gone. I only found some greasy material with some crumbles. Definitely my upper bushes had some grease nipples at the bolts to supply grease to the "undefined material" unlikely for a silent block.

I now manufactured upper bushes by synthetik material (POM her in Europe called) and added some PTFE washers at the side, as also posted here in this forum. Did I a mistake?

Where there various variants built? Anybody knows?

As always I appreciate your help. Hopefully after finishing my restoration I might be able to give some hints to others.

Dieter
Hi Dieter,

As far I I know, they were always silent blocks on these cars. The design of these things is the inner and outer sleeves are vulcanized to the rubber, so the resistance of the rubber also plays into the movement of the suspension. IMHO Changing these to sliding members where the inner sleeves rotate freely may alter the ride of the car.

Yale's bushings still had the rubber, but the inner sleeve had separated from the rubber bushing, and wallowed out the centers. Under compression, the wallowed out eye of the locating arm would allow the stabilizing arm to deflect a couple of millimeters before doing its job. I think this definitely contributed to the "squirminess" Yale was feeling. Add to the bigger problem of worn spring eye bushings, and you have the perfect storm of a loose rear suspension.

Tom
'63 330 America #5053
DWR46
Posts: 621
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 8:23 pm

Re: Maintenance

Post by DWR46 »

Yale: I am confused, you state that it would be great if the car had a maintenance book, yet the car has one. The Owners Manual has all the recommended maintenance items and the mileages, at which, they should should be addressed. The 330 GT has a good (for the era) shop manual that covers many of the required procedures for the car.

I was reading the Forza article on your engine rebuild and was puzzled by the cylinder head work done to your engine. They apparently did extensive welding in the combustion chambers to repair where the valves had been sunk too far into the head. However, this engine has removable valve seats. So if the valves were sunk too much, it would seem that all that should have been required was for the seats to be replaced and that would have restored the correct valve height with new valves installed. If the original seats were completely cut away by somebody, I will admit I have never heard of that level of abuse before. Please help me understand what happened to your engine.

As to maintenance items, the cracked block and the worn out trailing arm bushings are not items that would be anticipated in a factory maintenance schedule. Even with the cylinder head problems, I do not understand why the block cracked, and all silentboc bushings have a life span that many times is more related to time than to usage. So items like these will never be mentioned in any maintenance schedule. It is all part of the experience of owning and driving a 50 year old Ferrari.

Glad you have the car running better and can start to enjoy it again.
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Yale
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Location: New York City

Re: Maintenance

Post by Yale »

Hey Dyke,

Well you know I'm just a civilian so Tom Wilson's comment about me knowing anything about my engine rebuild is not really accurate. However as far as I understand it you can only do so many valve jobs on a Ferrari block before you need to do extensive work. Scott McPhee did all the work on the block and here is his web site photos on this sort of work http://buildandtune.com/?page_id=2825

As for the cracked block, there is just conjecture here about why it cracked. Were the transmission mounts old and that created flex? Were there many issues with Ferrari's four mount 330 blocks (Scott has repaired three others with exactly the same type of crack) and that is why Ferrari went to two mounts for the later cars? I don't know and rarely to I ever get definitive answers on these sorts of questions, in fact Tom Yang calls them Yale questions because I am asking about why things happen when without laboratory analysis no one is Ina position to answer.

As for the maintanence pages in the manual, yes I have that but not that usable for someone like me as I have put 25,000 miles on the car, had bought e car after a lot of work had been done, and have gone to three different mechanics in my 13 year ownship. Those silent blocks that I photographed for instance, I know remember that I did indeed replace them once before perhaps 8 years ago. You know when some things wear and you are not fully cognizant of this you end up putting a lot more stress on other parts.
Ex - 1964 330GT #6097
1963 Abarth Monomille
1970 Porsche 911S
1974 BMW 2002turbo
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Yale
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Location: New York City

Re: Maintenance

Post by Yale »

My computer locked up and I wasnt able to edit or continue my post below. Sorry. Anyway if there was a maintance book that stayed with the car one would know what had been done and what should be done. You deal with cars you are probably the only caretaker for over many years. We who don't work on our cars or who have cars for a few years bought from prior owners who have also only owned the cars for a few years are in a totally different place as to what has been done to the car and what needs to be done. Also, who remembers all that has happened especially when you have a car like mine that has parts replaced and maintance performed as often as you brush your teeth.

I know I'm speaking for all he when I say, always a pleasure to hear from you by the way.
Ex - 1964 330GT #6097
1963 Abarth Monomille
1970 Porsche 911S
1974 BMW 2002turbo
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tyang
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Re: Maintenance

Post by tyang »

Several years ago Yale came over and we took his car out for a drive. I noticed the shifter moving when loading up the engine. I asked Yale how long that was happening, and he asked if that was bad. I said, "maybe," but didn't elaborate. If the transmission mount was broken (which I suspected), heavy continued driving certainly would have put undue stress on the rear engine mount.

Tom
'63 330 America #5053
Lowell
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Re: Maintenance

Post by Lowell »

Yale wrote: As for the cracked block, there is just conjecture here about why it cracked. Were the transmission mounts old and that created flex? Were there many issues with Ferrari's four mount 330 blocks (Scott has repaired three others with exactly the same type of crack) and that is why Ferrari went to two mounts for the later cars?
I always thought that Ferrari went to the two engine mounts in the later Series II cars because that way they could uses the same blocks that are on the GTC.
The GTC has a torque tube and transaxle, and so alignment requires that the front engine mount have some flexibility. Hence the two engine mounts.
Lowell Brown
1966 Gold 330 2+2 Series II
DWR46
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Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 8:23 pm

Re: Maintenance

Post by DWR46 »

Lowell: You are correct in your statement about the reason that Ferrari went to the 2-mount blocks. In addition to standardizing production, the 2-mount block, when used with a single gearbox mount (on a front mounted gearbox), gives less vibration and harmonics to be transmitted into the passenger compartment. The American manufacturers discovered this in the early 1950s. It just took the Italians a few years longer.
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Yale
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Re: Maintenance

Post by Yale »

Hey Dyke,

Couple of questions. How often have you had to re-bush a 60's era Ferrari that is driven? Given that my upper and lower control arm bushes were done about seven years ago and Tom thought they should be done again perhaps that is their lifespan?

What did you think about what I had to say about the head work I needed because of worn valve seats? You haven't had an engine that had more then a few valve jobs and hence needed head work? I remember the mechanic saying they were beyond adjustment.

I figure I will send photos when I get them.

Thank you.
Ex - 1964 330GT #6097
1963 Abarth Monomille
1970 Porsche 911S
1974 BMW 2002turbo
DWR46
Posts: 621
Joined: Tue Sep 22, 2009 8:23 pm

Re: Maintenance

Post by DWR46 »

Yale: Tom is correct, you ask tough questions! However, I will take ashot at them.

1. I would expect trailing arm bushings to last about 40,000 miles on a well maintained car. Under good storage conditions they could last 30 years on a lightly used car.
2. Over the years, I have seen lots of engines with valve seat problems, but all that was ever required was to remove the old worn seats and install new ones. Usually these engines also required new valves because they had been ground too many times and were getting thin, and the stem tips were damaged by the adjusting screws and had worn through the stellite hardening on the tips of the valves. I am not questioninlg the competency of the man who did your heads, just commenting that I do not understand what kind of damage occured that required so much work to the head casting.
DWR46
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Re: Maintenance

Post by DWR46 »

Yale: One more thing, it is not at all uncommon to see the rocker arms touching the upper valve retainers, especially on the cars with 10 mm lift cams. We routinely have to "relieve" the rockers to get adequate clearance. I know that worn seats and valves contribute to this condition, but this alone is not cause for major valve work.
Suebian330
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Location: Germany, Stuttgart Area

Re: Maintenance

Post by Suebian330 »

Just coming back to Yales picture and to Tom´s comment:

Tom: "As far I I know, they were always silent blocks on these cars. The design of these things is the inner and outer sleeves are vulcanized to the rubber, so the resistance of the rubber also plays into the movement of the suspension. IMHO Changing these to sliding members where the inner sleeves rotate freely may alter the ride of the car."

Are the 8 bushes from the radius arms that hold the leaf spring. Then I understand. If they are they from the leaf spring and shackles, then I am a confused. The scetch in the manual I have for GT330 shows different design and parts assembly for the upper bushes in the shackles. The uppers are very likely silentblocks but the lower in the leaf spring eye show seperate parts for inner sleeve, outer sleeve, bush. Also there is a grease nipple. So obviously this is no silent block.
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[b]Suebian330

#8741 330 GT2+2[/b]
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tyang
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Re: Maintenance

Post by tyang »

Suebian330 wrote:Just coming back to Yales picture and to Tom´s comment:

Tom: "As far I I know, they were always silent blocks on these cars. The design of these things is the inner and outer sleeves are vulcanized to the rubber, so the resistance of the rubber also plays into the movement of the suspension. IMHO Changing these to sliding members where the inner sleeves rotate freely may alter the ride of the car."

Are the 8 bushes from the radius arms that hold the leaf spring. Then I understand. If they are they from the leaf spring and shackles, then I am a confused. The scetch in the manual I have for GT330 shows different design and parts assembly for the upper bushes in the shackles. The uppers are very likely silentblocks but the lower in the leaf spring eye show seperate parts for inner sleeve, outer sleeve, bush. Also there is a grease nipple. So obviously this is no silent block.
Yes the part Yale is talking about are the locating arms, and yes, the upper portion of the rear shackle assembly is a silent block with the other bushing being a greaseable joint. This greaseable joint is the problem in most of these cars as the bushing is very soft, and deteriorates into dust over time. I replace this along with the side plates with teflon or polyurethane.

Tom
'63 330 America #5053
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