Ben's Maserati Biturbo Spyder

[Grillage]

Some Non-Audi Content!

So, my wife has been angry with me since I converted the cabriolet to a 5 speed since she can't drive a manual.

This car showed up on the facebook group "Obscure Cars for Sale" and it was about 10 minutes from me so I figured I'd check it out.
It's an auto and a convertible and it was cheap so I figured what the hell.

I bought it earlier this week and brought it home last night.









The story is this: I bought it from a Maserati tech who bought it from a guy about 3 years ago. The car was that guy's dad's for a long time but he died I think and the son ended up with it. The car wasn't running right so he brought it to the dealership here. They don't work on this era Maserati but one of the techs bought the car.

It had a stuck choke and wasn't running quite right. The tech took the Carb out and sent it away for rebuild but never did anything more with the car.

I got it with the freshly rebuilt carb and a spare "bad" carb as well. Apparently the issue was a sticking choke.

These were the first production cars to come with two turbos. This is a 2.5L V6 twin turbo with about 190 HP. Nothing crazy but a rare car and kinda fun

Overall the car is pretty nice. About 36,000 miles. The interior is really cushy. Soft nice leather. The top is new which was a big plus for me having gone through replacement with my cabriolet before. A few dings in the doors but overall the paint is good. A little rust right at the headlights but nothing crazy.
We'll see if this was a huge mistake - it didn't cost too much so I should be okay I hope!

[scubagli]

The newest Grand tour they get three of these, pretty funny. Cool car btw.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Tapatalk

[Grillage]

Yeah I saw that. It was great

I started digging into the car yesterday and I'm going to start with replacing all the vacuum lines first. There has to be 30' of vac lines and half of them are cracked.
Silicone hoses to the rescue!

[Aktapod]

Nice! I also saw this crop up on that FB page and briefly daydreamed about it. Super rad, man.

[gabriel.b]

Found this

http://www.auto-italia.com/Maserati/

the only place I could find with parts for this car (That has a website at least)

[Grillage]

Nice! I also saw this crop up on that FB page and briefly daydreamed about it. Super rad, man.

Yeah, for $1000 why not right?

[Grillage]

Found this

http://www.auto-italia.com/Maserati/

the only place I could find with parts for this car (That has a website at least)

I saw them too. I have an email in to the guy about timing belt kits. I want to do that soon.

[A1QSHIP]

I was a service manager for these cars back in The Day. Replace all the fuel lines & carry a fire extinguisher with you. Other than that these are cool cars.

[Grillage]

I've already put a big puddle of gas on the driveway!

[AudiSport4000]

The newest Grand tour they get three of these, pretty funny. Cool car btw.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G870A using Tapatalk

lol, thats the first thing I thought of when I saw this. Awesome!

[Silverswift85]

Good luck on your project. Looks like its gonna be expensive.

[gabriel.b]

8-) I was a service manager for these cars back in The Day. Replace all the fuel lines & carry a fire extinguisher with you. Other than that these are cool cars.

Well, that kinda kills the appeal. lol

[Grillage]

I had a fire extinguisher in the V8 coupe at all times - I'll move it to this car

[A1QSHIP]

I had a fire extinguisher in the V8 coupe at all times - I'll move it to this car

I keep one in my Coupe, my S6 & my truck.

[Grillage]

I did some digging in the engine today and found a major problem.

The intake passages were totally full of coolant!


In the pic the intake is the two passages on the left. The spark plug goes in the hole on the right - which is also full

The choke on this car has coolant running through it and the carb had been disconnected from the car. The two hoses had bolts in them presumably to keep coolant from leaking out and they didn't work. I had noticed some coolant on the intake manifold when I would open the car after a day or so. There was coolant totally pooled up on both sides where the intake hits the heads so I am assuming the coolant seeped past the intake manifold gaskets and filled them and the cylinders up.

Is this game over for an engine? I've never dealt with anything like this before.

[Sparkyjack]

Okay what fits?
1.8t, 07k
Another v8?

[Grillage]

I had the same evil thought.
It has to stay automatic. Maybe 1.8 with an auto? I think it might still be okay. We'll see.

[ChrisAudi80]

I can remember any time I mentioned Maseratis are cool (the Quattroporte or the Ghibli )that everybody said stayTF away from the Biturbos. Complete disaster cases.

Anyway, you found the fuel leak, a coolant leak (the first of many?) and the problem with the carb. I would have thought these were injected though...

Anyway, have fun. It's something different.

[gabriel.b]

Anyway, you found the fuel leak, a coolant leak (the first of many?) and the problem with the carb. I would have thought these were injected though...

The later ('89 and on I believe) were injected. And looks like thats the only motor swap that would be easy

[Grillage]

'87 forward were fuel injected

However, I've made a bunch of progress the last couple weeks.

I was able to confirm that there is VERY minimal mixing of coolant and oil. It's clear that the coolant came through the intake manifold.
I cleaned out the cylinders as much as I could and ran a boroscope in there. No visible issues at all. So I am putting it together as is and giving it a shot.

I am eliminating the extremely complicated EGR system entirely as well as the other EPA mods to bring this back to the Italian version of the engine.

The Carb is the least desirable version with the coolant choke but I'm going to make sure it runs at all before I mess with swapping that out for the 84/85 version with a manual choke.

I did the timing belt service yesterday and timed the distributor as well.


Now cleaning everything up, waiting on a new thermostat and a couple coolant hoses that broke, and will put it all back together next weekend to try and start it up!

Worst case scenario from the Coolant intrusion was that it would rust the crank and bearings but the oil was coolant free so I'm good there. The remaining threat (which is real) is that the rings could be rusted or compromised and will break. That would destroy the cylinder walls and likely be game over. I'm rolling the dice but I think I'll be okay. Got all liquid out and put a bit of Marvel Mystery Oil in each spark plug hole to help lube everything.

If all else fails, I'll find a later FI engine

[Grillage]

Got everything back together this weekend and tried to get it to run. The good news is that all the electronics work. starter, etc. I have spark.

However it wouldn't quite turn over even with starter fluid for more than a second or so.

Also I had a backfire back up through the carb which is obviously an issue.
I did a compression test and found cylinder #6 (it's always the last one you test) had low compression. A leak down test revealed that both intake valves are leaking. they are both opened and closed from a single lifter (cups that sit on the end of the valves rather than hydraulic lifters. weird design)

So now I'm going to pull the heads after all and see what's up.

[elaw]

A leak down test revealed that both intake valves are leaking.

Maybe they were open while the engine sat for X years, and there's some rust on the seat and mating surface of the valves?

If that's the case it should be an easy fix... a little work with a wire wheel and lap them.

[Grillage]

I sure hope it's that simple. It's clear now that the best way to get the heads off is with the engine out of the car...

[Grillage]

I got everything loose but the head is stuck on there. This is driving me freaking crazy!

[themagellan]

came into this thread.

god help you