1302 Restoration

front view

That's beautiful Mike, I love the color!

I wondered who's 'goose this was posted on Instagram. Beautiful.... Fantastic job restoring her.

gorgeous...more pics ? Lee

A few more shots...

interior was completely black when I received the car and when stripping the old leather from around the windscreen seals it was apparent that the leather colour was changed from light tan, so a no brainer to go back to the original colour.

right view

And before someone posts the steering wheel is not original - at least the last 4 cars came with this wheel as the factory possibly ran out of the earlier leather/ wood style.

Super looking car. Great job on the resto....

Rocky

Mike,

SaWEEEEET!!!!
Beautiful job on the car......

Hope you enjoy it as much as we've enjoyed ours!

Going to take ours down to LA next week for Fabulous Fords Forever show at Knott's in Buena Park. Should be fun!

Cheers!
Steve

just a beautiful color, the car looks perfect. Btw, '1076 came with the wood Ferrero wheel but no signs of the leather.
I am curious;
- did any RHD cars have AC ?
- how does the accelerator cable get routed ? on LHD, the pedal directly tugs the cable, then routes thru the tube thru the left side of the spine...
- Is the parking break still on the passenger side ?

would love to see more pictures...funny how the lines of the car just look better and better every year...Lee

Mike, awesome Mangusta, only a shame that the steering wheel is on the wrong side.(LOL)
what rimas have you on the back, have you a better photo?
Simon

Thanks guys. To answer some questions as far as I know all Mangusta's have A/C. The later cars have the A/C integrated and controlled by the small black knob just left of water temp guage. The throttle cable is similar with the pedal tugging the cable and it runs just to the right of the gear stick and curves around to exit the bulkhead heading left. The park brake is an "umbrella" style which mounts under the dash and falls to hand well. Mine has yet to be put back in as I ran out of time. Re the wheels - well spotted these are the driving wheels that were made a few years ago by Group 4 with an extra inch of width all round- makes the car look more aggressive.
Mike

Some more shots old and new

side view showing both wheels

Rear quarter old and new

Beautiful car Mike, and an excellent colour choice! The Group4 wheels look fantastic on the car. I got one of the first sets from Jonathan as I was one of a few people who pushed him hard to make the 10" wide rears. They suit the Goose just the way the 10" wide Campys suit the Pantera. The re-trim work looks very well done., as does the rest. I'd love to see more photos — engine bay, front trunk. Great work. Thanks for sharing!

Mark

Mike, according to a German magazine sent to me by Roland Jaeckel a few years ago, DeTomaso was very busy with the then-new Pantera in '70, so he sent the last 52 Mangustas in unfinished form to a German distributor to finish. Starting with about 8MA 1192-onward, the cars were delivered via Germany with e-brake handles and other parts sourced from a Mercedes road car! When the Mercedes Parts mgr became aware of this, they threatened to sue the DeTomaso distributor! After that point, Merc' e-brake handles were still used but from clandestine sources, not the Mercedes factory.

The last 52 cars also were the source of most of the RHD examples. So your Mangusta probably differs in a number of small ways (plus the RHD steering) from earlier serial numbers.

Yes I have the original hand brake that was taken out of the car and replaced with a floor mounted one. The pivot under the car had been shortened for some reason and I feel would never work properly with the original. I will lengthen the pivot arm and replace all the original brake cables etc. Under the dash still has all the original mount points for this 'Merc style' handle.

What a great job. Fantastic!
Do you have spacers on the rear wheels?

Beautiful.

Dick Ruzzin

Hi Dick,

The Group 4 wheels just bolt straight on. The only real issue with them that Johnny Woods found is that the mounting surface is thinner than the original Goose wheels. So the original wheel nuts wind too far in. So as Johnny did I used some half wheel nuts to do the holding of the wheel and then the original DTom nuts just tightened up on the half nuts to finish the look. As yet I have not covered the front boot area or finished the trimming around the rear arches etc. I want to get some driving done ASAP! Mike

...sorry for the utter fascination on the trivial (!), after replacing throttle cable and AC hoses on a LHD car, a RHD car sparks my curiosity... The Alfa Guilia style handbrake itself wouldn't be that hard to move at the dash, I'm curious if the tensioner pulley is also mounted on the right side of the car (by the gas tank instead of to the left rear wheel well).
As well, I'd expect that the AC hoses still go thru the right side rocker, the whole placement of the in-dash AC (and the routing of the hoses) is interesting to me.
Btw, the only other pic google returned for a RHD Goose had the parking brake on the floor, whoever has this beautiful car...Lee

Sweet Mike....
I'm in lust..!

Rob, thanks for the comment. Lee that car is 8 MA 1294 in the UK. The resto completed by Johnny Woods turned a basic race car interior to this beautifully finished one. Interestingly they swapped the original late steering wheel for the earlier wood/leather one. This car should also have an under dash mounted umbrella style handbrake. All the various pulleys etc are orientated for Right hand drive with the final pivot where it pulls on the cables to the wheels mounted to the left of the sump. A/C hoses still go through the right sill and over the top of the dash and down at the far left to pick up the in cabin unit. Hope that all makes sense.
Mike

Idle rumor has it that only ten (10.0) right- hand drive Mangustas were ever built, including the late ones completed in Germany. So that makes RHD 'Gooses pretty rare DeTomasos!

Jack,

You missed the fact that this car, #1302, is #11 of the ten RHD cars!!

Not to mention that this is also the 402cnd car built of 400.......!

You need to update your rumor mill functions!

Chow! Hi to Judy!
S

What a beautiful goose and here in Australia too. It must have made quite a buzz at Autoitalia?

Hmmmm- is my math wrong? #1302(last)-#500 (first)= 802/2= 401 built. What am I missing?

If so, #1302 is number 402 of the well-known '400 coupes and one Spyder (#0912)' production quantity. And that last may also be incorrect until we get more info on the rumored second Spyder (#1236) also from the German batch, seen a few years ago in Spain. My note says, owned by "Stefano". Any more known on it?

I always expected a few extra'Geese to be 'discovered' ala the lost '66 Shelby Cobras, after seeing the dozen or so spare front & rear clips squirreled away in the factory warehouse back in the '90s, and the price runup the last year or so. Seems like a natural move.

OK , just to clear-up a few items.

1.- 8MA1244 is a white body finished in Germany, has a floor mounted ebrake still has the pulleys on the lower rad mount.

2. - The 401 was a number recalled by Mrs.DeTomaso (not a number identified by registry or confirmed file count)

3.- 8MA1302 was identified a few years back.

3. the 2nd spyder is not a factory conversion but a craftsman version

4.- There are at least one non-serialized Mangusta built from parts (the white Mexican car)

I am in need of the retention rubber for the rear fire-wall glass and the two back glasses in the rear engine covers.

Does anyone have any sources that they would share.
Thanks,
All the best,
DICK RUZZIN

Pantera Performance in San Diego or in Italy try Cicognani.

http://www.cicognaniguarnizioni.it

They have replicated every brand out there!!

Ciao.

Hi Dick, we used the Cicognani rubbers around the car. The only ones incorrect were the door rubbers as they were too 'thick' and the front boot area that had little angled bits and I believe it should be a round finish to the rubber seal.
Just to clear up any questions about how long 1302 has been around- I have owned this car for 3 years and personally known this car since 1989 and have documents to prove it has been in Australia for 10 years prior to that and in the UK when it was new. It is an original Right hand drive car as opposed to my other Mangusta 718 which has been in my possession since 1988. This car has been converted to Right hand drive and my intent is to change it back to Left hand drive as it left the factory.
Thanks Mike

Congratulations Mike! Your car looks bloody gorgeous - love the colour. You are correct, the interior pic posted by Lee is the one I did. The floor mounted hand brake was not original - it was actually hydraulic and worked very well but I would not trust it, and it's not legal for the MOT. As you said the steering wheel was not original either, I removed the later dished one - we found that wood/leather/stainless on ebay - they come up quite often, about once every 5 years!

Johnny

Pretty fascinating, guys. Which was the first of the German cars ? What else was changed for those assembled in Germany ? For example, so many parts had their chassis number marked underneath (like door panels and trunk deck). Were there any other body changes, say for example, was body filler used to cover the rough spot welds near the windshield columns ? Lee

The bodies left the Ghia plant incomplete in various steps. The distributor bought 5 (or so at a time) There are no major telltale signs. We had assumed: floor ebrake handle, coin tray, Becker radio, Citroen roof antenna and late dash configuration. For sure only the Germany cars had floor mounted ebrake handles, did they all have them is another research project.

These cars evolved thru production and many things changed. It is hard to identify when (if logical) items were upgraded ( rear fender gussets, 1 or 2 piece seat, rear defrost, dash configuration [there are 3], rear rim width [ 7.5 vs 8in] , magnesium or aluminium rims, Ferrero variation on steering [all leather or all wood, or dished], different spare tire hold down, very early cars have steel wings and hood, very early cars have 289s.

Unfortunately as we have seen the paperwork go trashed when the scrapped the filing cabinets and no true 'Marty' style reference exists.

It is unfortunate that so much of the documentation on these cars no longer exists, however with some knowledge and time we can piece together most of the way the cars should be. These are just my observations as I have seen most of the original Right hand drive cars in person. I have not seen 1286 nor 1294, however from what I have seen of the other cars is that they were trying to be as 'standard' as possible. By that I mean they all had the one piece seats all had dash mounted handbrake handle with late dash setup with integrated A/C vents. Windscreen wipers pivots were moved to wipe the reverse of the left hand drivers. All had the gussets welded into various corners of the chassis for strengthening, but not all had the large tapered support from the transmission bridge to the engine bay side wall. The other options were just that- some were optioned with rear window demister and some with radio etc. Pretty sure the Ferrero dished all leather wheel was used when they ran out of the flat leather/ wood wheels- last 5 cars I think. All cars, including the last still have the chassis number stamped onto various parts and hand written to interior panels etc. The finish using lead wiping also seemed consistent from early to late cars. As with any hand finished cars there will always be some differences that can not be explained and maybe this just adds to the mystique of the Mangusta production...
Mike

Mike,

Whilst looking at these cars, did you notice the style of front/rear calipers by chance?

I was thinking that some may have had a 3 piston front caliper???????

Normal (what's that??!) would seem to be the CR 2 piston caliper up front with an ORA 2 piston caliper out back, with a sprinkling of 12/3 3-piston calipers (marked Fiat Girling...cast iron) out back.

Cheers!
Steve

wrt documentation...does anyone no if anyone has the factory documentation on each car or was it lost when Detomaso folded?

Thanx
Mark

Hi Steve, Right hand drive cars had the 3 piston front calipers and the 2 piston rear callipers. No manufacturer name on castings, however look like Girling and I got seals etc to rebuild them from Crosthwaite & Gardiner in the UK. Mike