Awakening a Ferrari 330 GTC
Mint’s headquarters has recently moved to Auto Turismo Sport’s Shop in New Milford, Connecticut. ATS has been around a long time and are experts in Ferraris, other things Italian. While we slave away at our computers or speak to buyers and sellers on the phone, interesting things just happen. A good customer of “ours” (I like to think of Mint as part of the ATS team), recently purchased a 330 GTC. He already has one in good working order so we wondered what he wanted with this garage find. We assume it is because he didn’t want anyone else to have it. It hasn’t run in 18 years and it appears to be one of those restorations that died on the vine. But the exterior looks darn good as does the interior although it is pretty much apart at the moment. Our task was to see if the engine was free and if it is, will it run. It takes a strong stomach to buy a Ferrari not knowing if the engine is a runner or a lawn ornament. ATS recently acquired the wizard-like talents of Sean Sheridan who is an experienced Ferrari engine builder and known to be the one that fixes everyone else’s mistakes. Sean isn’t afraid of anything including waking a 12-cylinder Ferrari motor. Sean went through everything methodically before even attempting a start. It was like an episode of Chasing Classic Cars starring Sean Sheridan under the guiding eyes of shop owner Steve Mastroianni. There was a brief discussion whether to use starter fluid or gasoline. Steve’s dad, John, Sr., taught Steve everything he knows. He knows starter fluid on a long slumbering Ferrari engine is a bit too much. They went with gas. The results are in this 2 minute video. If you love great cars, you’ll enjoy this one. Click on the image to see the video.
That is fantastic! The buyer is lucky.
I would love to see a list of that needs to be done before waking a long sitting engine.
Will try and do that…