Ever since I read an article in Grassroots Motorsports back in 2006 about the Maserati Biturbo, there has been something about it that has called to me. Unlike other cars that I’ve been interested in, though, I cannot really explain what it is about these that draws me in. I don’t particularly care for how they look, I’m not all that interested in Maserati as a manufacturer or Italian cars as a whole, and while the interior is very posh, I don’t really like the Grandma’s-overstuffed-chair look to the seats. They certainly aren’t good cars if reliability is a factor at all in that equation, and by all accounts they aren’t particularly fast or nimble. But like a moth to the flame, I haven’t been able to put it out of my mind.
Over the years, there have been a number of cars at the GRM $2000 Challenge that have been considered white whales. For years, everyone talked about who would be the first person to actually bring a Zamboni. There was the Free Europa. There was the first Corvette. MonZora finally made its appearance. But the Biturbo remained as a car with the mystique of never having appeared at the Challenge with a decent amount of buzz about who would be the first to show up with one. Who could do it?
In 2023, I brought a very stock, very slow 1990 Saab 900 Turbo Convertible to the Challenge. The intent wasn’t to win anything or even impress anyone, all we wanted to do was just be there and what better way to spectate than from the inside? The car was well under the $2,000 budget, so we stuck some GTN$ vinyl on it and headed off. The response that we got there was absolutely unexpected. We didn’t win any awards or anything, but everybody wanted to talk about the Saab and complimented us on the car. That’s when it really sank in to me that it was possible to compete in the party while not being competitive in the event. At that moment, the gears started turning.
My search started off in a pretty wide area. While there were a few running examples out there, the prices were not conducive to a Challenge effort. In Duluth, MN’s craigslist, I found a promising candidate listed for $500, but despite having an amazing story, the title paperwork was likely lost to the sands of time and I really don’t want to be stuck with an albatross. Another was advertised on the Eastern seaboard for about $1,500 but it had been in a fire – surprise of surprises! – so that wasn’t going to work. One popped up in northern Georgia for only $600, but it was gone before I made up my mind to inquire. There was one in Tennessee, however, that was listed for $1,000 as a parts car that was promised to be 99% complete with a pile of spares.
Due to scheduling conflicts, it took a couple weeks before I could make the 4 hour trip to look at it. Early on a July Saturday morning, I picked up my dad, hooked up the trailer, and headed south. The car was pretty much as-advertised. Some rust on the bottoms of the doors and a little bit on the c-pillar, but nothing terminal anywhere. After taking it out of gear, the engine spun freely for a complete rotation and other than the air filter assembly, nothing appeared to be missing from the engine itself. The A/C compressor was long gone and there was another bracket that looked like it could have been for power steering, but I didn’t see any power steering lines hanging loose anywhere. The parts stash wasn’t massive, but there were a decent number of things that looked to be either useful or saleable.
The car belonged to the seller’s son. He had a driver and a second parts car in addition to this one at one time. The other parts car – which was reported to have been absolutely chock-full of even more parts – was stolen out of a side yard. The driver met its end in a conflagration at a gas station. Apparently he was driving the car, pulled over when another motorist pointed out the flames, and the car was fully-involved after that. Since the car was a total loss, he decided he was done with these and the remaining parts car and parts stash were for sale.
After a little bit of a think, I decided that it was worth the gamble, handed over the money, and got started with the winch.
Once the Challenge is over, I have three possible outcomes for the car:
- Sell it as a running car for at least what I have in it
- Keep it for occasional drives and car shows
- Remove the Maserati drivetrain and swap in something else to have a relatively reliable classic to drive around
I fully realize that I am jumping in to this without really looking where I’m going to land. I know that there could be a million different very expensive things wrong with this car. I also know that I could be missing some very vital parts – it was sitting in a field as a parts car, after all. But I’ve decided that this is an adventure that I want to at least make an attempt at. In order to have the most impact, I intend to keep this project as secret as possible so that the first that anyone knows that there will be a Biturbo at the Challenge will be when I roll in to the hotel parking lot on Thursday afternoon with the car on the trailer. The build thread is going to be created in an off-line fashion, as will the video series, with everything uploaded and set to go live on the weekend of the Challenge. So in a way, this is a message from the past, a message in a bottle – probably an olive oil bottle.