How the saddest Iso Grifo in the world was again made whole

The floor was missing,” RM Sotheby’s car specialist Paul Darvill admits. “For us, that’s quite unusual. All cars we offer normally have a floor.”

In September of 2016, Darvill had commissioned a corroded hunk of parts roughly resembling an Iso Grifo to the RM auction in London with some hope. “There are only about 400 Grifos in the world, so the chances of making a barn find like this are slim,” he recalls. 

The right-hand-drive Iso Grifo, beautifully photographed for the catalog, was a sad sight. For most, even RM’s estimate of £30,000 to £40,000 appeared ambitious. 

Only 4 minutes later, the hammer fell at an incredible £115,000. While the classic car world went wild, it was American car magazine Autoweek that summed it up best: "Someone just spent $171,500 on this Iso Grifo-shaped pile of rust–has the world gone mad?”

Photography courtesy RM Sotheby's

Afterward, everyone wanted to know what had happened and, above all, who had bought such a pile of pieces. So did we. A quick search revealed a German buyer.

Who does such a thing? And why? For the first years, buyer Wolfgang Dippold kept a low profile. He was adamant not to show his car to the media, nor did he make himself known in the relevant forums for this tiny marque that had been dead for some half a century.

Eventually, however, he allowed us to visit him and his car at an inconspicuous warehouse in the Franconian hinterland. Inside, he smiles without a hint of surprise. We can already tell by his other vehicles on display here that the man knows his stuff, so he must have been expecting the question on our minds.

Wolfgang turns around and points to a glass display case with a blue Matchbox Grifo. Collectors call the condition of his toy car “loved.” It is badly battered but still much better than the yellow exotic. 

“Even as a child, I found the Grifo unique,” he recalls. “We often played Top Trumps back then. If you had the Grifo, you outdid all the others.”

[The Iso Grifo: Italian Coachwork, American Muscle]

In the 1950s, the Iso brand became famous for developing the original Isetta, a microcar that only saw real success later as a BMW. With royalties pouring in from Germany, company boss Renzo Rivolta built his first GT in 1962 and, in 1963, added a beautiful two-seater called Grifo to the small lineup. It was designed by a young Giorgetto Giugiaro while at Italian styling house Bertone. 

Wolfgang’s rusty racer is one of the very early cars. “Chassis 064/D was built on July 19, 1966,” he explains, noting that the /D denotes a right-hand-drive car. 

“The car has been in the U.K. all its life until I bought it,” he continues. “The last owner, a Scotsman by the name of Michael Jardine-Paterson, had bought it in 1986 for £6250, when it was still in reasonably good condition.”

Michael handed the car to a workshop that didn’t start work for a considerable length of time and parked the car outside under a tarpaulin for many years. When the body shop eventually gave up and returned the car to Michael, pretty much everything was already lost.

But why take on such a car as a project? “I like challenges,” Wolfgang says with a disarming smile. “In my job, I’m mostly at a desk, dealing with paper and numbers, so I really enjoy getting my hands dirty working on my cars. I do most of the servicing of my cars, and no one is allowed to wash them, either.” 

We realize that there is probably more to it than the aforementioned oil changes when we see Wolfgang move taillights and hood brackets out of the way for our photos. “I still need to install these into a Ferrari. I haven’t got round to it yet.”

But we still haven’t laid eyes on Mellow Yellow. Or have we? Wolfgang walks with us to a drop-dead-gorgeous, light-blue LHD Grifo that looks like it came right off the showroom floor. “That’s it,” the owner says, beaming. “Three years, we literally touched every single element.

“Converted it to left-hand drive, a completely new floor, new sills, new fenders, new front and new tailgate. We were only able to keep parts of the frame, the upper part of the passenger compartment and most of the doors. The original color wasn’t yellow, either, but silver, but I already have quite a number of silver cars, and I thought this color brings out the lines of the car even better.”

Outside and inside, the two-seater appears like new. The panel gaps are fantastic–probably better than from the factory–the chrome shiny like a mirror, the underbody immaculate, with leather more like classic Italian furniture.

“We changed everything to left-hand drive, which wasn’t easy,” he tells us. “In the engine compartment, we had to move the battery, windscreen wiper motor, brake master cylinder and other parts, plus install a different brake booster, convert the clutch from hydraulic to mechanical actuation, rebuild the steering column and pedals and, of course, flip the dashboard. The only thing we kept are the windscreen wipers. Now they wipe the wrong way for a left-hand-drive car, but I like it. It reminds me of the car’s history.”

But why start with such an incredibly bad car? “I didn’t expect it to be that bad,” he admits. “I wasn’t able to be at the auction, so I left a maximum bid. It was only when I saw the car for the first time that I realized how big a job this actually was.” 

Of the 413 Grifos ever built, Wolfgang tells us, many have survived, but very few have remained untouched. “I was looking for one that wasn’t tinkered with. And we wanted to do a complete restoration anyway.” His small Italian collection consists of sports cars from the 1960s, all of which have undergone a total refurbishment.

He likes to be in control. “With this Grifo, I know every nook and cranny. I know exactly what we did and how we did it, and that’s a good thing.” 

Wolfgang had commissioned most of the restoration work to local shop Auto Sauer in Bamberg, which has worked on most other of his vehicles. But what to do about those unobtainable parts? “That was indeed a challenge. Because the company ceased to exist more than 45 years ago, there is no company support and no classic car department.” 

Wolfgang resorted to networking. He got in touch with two dozen Grifo owners all over the world. “From Arizona to northern Italy and all over Germany, I now know people, collectors, restorers, rebuilders, parts hoarders–but above all, Iso owners with a special enthusiasm and willingness to help,” the man behind this restoration laughs.

“A specialist from northern Germany who had just finished work on another Grifo made the boot lid for us from scratch. I got the wings and front section from someone who commissioned two sets in Italy 20 years ago but only needed one.”

Other than the color, how different is the car from factory standards? “We placed extreme value on originality in all details. The exhaust system, for example, was built according to the original plans using the old resorption method. But then, every Grifo is different,” Wolfgang laughs. “My Grifo was originally delivered in Argento Indianapolis and with blue leather inside. Now it is Azzurro Metallizzato, an original, period Iso color, and the leather inside is crema. 

“And it’s fair to say we improved a few things,” he continues. When new, the Grifo could be ordered with either a 300- or 350-horsepower Corvette V8. “We modified my 300-horsepower version to 350 horsepower with a Holley carburetor, modified intake manifold, valves, camshaft, cylinder head and pistons, and higher compression. A Tremec five-speed gearbox replaced the original four-speed, which we had refurbished.”

Who would have a gearbox restored that they no longer need? “I don’t know yet whether I’ll never need it again. It’s the original gearbox, and if I wanted to put it back in, it would have to be in perfect condition.” The owner also treated the car to a hidden air-conditioning system, electric power steering from EZ and a high-quality sound system hidden behind the original 1960s facia.

During our photo shoot, Wolfgang pushes the Italian-American exotic much more than we’d expected, braking at the last moment, pushing the tires to the limit on every turn, running that Corvette engine to redline. This car wasn’t intended to become a museum piece but to serve as a wonderful driver. 

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