Updates on the 1979 Ferrari 400

The Bridge Classic Cars workshop team have been going full steam ahead with preparing the 1979 Ferrari 400. Our technician, Jon, has been heading up the project from the moment the car came into our workshop a couple of months ago.

To begin with, Jon has had to replace the heater valve nestled deep under the scuttle of the classic Ferrari and on the back corner of the glorious V12. Once the new heater valve arrived, Jon had to make some modifications to get the unit to fit and operate correctly while also modifying the clamp attachment before getting it ready to fit back into the car.

After it was back in the car, Jon could begin testing. The first stage was to refill the coolant and pressurize the system to check for any leaks and then he can began to tune and check over the V12, but on a brief start up Jon noted that the car is now running on all 12 cylinders.

With the engine now ready to run, levels topped off in both the V12 and the automatic gearbox, Jon could turn his attention to making sure the luxury classic GT car stopped. He inspected each individual caliper as well as tracing all the brake lines and pipes back to check for corrosion, pinches or leaks. Once Jon got to the nearside front caliper, he noticed a very slight weep when the caliper was under pressure. Upon inspection, he found that previous to the car coming to us someone had stripped out the threads on the caliper and retapped it from 7/16th to 1/2 inch, Jon found a suitable bolt and had our technician Paul turn it down in a lathe to make a suitable union.

While waiting for Paul to machine the bolt, Jon stripped down the speedometer which he found small shards of plastic obscuring the warning lights. Once he had cleaned out the unit, he reassembled and got it back into the car.

With the new union suitably modified, Jon could remake the brake line which runs to the caliper. After bending up new pipework, he found that with the new union in place the top brake pipe would not tighten where someone had previously modified the unit and the threads were very badly worn.