I purchased a Maserati Coupe 2005 for 5 300 pounds....

Nahayiah

Junior Member
Messages
27
Dear all,
Yes after many issue with a previous seller, i 've seen mid of August an advert an ebay for a Maserati Coupe 2005 with 92k miles on the clock and sold as spares or repairs. Below the link to the ad :
WIthout seeing the car, i've make a bid and won the car. I don't recommend to do what I did of course.

Episode 1 : the discovery and the return back home
First part, UK quarantine was in place for visitors and I'm living in France so no choice delivery in France for roughly 600 euros.
The delivery has been made close to Calais, at the house of a friend, in the late evening.
Few days later, I've made the trip to get there and take it back to my house next to Paris.
The car had obviously not run for many months, so we did a deep check of everything basics (brakes, pipes , corrosion, fluids levels, engine etc).
Although I was expecting to have many majors issues to fix, actually not so much.

So I have decided to take the motorway back to home (2 hours trip in average conditions). Unfortunately, road blocks were in place and I had to leave the motorway just 50 km after entering it, and at the toll barrier (In France, we have to pay at exiting the motorways..), the gearbox shifted well to neutral position, but when I was in the need to drive again, it refused to engage the 1st gear, and only once it did it, it has fall back to Neutral almost immediately. Finally, I pushed the car next to a parking lot 100m from the exit with very nice comments from the others cars drivers as you can expect.

Hopefully, I had taken a bunch of F1 pump relays, so I closed the 12V and replaced the relay and reengaged the 12V. I heard the pump initializing itself and I could finish the trip back home not without a certain stress but in good conditions.

Below some pictures of the car (I remove the vents to clean them and I will have to also clean the center console, sticky effect), after a little cleaning of the inside (i kept one picture to show how was the leather before the cleaning).
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The good points :
  • engine works really fine
  • maintenance has been regularly and really achieved (numerous bills available)
  • very low level of rust (only surface rust)
  • backseats almost never used obviously


So what are the next steps :
  • Inside : finish cleaning the plastics using Isopropylic alcohol, dismantle a Nokia Bluetooth which is not at the right place and actually within the right car, and reflresh the buttons on the central console
  • Outside : a good cleaning / waxing for the external trims (body parts and headlights) and a bit or cleaning before applying rust converter/rust remover on the underframe (just minor areas and surface rust only)
  • Mechanical : change the F1 pump (using alfa reference already ordered), thanks to the tutorial found within this forum (Again thanks a lot, it will help) and refix the thermal isolation of the rear transmission (little noise at the back), trunk cylinders to replace
  • Find LHD headlights or find a way to convert the beam from RHD to LHD
 
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Nahayiah

Junior Member
Messages
27
Some additional pictures of the outside
 

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spkennyuk

Member
Messages
5,930
Hi welcome along.

Difficulty in selecting gear can be an early indicator that the clutch will need changing. Any idea from the history when it was last changed.

Changing the relay would have reset the system but so would switching the car off and leaving for a few minutes.

If you have access to a local indy with maserati sd / leonardo or launch diagnostic then i suggest getting a clutch reading to give you an idea of clutch life left and have the PIS point set.

Clutch reading is never 100% accurate bit it will give you a rough idea. Also the pressure plate tangs can fail before the clutch is worn fully. Some people get 20k miles on a clutch others get 50k miles.

Hows the gear changes when running normally ? If they were a bit laggy in sport mode then it may just be that the PIS setting is too wide 1mm out makes the world of difference.
 

Nahayiah

Junior Member
Messages
27
On the obd, I have the code P0806 which is coming fixed and the light on the dashboard.
The previous owner had already issues with it and did some repairs but obviously not the right parts.
below , previous repairs associated :
75234

I checked with a friend and the diagnostic made by the garage doesn't seem right, the true problem seems to really be the pump.

PS : how do you change the PIS setting ? Thanks in advance
 

FIFTY

Member
Messages
3,100
Nice write up, sounds like you had quite an adventure to start your Maserati story

The e-bay listing describes an intermittent staring fault, have you experienced this yet and have you had any success finding the cause?
 

Zep

Moderator
Messages
9,110
On the obd, I have the code P0806 which is coming fixed and the light on the dashboard.
The previous owner had already issues with it and did some repairs but obviously not the right parts.
below , previous repairs associated :
View attachment 75234

I checked with a friend and the diagnostic made by the garage doesn't seem right, the true problem seems to really be the pump.

PS : how do you change the PIS setting ? Thanks in advance

It could well have been both the clutch solenoid and the pump. And the relay. But it certainly sounds like a bargain.
 

spkennyuk

Member
Messages
5,930
On the obd, I have the code P0806 which is coming fixed and the light on the dashboard.
The previous owner had already issues with it and did some repairs but obviously not the right parts.
below , previous repairs associated :
View attachment 75234

I checked with a friend and the diagnostic made by the garage doesn't seem right, the true problem seems to really be the pump.

PS : how do you change the PIS setting ? Thanks in advance

The PIS setting can only be changed with either SD , leonardo or launch diagnostic.

Simple enough to do but you do need the diagnostic tool.

Basically go into the gear box tcu and then advanced functions and you should see somewhere a PIS read function.

Read the current pis setting probably around 4.65 You should also see a PIS write function. Change the setting to say 4.55 and write to the TCU. Next with the car running check the primary gearbox angle speed. Select first gear but dont touch the accelerator you should get a zero rpm reading. Select reverse and check the reading again it should remain at zero rpm.
If it increases above zero in either gear then the clutch is starting to drag and you need to increase the PIS setting back up in 0.01 increments. Until there is zero reading on the primary gearbox angle speed when you select first or reverse gear.

Basically you want to get the PIS setting as tight as you can without the clutch dragging.

At the moment when the car is stood still and in gear and your press the accelorator does it start to move at 1600 to 1800 rpm ?

If yes then the PIS setting is slightly out. With the correct setting it will start to move at around 1100 to 1200 rpm as soon as you touch the loud pedal. Gear changes above 3000 rpm should be nice and smooth then and stop start traffic wont be as tiresome.
 
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Nahayiah

Junior Member
Messages
27
Nice write up, sounds like you had quite an adventure to start your Maserati story

The e-bay listing describes an intermittent staring fault, have you experienced this yet and have you had any success finding the cause?
My friend who received the car experienced it when he tried to restart the car first, it was due to an alarm cable which was partially disconnected somewhere according to him. The second source of problem is the car refused to start if the pump didn't start correctly when the car is unlocked.
 

Nahayiah

Junior Member
Messages
27
Well done Nahayiah!

You can convert the beam from RHD to LHD, a little bit tricky, but no need to buy new lenses, you can adjust it. http://www.maseratitude.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=3987&start=100#p100087
It's now possible to adjust the PIS with the launch mini pro X431, very useful to read the all the error codes too. It works well with the 3200gt too by the way.
Thanks for the link, I will anyway remove the headlights to clean then and refresh them, so I will use the tutorial to twist the right direction the bulb.
 

mjheathcote

Centenary Club
Messages
9,033

philw696

Member
Messages
25,113
Certainly a nice find if you don't mind the RHD here in France.
I'm down in the Mayenne and have a Launch X431.
Brought a Porsche over from the UK last year and got it in the system easily.
Bon Chance and keep us posted.
 

Nahayiah

Junior Member
Messages
27
Certainly a nice find if you don't mind the RHD here in France.
I'm down in the Mayenne and have a Launch X431.
Brought a Porsche over from the UK last year and got it in the system easily.
Bon Chance and keep us posted.

Actually, i'm driving only RHD cars since 6 years now (I started by Z4 phase 2.5l 204ch and all my cars have been RHD and manual , except lasts ones the XK8 and the Maserati), so absolutely no issues with RHD.
Registration of UK cars in France is almost exactly the same as any french car if the Lign K of the V5 is filled (just the tax document "quitus fiscal" in addition to get from Tax office).

For the Launch X431, if anybody has a good plan to get it at competitive price, please let me know since prices seem to be highly variable according to exact model (from roughly 160 to 650 pounds) :
Thanks in advance.
 

mjheathcote

Centenary Club
Messages
9,033
Actually, i'm driving only RHD cars since 6 years now (I started by Z4 phase 2.5l 204ch and all my cars have been RHD and manual , except lasts ones the XK8 and the Maserati), so absolutely no issues with RHD.
Registration of UK cars in France is almost exactly the same as any french car if the Lign K of the V5 is filled (just the tax document "quitus fiscal" in addition to get from Tax office).

For the Launch X431, if anybody has a good plan to get it at competitive price, please let me know since prices seem to be highly variable according to exact model (from roughly 160 to 650 pounds) :
Thanks in advance.

I'm suprised if you can't just get the software, when you have a android tablet and Bluetooth obd2 reader already.
 

spkennyuk

Member
Messages
5,930
I'm suprised if you can't just get the software, when you have a android tablet and Bluetooth obd2 reader already.

Plenty of cracked versions around on ebay and the like. The software is coded to the bluetooth obd reader serial number so only works with certain obd reader modules.
 

philw696

Member
Messages
25,113
I have the Launch X431 Pros Mini and have to say it's one of the best machines out there.
Back up from Launch is second to none.
What you can do with it is quite amazing.
Just sorted pedestrian impact fault out where Jaguar wanted €700 to renew impact sensors 10 year old car and all that.
My advice is becareful with some of the cheap stuff as people have blown ECU's up.
Like anything you get what you pay for.