Old Jock wrote:
Hi Car photographer. Great thread and for what it's worth I prefer the top grille, it looks much more like the one Ferrari fitted to the original! I am looking at buying the Fiorano kit and another forum member, Roadster, suggested I look at your thread. Have you had any problems with the build or has it all been fairly straightforward? Anything on the basic kit which could be improved? Any advice or information will be greatly appreciated - this will be my first kit car build so please assume I know nothing! Thanks in advance.
Glad to see my build has re-kindled a bit of interest in these kits again (maybe I should get some sort of commission)
One of the things that made me feel a little sad when I got it was that there used to be a network of people who had them, and that seemed to have disappeared a couple of years ago .... so the more the merrier in my opinion.
To be honest I bought mine already 'half built' - so I don't know what problems you might have at the start of the build.
we have had some issues - the one I have at present is that it seems to be burning way too much fuel - my mechanic friend seems to think it could be because the engine is angled slightly ( about an inch higher at the front compared to the back of the engine) - and he thinks this is making the one carburetor flood constantly. he's going to have to change the engine mounts slightly to try and overcome this - and see if it fixes the problem - fingers crossed.
The wiring loom could be an issue I suppose - mine didn't come with a loom from the donor car,
so I brought a generic kit car 12v loom (much cheaper than a spitfire one) but it had to be all wired up - which took a bit of time and skill from my mechanic friend.
one other problem I had was fitting seats - the spitfire ones I had just wouldn't fit in and I also tried some small bucket seats from a kit car parts supplier (like most fioranos seem to have) - and if I had fitted them - the driving position would have been so far out that it would have been uncomfortable to sit in and drive for very long I think.
so I ended up using old landrover seat bases, mounted onto old landrover 'middle seat' frames, that were then adapted to fit the removable bases. then I made a basic seat back that I had covered professionally by an upholsterer.
but I think now the driving position will be much better and the seats also look more 'period' maybe too.
apart from a few things like that I don't think it's been too bad compared to other kits - it's just taken a while because my friend who's helping me is busy with other work and so can't work on it as often as I'd like him to.
if you have any other questions feel free to ask and let me know if you manage to get hold of one
I'm hoping to maybe have mine roadworthy and drivable for the Stoneleigh show, but who knows
Keep up the good work on the car - and the thread
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