AM109/A1*1032* - Mistral 4.0 - 1966

Celeste Chiaro over Senape leather.
Fully documented from the factory.
Left Modena for San Francisco in October 1966.
Came to Norway from Sweden in 2002, with the current owner since 2013.
Restored between 2013-2019.
Owner in Oslo, Norway.

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A very beautiful car you have. Assumingly the car has been restored by a professional. My Mistral is 1034 with 49 as internal factory number, built in 1967. 1034 is currently under restoration, which is slow, but it is a hobby and no need to hurry. I am considering to reuse the leather interior. Any experience with that?

Gerard

Hi Gerard,
thank you very much! 1032 has internal factory number 40, so the cars have possibly been on the same line!
It has been restored over seven years, and all disassembly and assembly has been done by me and my friend, and also all coordination. Interior, engine, gearbox and rear differential was sent away. And obviously the paint job. I have a friend who works at a body shop and he has helped me tremendously.

My leather interior wasn’t pretty at all, so we went with everything new. So sadly no experience with reusing the original…

//Alex

Hi Alexander,
thanks for your reply and nice to hear from you.
Seven years restoring the Mistral is quite similar to mine, although mine is not finished yet and will take some time to complete.
The internal number of my Mistral is 49. All body and trim parts have that number stamped in or even written on them by pencil, up to the cardboard pieces for the upholstery.

I bought 1034 in 2013. At that time a previous project, restoring a 3500 GT was coming to an end and I was anxious running out of interesting projects. Restoration projects were becoming expensive so I started looking around for one. One a single day my wife and I saw 8 candidates, but we settled on 1034. The previous owner of 1034, a Porsche dealer , had acquired the car long ago and had sent it off to Italy for a simple restoration. The Italian company came back with a quotation over 100,000 Euros to do the job and the owner told them to send it back. However the Italians had entirely dismantled the car to be able to make a good assessment. The Porsche dealer stored the dismantled car in his garage and left it there. Then Porsche forced all dealerships to upgrade their showrooms and he had to move his enterprise into a new building. So dismantled 1034 and all the parts became a nuisance. I transported the chassis and all parts to Maastricht and stored the lot for a few years at a farm and a friend’s attic. Then, after adding a new garage to our house, including a hydraulic car lift I brought the chassis home but left all the parts in stock.
The chassis was in good shape except for the door wells , doors and rear wheel arches. I did the welding myself, removed all paint layers with a paint stripper and had it blasted and repainted, also by a friend who has a bodyshop.
Disassembling the engine explained why the car in his early life was put in a garage and not driven any longer. The gear-wheel that connects the crankshaft to the cam chain had failed. Very luckily a friend of mine who buys and sells 3500 GT parts had bought one in a batch and since I did him a favor with 3500 GT parts he gave it to me for a reasonable price. The engine overhaul was not a simple task. There was a minor crack in one of the bolt holes of the head, and the cylinders had to be honed under strength pressure by an expert. The head gasket was especially manufactured. The engine was entirely overhauled, new pistons, valves etc.
The lucas fuel injection system has also been overhauled and a Bosch fuel pump will replace the original one that is prone to failure, causing gasoline to be mixed with the engine oil.

So now I am wrestling with the electric wiring harness, trying to figure out the function of all the wires. Remember, I bought 1034 entirely dismantled.
Would you by any chance know of a colored wiring diagram of a Mistral?

So it can very well be that Maserati was working on 1032 and 1034 at the same time given their internal numbers are so close as well. I am not sure however if the numbering was consistently applied. For 3500 GTs indeed are numbers by production order. However if I understand well, the Mistral chassis was made by Maserati, then transported to Frua for the body panels, then returned to Maserati for assembly. However, from what I see in my car, the internal numbers even occur on small pieces of wood supporting the gasoline tanks. So I rather suspect the cars were entirely assembled and spraypainted at Frua and then the engine and drive train were added by Maserati again.

Then finally, I am curious about what sort of problems you encountered during assembly and in what order you worked. I promised myself to be very systematic with assembly and strictly follow this order: 1 front and rear wheels and suspension, 2 electric wiring, 3 braking system, 4 gasoline system 5. heating system 6 upholstery and seats 7 chrome and trim and latest front and rear windows. But now I experience this does not work. For example I had to install the frame covered with leather between engine bay and passenger compartment before installing the heater
Regarding the leather interior and floor carpet. I would very much like to use the originals although they are dirty and cracked.

Gerard
Maastricht

Hi again,
Sorry, I don’t have a colored wiring diagram… We used one available online and used colored markers when needed to highlight.

We started in the back, finishing off tanks, fuel lines etc, working our way forward. Everything takes longer time than expected. Although I have kept all original parts, we have also used the Bosch fuel pump kit, a brake booster kit and a new wiper kit, all from McGrath. And also a oil filter kit that is easily revered to original, but that aids the use of more available screw-on oil filters.

I have probably forgotten a lot of things as seven years is a long time. But I have a lot of pictures if you need anything (even though in retrospect it seems I have taken pictures of all the wrong things…!).

One thing I remember, though, is when we worked our way forward, was that a goal was to get the car closed with all glass, rubbers and seals. The idea was to get it to look finished from the outside, and then start on the inside. However, we learnt the hard way that the dashboard needs to go in before the front wind screen. So we had to get the window out again, buy new rubber seal and do it twice. Not a big problem as such, but the seal is not cheap, and the risk of breaking the window was of course there.

If you need any pictures of parts of the finished car for reference in your restoration, just let me know.

//Alex

Hi,
I just went through your conversation and I would like to confirm that you may be able to use the original Conolly leather. One of the two Mistrals I have done had the cracked and dry old leather and it was reinforced from below so that it would not tear. Of course a new padding was used. I had to give it out to a specialist - paid a fortune but worths it.

Another issue: I replaced the original two (!) Lucas pumps because they started leaking all the time. Possibly due to the high ethanol content of the modern fuels - no Viton replacement seals are available only rubber… It is the mismatch between the oil and the fuel pressure that causes the fuel entering the engine oil. This is due to the faulty calibration of the early Lucas metering units not the fuel pump.

Attila

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The car has now been sold to another owner in Norway.

Thank you for the update. The new owner is welcome to share his experiences with his new car.