Miguel Sánchez
PHOTOS MASERATI 3500 GT TOURING EX FANGIO: FINARTE
From a few years to this part the rust followers are gaining positions. There are more and more restorations that leave the patina of time intact, respecting some bodies that others would pass at the moment for a good painter. However, this occurs more in the sphere of the classics "PopularThan in the high-end ones.
That is why, although the oxidation of this Maserati 3500 GT Touring conquers more than one look, it will surely look different in a few months. And it is that, after all, not only it is a fundamental model in the history of the trident brand, but also a unit with a very special driver. Neither more nor less than the five times champion F1 World Championship Juan Manuel "Crooked”Fangio.
With such credentials, the surprising thing is that this Maserati is in the state we are seeing. Full of cobwebs after being abandoned in an Italian garage for over 30 years. An oblivion that will surely end this October 25 thanks to the auction that Finarte will hold within the framework of the Padua Fair. Anyway, the best thing is to tell the story from the beginning.
MASERATI 3500 GT. THE LEAP TO INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION
In the mid-50s, no one doubted the enormous prestige of Maserati as a racing manufacturer. However, and unlike other brands such as Ferrari, the trident were unable to turn their technological potential to series production. The result was that brand accounts were meager in profits. Thus, Giulio Alfieri began in 1956 to work on a 6-cylinder engine derived from the one that equipped the legendary 350S.
However, this time the objective would not be the circuits but the dealerships, since around this new engine it was planned to launch a gran turismo model capable of placing the brand within industrial parameters. And what if they succeeded! Because thanks to the 3500 GT Maserati went from manufacturing a maximum of 3 cars a month to assembling two a day.
Thanks to the 2226 units produced between 1957 and 1964 3500 GT defined the formula for success for Maserati: an intense sportiness -but tamed for the enjoyment of any driver- wrapped in luxury finishes. A hybrid of characters powered by a 3-liter engine capable of producing 5CV at 220 rpm in its first evolutions. All this wrapped in a bodywork designed by Touring with its Superleggera system, which leaves the whole in a measured 5500 kilos.
BETWEEN TESTING AND PERSONAL USE: THE MASERATI 3500 GT BY FANGIO
Although Fangio retired in 1958 (just the year of his bizarre kidnapping in Havana) it continued with an important agenda within the automotive industry. An agenda that frequently took him to Italy, the place where he used this 3500 GT Touring for his personal trips. Now, was it wholly his own? Not really, this is the point where the most interesting information arrives.
Marketed to industrialists close to Fangio in 1960, this 3500 GT was loaned to the pilot in exchange for passing test reports to Maserati. Something that, as shown by the preserved documentation, Fangio fulfilled by drawing conclusions that would later be used when developing the successive evolutions of the model. After all this, the car was left at the Maserati facilities in 1966, remaining in custody until in 1981 it was handed over to two of Fangio's friends.
One of them was the historic test pilot of the brand Guerino Bertocchi, who died that same year. At that time, Fangio's 3500 GT remains in the hands of the remaining friend, who shares ownership of the car with the Argentine himself. And well, that's when everything starts to get mixed up until it ends with the Maserati stored in a garage for 38 years.
Time in which the oxide was present, being necessary a deep restoration that will have to be added to the figure with which the deck is lowered in the auction on October 25.
