Rubber Update

Following on from my last post, I've explored a few options and spoke with Jorrit at Auto Forza who's been aware of this issue for a while and has been on the look out for a solution.

It seems that Maserati made an adapter kit for the non-ABS Ghibli in order to fit the later designed package from the GT variant. I also discovered that the design of the ABS and the subsequent GT cars are both different, which surprised me.

Fortuitously, Jorrit came across a Ghibli non-ABS subframe fitted with the adapter rings to fit the new parts from a GT car. Since he suspects that the second hand subframe is not completely straight, he's going to remove the adapters from this and fit them onto my good subframe and then order parts 1 to 7 in the drawing below. Since the rubbers from this GT group are cheap, I'll order a spare couple and take some measurements from these and try and get an equivalent poly part sourced.


This set up should make the front of my car feel stiffer and should help prevent rubbing my tires against the wheel arch when I corner hard. Talking of which, I checked my front tire size to jog my memory and indeed I fitted a pair of 225x40 tires on the front. Next time I'll fit some 225x35 which should prevent future rubbing... I went with the larger wall height to try and raise the front of the car a bit, but I think 40 was a little excessive in hindsight.

So, I'll be booking my car in with Jorrit shortly to do the following:

1. Upgrade the front bushings to GT spec.
2. Fit the Mocal oil/water heat exchanger.
3. Replace the pin in the driver's side door hinge.
4. Measure up the exhaust so that I can order some catalysts.

Hopefully I can get this sorted next week and ready for a drive to Mosel in Germany at the end of the month!

Rubber Pads

My car is getting to the age where the rubber parts are needing replacement. Unfortunately, some of these parts are becoming increasingly difficult to source.


The latest parts requiring replacement are part of the suspension set-up and are labelled number 45 in the drawing above and Maserati refer to them as RUBBER PAD Part No. 396650021. The effect of these wearing is primarily felt when braking... the front suspension feels to move a little before, which can be a little un-nerving!

It seems that the non-ABS Ghibli was the only Maserati fitted with these parts, since the group of parts were changed for the ABS and later variants. Although the drawing looks identical for the 2.24v, it has a different part number (BUFFER Part No. 316620110 (Supercedes To Part No. 396650110)).

If the part I need is no longer available, I have a couple of options. First, I need to check whether the 2.24v part and the Ghibli part is actually physically different. If they're the same then I can just get one of those. Another alternative is to upgrade to the ABS parts, but this may not be straight forward and may require changing out some other components such as the subframe, which will turn out to be expensive. Another alternative is to fit some polyurethane generic replacement from Powerflex and then machine some adapter spacers. At least these generic parts will be easier to source in future plus they're stiffer and much tougher wearing, so shouldn't require replacing as frequently!