The (one and only) '0846' Debate Thread

So more discussion that it was Piper who hacked up the chassis while it was in his possession. Or, you've spent the last few days detailing how the 003/0846 chassis is missing some engine mounting tubes that prove it isn't 0846, yet you just now post that Hajduk Jr removed some tubes that had been welded on the chassis - so before removal of those tubes, how well did the chassis match a modified 0846 P3 to P4? Who added or removed engine mounts and chassis tubes? Piper and/or Hadjuk Jr?


Steve, you've chased every thread, badgered and challenged MF when you didn't like his letter to JG, you chased down this John Hajduk Jr about the chassis repairs/changes/differences - yet you refuse to pursue David Piper about the truths of the origins of this chassis, differences to his other replica chassis, the changes to the engine mounts done in a fashion that nobody at Ferrari would have done, now tubes welded on the chassis in a different way - all leads back to Piper.

Please, pull on that thread, be impartial rather than determined just to prove JG wrong, and dig up the evidence and truth of where that chassis actually came from and what Piper did to it while he owned it.

 

Look at what Steve is actually pointing at. Hadjuck is apparently denying the statements that have been attributed to him. If those statements did not occur or are not making the Targa Forio and Le Mans connection then the quest by the owner of DP0003 falls apart from the beginning.

Steve: Can you provide more details on what Hadjuck was and was not confirming from that cited conversation so many years back?

 

Jeff. Check your email.

 

How do you know what damage was done to a chassis simply by reading a book?
There are photos of the 1967 TF crash, but NO photos showing the chassis damage.
So how did he know what chassis damage there was? He obviously didn't know. It was speculation or guessing, at best.
It's time to stop quoting the chassis damage, which no-one, not even Napolis, can prove was the result of the Targa Florio crash.
Nathan

 

I'm getting why!
Rob basically said that posts should stick to actually discussing the car. And you've obviously got it because your post was mainly about "I am glad the discussion has flipped to the real issue at stake, the chassis and how it was built"
Whatever you think of Steve, it is obvious that he has done more research into the chassis than anyone else on this thread, and he has come up with some interesting photos and information.
There will always be unanswered questions about this car, but as Napolis said, "the answer is in the metal."
Nathan

 

One could say the same thing about Napolis. When Forghieri first spoke Napolis said that he was old, his memory had gone etc. After he's taken Forghieri out to dinner, got him to sign a sheet of paper and had his photo taken, then what Forghieri says is what goes.
So, any criticism of Napolis methodology?
Nathan

 

At the risk of being told its not relevant, John Hajduk has a lot of experience with Ferrari racing cars of the period and was one of the more reputable Ferrari shops in the area. Restored at least two 512S/M and a 312P among others. SHOULD have known what he was talking about............

 

How could he attribute chassis damage to a particular crash?
Sure he can recognise chassis damage, even I could do that, but it would have been impossible for him to say where and when it happened - just by reading a book.
In fact it appears that he didn't even know which chassis he was working on at that time! (read the PDF)
If he had photos of the chassis damage then he could have compared the photo with the actual chassis, but he didn't have a photo, so how could he know?
Nathan

 

Nathan. Re read my posts on the subject. I've made quite a few that answer your question. Of course I've said it over and over again, Anyone who shouts from the rooftops that the recollection of an 80 year old man about tiny details of a metal tube 50 years ago, deserbes ridicule. Even more so when an adoption of gospel or utter rejection change depending on the latest spin of of his last correspondence. Mr. G is bias, it's his car. I've not ever heard him say that MF's recollection was gospel. After Steve touted MF as the ultimate truth and the light, Mr. G posts a photo of the letter without comment. I think a point was made without words. But of Mr. G, holds MF recollection as gospel and unassailable as Steve did, then he deserves criticism of course. Steve pretends to be unbias and following the evidence, when it's clearly obviously comtinuous spin to prove his conclusion.

 

John,
It's all Steve said this, Steve said that. In fact it's MF that said one thing, changed his mind, and then changed it back again. Relying on the memory of an 80 year old man, over events of more than 50 years ago is not wise.
But now we have photos and information about the actual chassis. As Napolis said - it's all in the metal.
Nathan

 

I did not reject anything Ing. Forghieri said in his letters to Jim. If you read the thread you will see that I asked him for clarification. Your thoroughness is shocking. You underestimate Ing. Forghieri. We are not talking about any 80 year old man here either. He oversaw the design of these cars and it would be clear to any engineer with half a brain that the solution to mount the engine currently in the car does not correspond with engineering sound practices intended to stiffen a chassis up. Pathetic.

Oh, and I've done my own research which I have posted if you cared to look.

 

Steve you spin and pick and chose every bit of evidence you present on this forum including what you now present as the totality of MF's conclusion, which you previously hailed as gospel. I carry a fairly decent rep. for presenting forensic evidence to juries, used metallurgy experts, performed intricate accident reconstructiion, deposed more than 1,000 lay and expert witnesses, and I can say this from that experience:. If you are interested in the truth, Honest Credibility is important in a forensic investigation expert. If your objective is pre-determined, you can selectively chose what to present, how to present it and make nearly anything persuasive with enough work and effort. There are "experts" around the world who lack integrity and get paid to present pre-determined "expert" opinions to an audience. When I am assessing my own risks of loss myself, intellectual honesty and the credibility of my expert is paramount. If all they intend to do is have a pre-determined outcome, it's very easy to be mislead. You've proven that you fall into the category of people that hold themselves out as unbiased experts that mask a hidden agenda and a lack of intellectual honesty or consistency. Once unmasked as such, I've learned from seeing the results of such misleading to not to trust opinions from such people.

There's been a lot of evidence presented that lends support to Jim's claims and a lot of evidence that casts doubt on them. The only consistency in your analysis of all of this evidence is that the evidence casting doubt for you is always definitive and beyond question, and all of evidence for Jim's position is made up and fabricated. If your opinions are presented to the audience with the qualification that you are clearly an advocate, then I've got no criticism. But as long as you present evidence pretending to be some unbiased expert, people should speak up, because it's unlikely that people will read this entire thread to make credibility calls themself.

Im not invested in this, and I'm gong back to life now and don't intend to spend more time of this forum, so don't take my lack of response as any agreement to anything further.

 

Your post describes YOU perfectly in your pre determined biased attack on my credibility. Now, please present some facts that challenge the forensic evidence I have presented.

Ha! Good cop out at the end of your post.

 

John,
very well put.

George

 

It seems like the perceived changes in MF's viewpoint have been more due to variation in the data in front of him, at the time he made each statement, than it is due to any inconsistency in his interpretation of that information. My guess, and it is just a guess, is that he remembers the details very well. If he didn't remember them well, it's likely that he would express some at least some uncertainty in his statements, but that has not been the case at all. Each of his statements seem to be clear and unambiguous, it is only the information he has had to work with that has varied.

 

" I carry a fairly decent rep. "

useless commentating regarding the subject

 

Peter
Good point. Maybe I was a bit hasty in my comments.
Nathan

 

So who implemented that pathetic engine mounting solution, modified the tubes (cut, weld), with new mounting locations? It wasn't JG, it was like that when he bought the car. Do all three Piper replica frames have the same pathetic solution? If not, then the JG car's chassis was different to begin with and the three frames were not identical (and why not?), or Piper came up with the pathetic mounting solution.

Back to Piper with your research, Steve.

 

Nathan,

The incidents at the Targa Florio are shown in photographs all over the web. It's easy to just google 0846 and Targa and they are there in abundance. Someone like John, who has an intimate knowledge of the car and the car sitting right in front of him could easily have looked at the damage photographs, see how the car hit the curbs and see where the chassis would have bent in response to that impact.

While it isn't necessarily rocket science, someone who is skilled and has seen this kind of damage on a race car could readily discern what damage most likely would have resulted in response to the impacts that occurred, and then looked at the chassis in question and see damage that was similar or repairs that likely would have been made in response to that kind of damage. John is a highly skilled fabricator and he has been doing this for a long time, I think that he could easily look at what he saw in terms of damage and repairs to Jim's car and determine if it was consistent with the known incidents that 0846 had.

When John called Jim as he was working on the car he said that there was damage to the car that was consistent with what he would have expected to see had the car he was looking at crashed as 0846 did. He didn't say where or when that could have happened, or who repaired it, all he said was this was consistent with the type and severity of the damage from that kind of incident. He also noted that there were different types of tubing used in some of the repairs and that the welding of the repaired sections were, to his eye, not done by the same welder who originally welded the chassis.

The dilemma here is there has only been one P car that was wrecked in this manner and that was 0846. There are no records that Piper wrecked this car in such a way that it would have damage consistent with the damage that is apparently repaired on 0846. If this was indeed a new chassis built for Piper, how did it get bent up and repaired in this manner??

While this doesn't say this chassis is absolutely 0846, it makes it hard to understand how the repairs got there and who did them if it happened before Piper built the car from a new chassis that he had made to P4 prints as was his story.

 

I'm not convinced. It's still speculation, guess work. Hardly a basis on which to build a whole new identity for 003.
I wish we had photos of these different types of tubing and welding. If it had been my chassis, and such an important find had been made then I would, for sure, have taken photos. Wouldn't you?
Nathan

 

100% true
save every bent and corroded tube.

 

John Hajduk Jr told me he still has the tubes that were braze welded that he removed from DP0003 and then replaced. Perhaps someone can contact him and ask him to post pictures of them.

 

See http://p45c.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/project.pdf

Its all there (I think).
Pete

 

Pete
It's not all there. The John Hajduk piece is on p.20 of the PDF, but there are no photos of the chassis as bought!
If it had been my chassis, and such an important find had been made then I would, for sure, have taken photos. Wouldn't you?
Nathan

 

In all these 415 pages and the pdf am I right in thinking the only direct information that has ever been provided is that of MF after Steve first contacted him?

Everything else is total hearsay? I don't recall seeing one piece of "direct from the source" information within the pdf, it's all Jims interpretation of other peoples words/beliefs?