dt95aac
Member
- Messages
- 116
First post on here, so nice to meet everyone.
I've always fancied a Ghibli II, I was a teenager when they were sold new and they made a lasting impression on me.
I recently decided to get one, but there's not a lot of choice in Greece, and what there is, is either crash damaged or poorly maintained.
After going through a few cars, I decided that finding one in good shape was a no go, so I had to bite the bullet and get a rough one to restore.
I ended up with a 96 GT, with 185k km which I got at a very good price, so I could afford to invest on it.
The car was very rough both visually and mechanically, but it was not accident damaged and everything seemed to be working.
First step was to remove the engine, to assess it's condition.
The reveal was shocking, the heads were horribly corroded and pitted beyond repair.
Amazingly this engine was working well, building boost, maintaining temperature, it even passed an mot a month before disassembly.
We decided to source a healthy set of heads and proceed with a full rebuilt of the engine.
With the engine work in progress we removed the shocks, steering rack and radiators which were all sent to be rebuilt.
The firewall insulation was removed and it revealed further horrors.
There was significant corrosion, with parts of metal completely missing.
The fire wall and wheel wells were completely stripped, the offending parts were cut out and replaced, the whole area was resealed and painted using the factory colour.
The result was rather pleasing.
Then came the time for reassembly.
Back to the present, the car is undergoing a full respray, as there was bubbling in various panels and we wanted to get ahead of things to avoid further deterioration.
I've always fancied a Ghibli II, I was a teenager when they were sold new and they made a lasting impression on me.
I recently decided to get one, but there's not a lot of choice in Greece, and what there is, is either crash damaged or poorly maintained.
After going through a few cars, I decided that finding one in good shape was a no go, so I had to bite the bullet and get a rough one to restore.
I ended up with a 96 GT, with 185k km which I got at a very good price, so I could afford to invest on it.
The car was very rough both visually and mechanically, but it was not accident damaged and everything seemed to be working.
First step was to remove the engine, to assess it's condition.
The reveal was shocking, the heads were horribly corroded and pitted beyond repair.
Amazingly this engine was working well, building boost, maintaining temperature, it even passed an mot a month before disassembly.
We decided to source a healthy set of heads and proceed with a full rebuilt of the engine.
With the engine work in progress we removed the shocks, steering rack and radiators which were all sent to be rebuilt.
The firewall insulation was removed and it revealed further horrors.
There was significant corrosion, with parts of metal completely missing.
The fire wall and wheel wells were completely stripped, the offending parts were cut out and replaced, the whole area was resealed and painted using the factory colour.
The result was rather pleasing.
Then came the time for reassembly.
Back to the present, the car is undergoing a full respray, as there was bubbling in various panels and we wanted to get ahead of things to avoid further deterioration.
