Scorpion #621 resurrection

think jedi

True Classic
Back story:

I picked up this Lancia Scorpion from a shop in Brisbane in 2016. Athough I didn't know it at the time, it had been featured on Bring a Trailer. It had been sitting for a couple of years. It featured sad-looking white paint, surface rust starting to show in various places, and some god-awful Honda bumpers that were retrofitted on the car in an ill-conceived effort to make it look like a Montecarlo. I have to hand it to the previous owner...the front bumper almost worked. The rear...not so much. It had an ANSA quad tip exhaust, but also came with the stock exhaust.

The car ran (unbelievably), so I was able to drive it from Brisbane to Palo Alto with one tail light out and long-expired plates. Yeah, I was dumb. But I made it. After my buddy went over the engine to be sure things were OK, he put on the stock exhaust back on and attempted to smog it. It failed twice and finally managed to pass the 3rd time. Barely. Then someone backed into it and smashed the driver's front fender. After dicking with Geico (the culprit's insurance company), I managed to get $2500 to get the fender back into shape.

With smog in hand, he put the fun ANSA exhaust back on and drove it to Monterey and delivered it to me.

This is what it looked like in 2013...
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this is what it looked like when I got it...
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tJ
 
I documented a bunch of stuff I did recently in the "What'd ya do to your X1/20 today" thread. I'll highlight those here, but if you want to see more, you can go check out that thread.

Things I did:

2016:
- Assessed condition of car, noting issues. Then amassed parts from Midwest Bayless, Monte Hospital, eBay, and locally.

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- completely stripped the car and exposed rusted out floors and scary looking rear engine firewall. The driver's seat was only held in with one bolt! Took copious pics and video of stuff I might forget.

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- scaled rust from bulkhead, frunk battery box area, and floors (as best I could)

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- towed her to friend's shop to get painted. It sat there for 2+ years before he finally got around to it.

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2019:

- got a call from friend...he finished working on the car. I scrambled to clear my garage. Received car and went to work trying to remember how everything went back together. Boy am I glad I took pics and vids!

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tJ
 

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Thanks NM850. Some things I did since March 2019:

Put in window regulators and door glass:

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Started, but did not yet finish, putting the recovered roof back on. Not finished because I need to sort out what I'm going to do for latches as I'm missing one of mine.

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Removed and replaced rear glass and rear quarter glass. Also fixed a rock chip in the windshield:

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Fixed rear quarter window trim, refurbished the side trim and replaced. Ugly details in the "What'd ya do with your X1/20" thread.

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tJ
 
Did some sprucing up of the engine compartment about a week ago. Replaced all braided emissions hoses with new ones. Replaced the cracked airbox to carb hose with one I bought from McMaster-Carr. Pulled the emissions spider out and soaked it in Evaporust. Cleaned the heads up and painted the valve covers. Cleaned the EGR valve (even though it's not hooked up at the moment)...it's never looked so good. Put in a new air filter from Rock Auto (which needed cutting to fit right..bastards!) And cleaned up and painted the aluminum plate where the spare tire mounts. Also painted the spare tire mount, but that isn't going in for awhile.

I need to do some management of the spark plug cables. I may draw up and print something to accomplish that. Anyway, it's not show quality, but was never meant to be. Just decent enough for Cars & Coffee.

tJ

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Recently cleaned up the rear end of the car. :) The original tail panel had big chunks missing out of it and had been screwed to the body work with sheet metal screws. I am beginning to think a Nissan 240 would been better off in the hands of a drift-crazy teen than Sofia was in the hands of the PO. Anyway, early in my parts acquiring binge, I found a guy who had a hood prop, one of Chris Obert's machined hood popper handles, and a tail panel. The panel wasn't perfect (2 cracks in the slats on the back, but not really that noticeable). I repaired those cracks reasonably well (you have to really be looking for them to notice them). But overall, it's a BIG improvement over what was there before. I also took the opportunity to pull apart the tail lamps, sand down the trim and paint them with SEM trim spray. Then I junked the crappy, incorrect self-tapping screws that held the tail lamps on and fitted them back on with proper plastic Fiat screws.

BEFORE:
Big chunks missing out of the grill. Cracks all over the place. Faded. The tail lamp chrome was peeling. The screws are holding them on are either incorrect colored Fiat screws or plain metal self-tapping screws.

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AFTER:

Installation of new-to-me rear panel:

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Tails just re-sprayed:

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Tails reinstalled, sans lenses.

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Lenses installed with proper screws.

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And working again!

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tJ
 
That handful of vents reminds me of a casino advert of a hand full of cash (which is probably not far off truth). Ka-Ching Baby!

I specifically went down the road of getting the red turn signals to go with the red brake and parking lights. Looks so proper on yours!
 
Where did you get them?

I got them on the Italian eBay (http://www.ebay.it). There's a place selling repros that are spot-on. Best of all, they're not waiting the shatter to pieces when you look at them cross-eyed! Here's the link: https://www.ebay.it/itm/SET-3-GRIGL...134121?hash=item2cf90ff729:g:~Q8AAOSwEP5dpERR

Moto, thanks for the props on the turn signals. I'm really pleased with how the back end turned out. I may end up fixing my old rear panel and retrofitting the 037 style lights on....we'll see.

tJ
 
So question for those of you who have had/seen both S1 and S2 Scorpions/Montecarlos. I have this hood blanket, and I honestly don't remember if it came with the car or if it came with a trove of parts I picked up for the car 3 years ago. Either way, it appears to fit the hood, but the weird thing is that the holes don't line up with the holes in the hood. Not only that, the clips don't fit into the holes on the hood...they're much too small. I'm guessing that the hood blanket is from a later model car? Are the S1 and S2 cars different in this respect? I'm kinda scratching my head over this one...I know the car didn't have the hood blanket on when I got the car. It may have been tucked away, but who knows where it came from? I can drill the holes where they need to be, but I'd just like the know WTF is going on.

tJ
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So question for those of you who have had/seen both S1 and S2 Scorpions/Montecarlos. I have this hood blanket, and I honestly don't remember if it came with the car or if it came with a trove of parts I picked up for the car 3 years ago. Either way, it appears to fit the hood, but the weird thing is that the holes don't line up with the holes in the hood. Not only that, the clips don't fit into the holes on the hood...they're much too small. I'm guessing that the hood blanket is from a later model car? Are the S1 and S2 cars different in this respect? I'm kinda scratching my head over this one...I know the car didn't have the hood blanket on when I got the car. It may have been tucked away, but who knows where it came from? I can drill the holes where they need to be, but I'd just like the know WTF is going on.

tJ
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The "hood blanket" was not included on '76 models. It was added on the '77 models. I have a '76 and also have the "blanket" on the shelf but never tried to install it - always assumed it would fit - maybe not...
 
The "hood blanket" was not included on '76 models. It was added on the '77 models. I have a '76 and also have the "blanket" on the shelf but never tried to install it - always assumed it would fit - maybe not...

OK, thank you...now that makes more sense. I will probably fit it now that I know that drilling will be necessary. It appears to fit. On the other hand, I may decide not to fit it. It would look nice, but it's not really necessary. A hood blanket is better for an engine compartment, but I don't see that really being practical on our hoods.

tJ
 
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Last weekend I cleaned up the frunk carpets and reinstalled them. I'm scratching my head over the fact that the frunk carpets don't completely cover the frunk by the battery box. This is the way they were when I got the car. Pics I see online show that the carpets cover the whole funk. Weird. Maybe another S1 vs. S2 thing?

tJ

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I put a new Vitaloni Californian mirror on the passenger door today. It was a little fiddly to get things lined up the same as they are on the driver's side. Lots of measuring and re-measuring to make sure things were right.

Blue tape to protect the rest of the paint while I drill. I already drilled the first hole:
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Drilled second hole:
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Peeled back tape and mounted the mirror base:
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The mirrors on the car:

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tJ
 

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A couple of years ago, I started the search for Montecarlo turn signals to use in the the Monte-style bumpers I got from Midwest-Bayless. The signals I had (from a Honda Accord, I reckon), weren't going to work, and US-spec Scorpion signals weren't going to do it for me. Monte Hospital didn't have any in stock and eBay wasn't coughing up any. I finally spotted a couple of turn signals in a "job lot" of Montecarlo and Beta parts that a guy from the UK was selling. I bought the lot and had it shipped. When they arrived, I confirmed that both left/right turn signals were included, but unfortunately, the left turn signal lens was cracked. Somewhere else, I managed to snag a single clear NOS left turn signal. I put all the parts away for 2 years while the car was being painted (yeah, 2 years...).

Yesterday, I pulled out the signals and remembered the issue I had. I noticed, however, that the amber part of the signals appear to be painted amber. Hmmm....
So I bought a can of Krylon "Stained Glass" tangerine orange paint, masked off the clear part and went to town. The bottom signal is the original clear/amber lens (albeit cracked). The top is the clear/clear lens.

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Finished:

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All in all, I'm very pleased. Once installed, you'll never even know the difference.

tJ
 
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