1992 Maserati Biturbo 430....
Discussion
For as long as I can remember I've always wanted to own a Maserati of some description, I've been a life long fan of Italian cars of all persuasions but there has always been a certain mystique about the road cars that Maserati built from the 1950s onwards - even the numerous and varied Biturbo models from the period when Alejandro De Tomaso owned the company have a particular charm, despite being dismissed or overlooked by some enthusiasts, and so almost five decades after seeing a brand new Bora in the flesh as a very excited nipper, I now have a Maser of my own.
The road to actually acquiring it has a been long and meandering one, at times mind bogglingly dreamlike and frustrating in equal measure. It started in earnest four years ago this month when my Dad died unexpectedly and rather suddenly, his heart just stopped, he keeled over in his beloved boozer with a pint in his hand and I woke up the following day in a bit of a daze. Rather than it being a real downer, it was more of a light headed haze of not really knowing what to think or feel. As the day wore on, sitting around with my two sisters and younger brother, it began to sink in that life really is short and I thought to myself ''if I don't knuckle down and get something I really like now I probably never will'', and so the search began. It had to be something Italian and at least mildly exotic, and definitely something my Dad would have liked. At one point I thought about borrowing enough to buy a Dino 308GT4, a Maserati Merak or a Lamborghini Urraco but couldn't quite get past the enormity of it. The trouble was, as the months rolled by I was allowing myself to get distracted by lots of other non Italian cars as well, examples of which I'd already owned, thoughts of old Jags, Rovers and Minis came and went several times, I've had fifteen classic Minis over the last thirty years and still own a '68 Cooper S but the distractions continued. I thought about Triumph Stags, Rolls Royce Silver Shadows, Karmann Ghias and '70s Fords for a while but those urges soon dissipated. On three separate occasions I looked quite seriously into buying an American V8 of some sort and even quite recently went off on a tangent looking at air cooled flat six Chevy Corvair Coupes, but all the while I had the nagging urge to drift back to the Italian stuff that I knew really floated by boat.
While all of this was going on I managed to sell the Mini 30 I'd bought on a whim a week before the first lockdown of 2020 started (I did hardly anything to it, or with it, so I put it up for sale on carandclassic.com). With the money now sitting in my account and a with bit more liberated from elsewhere topping up the budget I started looking at the Italian stuff again. Alfa Spiders and Alfetta GTVs were now back on the radar, as were Fiat 124 Spiders and 130 Coupes, and Lancia Beta, Montecarlo, Fulvia and Flavia Coupes but in my heart I knew what I really wanted was a Maserati. It was around this time that I mentioned my daft yearning in one of the classic car threads on here, which is when fellow PH'er Manorcom mentioned that he knew of a Maserati 430 which might be coming for sale soon. I asked him for some details and thought about it for a couple of weeks and in the meantime looked into Quattroportes Vs, 3200GTs, Ghibli IIs and the older Quattroporte IVs (again!), but after a bit of a cock up at my end in communication I got the seller's contact details from Manorcom and rang him up to ask about the 430. A time and date was duly arranged for me to go over to nearby Coleshill in Warwickshire to see it and after talking to Mike the owner for a while I knew I wanted it. Mike is a semi retired Maserati specialist which helped no end, but he wanted me to think about it properly before taking the plunge. With this in mind we decided that I'd go back the following weekend and have another, longer look at it and take it for a drive, Mike also put the car up on the two post lift in his workshop so I could see what it was like underneath. We chatted some more over a cuppa and made a deal, the reality then dawned on me that I'd just bought a thirty year old Maser from a period when the company's reputation wasn't at its best, but I knew what I was letting myself in for and went in with my eyes open. Mike agreed to put a new MOT on the car and very kindly offered to deliver it to my house once it had passed, even nicer was the inclusion in the deal of a whole load of spares which includes a pair of doors and a bootlid (I'll be picking these up in a week or so in a hired van). Last Saturday Mike and his mate duly turned up with the Maser on a low loader.... I was rather pleased....
I took these photos at Mike's workshop on my second viewing....
After that long winded explanation as to how I arrived at this point I ought to describe the car itself - it's a Tipo AM332 Maserati Biturbo 430 2.8 litre 18 valve V6 Auto with an 'SE' bodykit and a continuous history from new, it was first registered on 1st August 1992 as 'K24 NCR' and the Irish 'MAZ 4301' number was put on it in July 1997, it's had five previous owners and is one of about 1,200 or so 430s built, about ten percent of which were RHD from the factory at a rough guess. The interior is very soft leather and alcantara (including the headlining) most of which is original, the only new bit being the slightly lighter alcantara side bolsters on the driver's seat. The alcantara will need some attention at some point as it's a bit grubby in places. The carpet although dirty and needing a proper seeing to is deep pile and very Italian, it looks very similar to some Innocenti Minis I've seen. All of the wood bar the radio / heater panel surround piece is in excellent nick and the all important Swiss Lasalle clock is still intact and working (they often go missing on Biturbos). The plastic switch gear and air vents look a bit 'parts bin' in places but it all sort of comes together when you've been sitting in the car for a few minutes. Everything except the speedo and the metal sunroof is in good working order, apparently the speedo issue is a common one with these cars but is not insurmountable and the sunroof might just need a new switch, although it's not a really a priority for me at the moment. It starts first time with a rather nice rumble and the stainless steel exhaust which was fitted way back in 1997 makes it sound pretty good.
Despite it's resemblance to a late '70s / early '70s 3 series BMW it has distinctively Italian touches, the power steering fluid reservoir has a little safety valve on top which I've never some across before and the Maserati name and trident emblem are all over the car, inside and out. The bonnet release cable is doubled up 'just in case' and the large trident on the front grille is chromed metal rather than moulded plastic. The front seats are electric and are as comfortable as they look, the steering column is adjustable and the radio antenna, the petrol filler cap and bootlid are all electrically operated (there's a dummy filler flap on the nearside of the car). As soon as I'd taken the car round to the garage at the back of the house I started taking bits off it to give it a good clean, I've already removed, repainted and replaced the black grille pieces that fit under the front number plate....
[url]
|https://thumbsnap.com/HoGUBCDj[/url]
[url]
|https://thumbsnap.com/wpqJHbif[/url]
My immediate plan is to get it down to Migliore in Bromsgrove to see about having the engine bay completely refurbished top to bottom, ie: engine out, a proper clean up, repaint (including the red crackle finish on the cam covers and plenum chamber) and refitted with new fuel lines, hoses, clips etc.
I took it out this morning to put some fuel in it, the idle is a bit lumpy until it's properly warmed up but it feels like a really good car with plenty of character.
Edited to add : the term Biturbo was quietly dropped by Maserati in press material in 1988 but the V5C still describes it as one.
The road to actually acquiring it has a been long and meandering one, at times mind bogglingly dreamlike and frustrating in equal measure. It started in earnest four years ago this month when my Dad died unexpectedly and rather suddenly, his heart just stopped, he keeled over in his beloved boozer with a pint in his hand and I woke up the following day in a bit of a daze. Rather than it being a real downer, it was more of a light headed haze of not really knowing what to think or feel. As the day wore on, sitting around with my two sisters and younger brother, it began to sink in that life really is short and I thought to myself ''if I don't knuckle down and get something I really like now I probably never will'', and so the search began. It had to be something Italian and at least mildly exotic, and definitely something my Dad would have liked. At one point I thought about borrowing enough to buy a Dino 308GT4, a Maserati Merak or a Lamborghini Urraco but couldn't quite get past the enormity of it. The trouble was, as the months rolled by I was allowing myself to get distracted by lots of other non Italian cars as well, examples of which I'd already owned, thoughts of old Jags, Rovers and Minis came and went several times, I've had fifteen classic Minis over the last thirty years and still own a '68 Cooper S but the distractions continued. I thought about Triumph Stags, Rolls Royce Silver Shadows, Karmann Ghias and '70s Fords for a while but those urges soon dissipated. On three separate occasions I looked quite seriously into buying an American V8 of some sort and even quite recently went off on a tangent looking at air cooled flat six Chevy Corvair Coupes, but all the while I had the nagging urge to drift back to the Italian stuff that I knew really floated by boat.
While all of this was going on I managed to sell the Mini 30 I'd bought on a whim a week before the first lockdown of 2020 started (I did hardly anything to it, or with it, so I put it up for sale on carandclassic.com). With the money now sitting in my account and a with bit more liberated from elsewhere topping up the budget I started looking at the Italian stuff again. Alfa Spiders and Alfetta GTVs were now back on the radar, as were Fiat 124 Spiders and 130 Coupes, and Lancia Beta, Montecarlo, Fulvia and Flavia Coupes but in my heart I knew what I really wanted was a Maserati. It was around this time that I mentioned my daft yearning in one of the classic car threads on here, which is when fellow PH'er Manorcom mentioned that he knew of a Maserati 430 which might be coming for sale soon. I asked him for some details and thought about it for a couple of weeks and in the meantime looked into Quattroportes Vs, 3200GTs, Ghibli IIs and the older Quattroporte IVs (again!), but after a bit of a cock up at my end in communication I got the seller's contact details from Manorcom and rang him up to ask about the 430. A time and date was duly arranged for me to go over to nearby Coleshill in Warwickshire to see it and after talking to Mike the owner for a while I knew I wanted it. Mike is a semi retired Maserati specialist which helped no end, but he wanted me to think about it properly before taking the plunge. With this in mind we decided that I'd go back the following weekend and have another, longer look at it and take it for a drive, Mike also put the car up on the two post lift in his workshop so I could see what it was like underneath. We chatted some more over a cuppa and made a deal, the reality then dawned on me that I'd just bought a thirty year old Maser from a period when the company's reputation wasn't at its best, but I knew what I was letting myself in for and went in with my eyes open. Mike agreed to put a new MOT on the car and very kindly offered to deliver it to my house once it had passed, even nicer was the inclusion in the deal of a whole load of spares which includes a pair of doors and a bootlid (I'll be picking these up in a week or so in a hired van). Last Saturday Mike and his mate duly turned up with the Maser on a low loader.... I was rather pleased....
I took these photos at Mike's workshop on my second viewing....
After that long winded explanation as to how I arrived at this point I ought to describe the car itself - it's a Tipo AM332 Maserati Biturbo 430 2.8 litre 18 valve V6 Auto with an 'SE' bodykit and a continuous history from new, it was first registered on 1st August 1992 as 'K24 NCR' and the Irish 'MAZ 4301' number was put on it in July 1997, it's had five previous owners and is one of about 1,200 or so 430s built, about ten percent of which were RHD from the factory at a rough guess. The interior is very soft leather and alcantara (including the headlining) most of which is original, the only new bit being the slightly lighter alcantara side bolsters on the driver's seat. The alcantara will need some attention at some point as it's a bit grubby in places. The carpet although dirty and needing a proper seeing to is deep pile and very Italian, it looks very similar to some Innocenti Minis I've seen. All of the wood bar the radio / heater panel surround piece is in excellent nick and the all important Swiss Lasalle clock is still intact and working (they often go missing on Biturbos). The plastic switch gear and air vents look a bit 'parts bin' in places but it all sort of comes together when you've been sitting in the car for a few minutes. Everything except the speedo and the metal sunroof is in good working order, apparently the speedo issue is a common one with these cars but is not insurmountable and the sunroof might just need a new switch, although it's not a really a priority for me at the moment. It starts first time with a rather nice rumble and the stainless steel exhaust which was fitted way back in 1997 makes it sound pretty good.
Despite it's resemblance to a late '70s / early '70s 3 series BMW it has distinctively Italian touches, the power steering fluid reservoir has a little safety valve on top which I've never some across before and the Maserati name and trident emblem are all over the car, inside and out. The bonnet release cable is doubled up 'just in case' and the large trident on the front grille is chromed metal rather than moulded plastic. The front seats are electric and are as comfortable as they look, the steering column is adjustable and the radio antenna, the petrol filler cap and bootlid are all electrically operated (there's a dummy filler flap on the nearside of the car). As soon as I'd taken the car round to the garage at the back of the house I started taking bits off it to give it a good clean, I've already removed, repainted and replaced the black grille pieces that fit under the front number plate....
[url]|https://thumbsnap.com/HoGUBCDj[/url][url]|https://thumbsnap.com/wpqJHbif[/url]My immediate plan is to get it down to Migliore in Bromsgrove to see about having the engine bay completely refurbished top to bottom, ie: engine out, a proper clean up, repaint (including the red crackle finish on the cam covers and plenum chamber) and refitted with new fuel lines, hoses, clips etc.
I took it out this morning to put some fuel in it, the idle is a bit lumpy until it's properly warmed up but it feels like a really good car with plenty of character.
Edited to add : the term Biturbo was quietly dropped by Maserati in press material in 1988 but the V5C still describes it as one.
Edited by P5BNij on Sunday 27th June 18:27
Brilliant!
Checked readers drives specifically to see if you’d started a thread in the 430. Am not disappointed.
As said before I absolutely love these and look forward to reading your updates.
Has any other manufacturer ever done seats with the leather on the bit you sit on and Alcantara on the bolsters? It’s the sort of mad detail I love on cars like this
Checked readers drives specifically to see if you’d started a thread in the 430. Am not disappointed.
As said before I absolutely love these and look forward to reading your updates.
Has any other manufacturer ever done seats with the leather on the bit you sit on and Alcantara on the bolsters? It’s the sort of mad detail I love on cars like this
meanwhile you will be frantically working behind the scenes keeping on top of the Italian engineering (although not too much I hope)!
shih tzu faced said:
Brilliant!
Checked readers drives specifically to see if you’d started a thread in the 430. Am not disappointed.
As said before I absolutely love these and look forward to reading your updates.
Has any other manufacturer ever done seats with the leather on the bit you sit on and Alcantara on the bolsters? It’s the sort of mad detail I love on cars like this
I *think* Lamborghini may have offered the same seat combo on some Espadas but am happy to be corrected Checked readers drives specifically to see if you’d started a thread in the 430. Am not disappointed.
As said before I absolutely love these and look forward to reading your updates.
Has any other manufacturer ever done seats with the leather on the bit you sit on and Alcantara on the bolsters? It’s the sort of mad detail I love on cars like this
Still lots to do on it - for one thing the extra gubbins in the engine bay, namely the blue dump valve and extra piping will be removed at some point, I'm not sure which of the five previous owners fitted it but it doesn't appear to add anything to the car's running or performance, not that I've really pushed it hard yet.
That's a great find OP. 
I've always wanted a Maserati since I read about a Quattroporte in my 1966 Observers Book of Cars! (Yes I'm old).
Never owned one but drove a couple at a test day in 2008 and they were fantastic, but way out of my budget.
But Maserati interiors are just stunning!
I hope you can get it back to it's best fairly painlessly.
I've always wanted a Maserati since I read about a Quattroporte in my 1966 Observers Book of Cars! (Yes I'm old).
Never owned one but drove a couple at a test day in 2008 and they were fantastic, but way out of my budget.
But Maserati interiors are just stunning!
I hope you can get it back to it's best fairly painlessly.
Congratulations!
I tried to buy a Biturbo (preferably 430) about 10 years ago, test drove a couple, and got as far as paying for an independent assessment of one, but every one I looked at (in Aus) was either a money pit
I then fell in love with a very nice Quattroporte IV (v8)
, but couldn't quite afford it, even with man-maths 
.
I still have a couple of books of period road tests - maybe one day...
I tried to buy a Biturbo (preferably 430) about 10 years ago, test drove a couple, and got as far as paying for an independent assessment of one, but every one I looked at (in Aus) was either a money pit
assessor said:
I want you to own a Maserati, but not this one
, very optimistically priced, or both.I then fell in love with a very nice Quattroporte IV (v8)
, but couldn't quite afford it, even with man-maths .I still have a couple of books of period road tests - maybe one day...
If you don't know about him already I can thoroughly recommend Mike Roberts at The Maserati Shed : http://www.robertsaerospace.com/ for these.
Great look car OP and good luck with it.
Great look car OP and good luck with it.
P5BNij said:
I *think* Lamborghini may have offered the same seat combo on some Espadas but am happy to be corrected
Still lots to do on it - for one thing the extra gubbins in the engine bay, namely the blue dump valve and extra piping will be removed at some point, I'm not sure which of the five previous owners fitted it but it doesn't appear to add anything to the car's running or performance, not that I've really pushed it hard yet.
Good call. Dump valves are fun on hot hatches, but don't really seem in keeping with a modern Italian classic.Still lots to do on it - for one thing the extra gubbins in the engine bay, namely the blue dump valve and extra piping will be removed at some point, I'm not sure which of the five previous owners fitted it but it doesn't appear to add anything to the car's running or performance, not that I've really pushed it hard yet.
Not that I have any experience with this car, but in general you'll probably experience better economy and part-throttle response with a recirculating valve fitted.
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