Hi Enrico and all Maserati fans everywhere!

I thought I would like to share with you the restoration of my 1971 4.7 litre Maserati Indy, a right-hand drive UK car.

Last September I was browsing as I do Ebay motors. Looking for parts for a Capri I was going to restore. I spotted this Red very shiny smart looking stunner of a car in one of the ads. ‘What’s that all about I asked myself’. Maserati Indy.. hnmn.. £12,000 was the price. I did a bit of research on the car and was hooked.. I plunged in with both feet, and eyes wide shut! Lot of emails and wiring of loads of dosh later I had acquired the car.

The car had been stored by the previous owner in a secure dry store in the South. It had been there 12 years! Prior to that it had been a Maserati specialist having loads of work done. I noted that the engine had been fully rebuilt and had done more or less zero miles since the rebuild. It had only run round the compound at the store once a month to keep it free and running. It had loads of work done including a bare metal respray etc etc.

It has not turned a wheel on the road for what must have been 20 years! I had the car shipped to the my home near Sheffield and drove it into the garage.

There it sat for a week or two with me poking and assessing what had to be done (what I could visually see that is!). My first job was a full front suspension rebuild. All new bushes, new top and bottom ball joints, new gaiters on the steering ball joints etc. This took a few weeks as I had to wait for parts to arrive from Italy and the US.

While I was waiting I made some new inner wheel arch liners as these were missing from the car. Cleaned up all the suspension gear and re-painted it all.

When I drove the car into the garage there was curious knocking sound coming from the engine. I traced this to the cable that drives the water pump from the A/C compressor pulley. I took it off (the whole water pump etc.) to find that the cable had not broken but had been cut in half! I looked in all bumf I had acquired with the car and it pointed to the culprits being the person/s who had rebuilt the A/C compressor. Instead of undoing the cable he had just cut it in half… silly sod! That was repaired, quite an easy undertaking apart from the weight of the compressor.. great big industrial unit that it is.. (comes off a truck so I found out!).

I moved on to the tail gate.. great big sheet of glass and metal that needs a team of wild elephants to lift it. This is where I nearly took my finger off! I was assessing the need for something to lift it off the latch as it was impossible to pull the lever and be at the back of the car at the same time in order to lift the tailgate up, unless you are my wife who seems to be able to be in two places at the same time!

I was juggling the weight with one hand and a shrill voice called right from behind my ear.. making me jump as I did I let go of the tail gate and it dropped its full weight onto by index finger. OUCH!! The world went a little bit wild for a few minutes as I hopped about the garage singing the praises of our great creator and blaspheming until the pain subsided. "Do you want this cup of tea then?" she asked. Needless to say I told her where to put it.

I had to leave things for a week until I could actually bend my finger again.

During the forced break, I devised a ‘cunning plan’… I needed to get the tailgate off the latch so I could lift it, its sheer weight would not let it lift up on its own.

I bought two door poppers rated at 40 kilos, I made up some brackets and bonded. Welded these onto the rear panel (see pics). They actually work brilliantly, they lift it off the latch.. I don’t have to try to be in two places at once!!

I turned my attention to making a new cover for the fuel pumps as this was missing, and also a boot floor as this had vanished at some point in the distant past. These were made from aluminium and lots of trimming..

Once done I thought about the interior. It really looked bad. The leather at some point had been painted.. and badly! Looked like they had used Dulux gloss!! Who ever did it could not be bothered to remove any trim pieces. They had painted round the gauges, etc. I think it must have been a witless and blind baboon who they gave a brush to do it. It really was bad. I observed something pretty odd about his time. ‘Why were my 'balls' worn away?’

Not my own 'balls' although they should be judging by the amount of time I had spent scrabbling around under the car! The ‘balls’ I am referring to are the ones on the seat adjusters. They were very definitely worn away.. humn I thought how could that happen. As it happens I found out in a few minutes. Under the seat were the mummified remains of a mouse. Poor little sod, it had gnawed away at the balls looking for food.

The alarm bells started ringing in my head about the same time as the wizened little corpse headed into the bin. ‘What else had it eaten?’ Where indeed had it been living?

I needed to find out how much damage it had done, possibly to the wiring.. I was going to have the interior re-trimmed in leather anyway so I pulled out the seats.. no sign of the mouse nest in them or near them, back seats out, nope, not here either. Centre console out… HA! HA!.. Found it! It had been making a hotel under the rear arm rest under the console. It was in a right old state, because of the mouse wee.. it had rusted the centre transmission tunnel, not through but very pitted. It had been there from June 1995! I can tell you that because it had read a lot of bits of newspapers it had made the nest from.

I cleaned it all out and removed the dash completely, looking for tell tale bits of wiring insulation, I was lucky it just seemed to have had a taste for the black balls on the seats and not the wiring. I packed everything off to the trimmers for a full workover.

The carpets looked like they had been cast offs from Steptoes so I pulled them all out with care as I was going to use them as templates for the new ones.

At this point I found the RUST!! The dreaded tin worm had been more destructive than my mouse lodger. The full length of the inner sills on both sides was rotten. I had to cut the whole lot out (after bracing the car) and weld in new metal. This took ages, by the time I had done the interior was back from the trimmers and WOW!! What a transformation.. by gawd it smells loverly!

I had to do a bit of trimming myself in the car, as some of the bits would not come out, rear seat surround C pillar padding etc. I made up the new carpets and plonked the new interor in. What a brilliant transformation.

This was the point when I snapped the light and the indicator stalks, big arse in the way wallop.. crack , sounded expensive that I do remember thinking. It was! I tried to located a full set of stalk switches to no avail. I packed them off to Italy, for repair. I replaced all the dash and the dials all the electrics, removed dome seriously stupid wiring from the light switches. Called an auto electrician as I had pulled off something important and the lights would not pop up. By this time I had got the switches back and in the car (700 euros it cost). It took the auto sparks man some 2 hours to fix the lighting problem. In the past someone had jury rigged the lights to bypass the switch as it was not working, they had mixed up the wires to such an extent we had to trace each one back to source to get things back to normal, I think the new light switch as £25.00 was the cheapest thing I had bought for the car.

We had it all back together without the whole lot bursting into flames.

I fitted a keyed isolator to the live battery feed so I can isolate all the electrics when I leave the car. So it cannot be started or moved without the security key to turn on the power.. plus it acts as a master switch in case of fire. well it is an Italian car after all no critisism intended I have had two other Italian cars at one time or another and both had electrical fires. Also I have seen the pictures on Enrico’s pages of the Ghibli on fire, NO WAY IS THAT HAPPENING TO MINDY THE INDY!

The great day arrived when she was ready for a run. Off we went. Although not very far… remember the mention of the cut cable and the air con compressor?

I found out why the cable had been cut. But not by the Air con guy (apologies if you ever read this). I had travelled just 17 miles when there was a massive screeching from under the bonnet. I pulled over, thinking I was about to see a repeat of the infamous J Clarkson’s escapades with the Maserati Bora’s engine he trashed on a recent episode.

I lifted the bonnet.. noting that all the big bits seemed to be where the should be, all the small bits were still in evidence. I started the engine again the massive screeching came with it. I thought in for a penny in for a pound. I poked my head in the engine bay and could see the belts whizzing round but the water pump/air-con pulley wasn't.

I pulled the wire from the air-con clutch and the screeching stopped and all was normal again. I have yet to tackle that little job, seems to be that the compressor has seized.

I returned home and checked for leaks, none. All was well until I pulled the dip stick. If I had some ham and bread I could have used the mayonnaise that coated the dip stick. YUK.

I went inside and tried to forget all about Maseratis. I plucked up the courage to have a look at the problem a few days later. I checked all the compressions, they were fine. I checked the water, fine. I drained off all the oil and replaced it with fresh oil.

I ran the car and thankfully all seems well apart from a bit of a misfire at about 2,000 rpm. I will check that later. Seems that the engine had some condensation in it. I will let you know if it develops into a full head off job. I hope I win the lottery tonight because that’s going to be expensive.

I hope you have enjoyed my little essay on the Indy. Please look at the pictures, she's not show condition but she does look the part.

Andrew.

Andrew would like to hear from other UK or Euro Indy owners so you can share information. So, if you are out there please drop me an email and I will pass it on.