And you thought aircraft ownership was bad...

That does read remarkably like an airplane purchase adventure. I also had no idea about some of the weak points of the 355. I remember when the 360s were new, the Ferrari dealer in Greenwich, CT told me that the 355s had good resale value because of the waiting time on a new 360.

Very well-written. Although as someone who's owned many Jaguar XJ-S V12s, I found them all to be quite reliable. Or at least a reliable source of income - we had some customers at the shop who had two XJ-S V12s. One lived at the shop and the other got driven.
 
I do think he's seriously understating the cost of a Ferrari engine rebuild, though.
 
Thanks for sharing, that was one of the most hilarious bits of writing I've enjoyed.

'Gimp
 
I got my Ferrari from a guy who owed me a bunch of money, but had nothing in the bank. When we got up to the judge for financial examination, he didn't admit to having it, but I'd seen it and found it registered. I told the judge - he got mad, and asked if I would take it in lieu of cash. I said yes, although it was a bit short of his judgment amount.

Been a fun car, but not something I recommend for anyone but a wealthy collector or a good DIY guy. I'm the latter.
 
What kind of Ferrari did you end up with?

A friend of mine was trying to sell me his 328 a few years back. I considered it, but the car had several issues and I drive my cars. Besides, my Japanese wondercar is way faster for way less money.
 
I have a Mondial cab. It's old, it's easy to work on and relatively nice to drive.
 
I owned a 348 spider for a few years. It was a whole lot of fun. It rode like a souped up go kart with absolutely no body roll no matter how hard you corner. When it lost traction under hard cornering it would skip sideways like a flat rock over water.
Mine did not require too much upkeep and was reliable. I did sell it though before having to go through a major service.
 
Lol, amateur hour stuff, look at buying a yacht, your "Pre-purchase inspection" costs start around $5000 for 100' boat.
 
docmirror said:
F-355 ~$70k.

100' yacht ~$1mil?
Click to expand...

If you're paying $1MM for a 100' yacht, you better spend some more money inspecting and figure on a $1.5MM refit on purchase or a 20% ($200,000) annual operation cost to account for the extra repairs.
 
pfft. that's why there was a "?" in there. My bote is 28' and rides on a tandem trailer.
 
FormerHangie said:
I always thought of the 308 as being the Morgan Fairchild of the motoring world: very pretty, but not much of a performer.
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It was blindingly fast compared to the 54 hp Datsun 210 wagon I was driving in 1980. ;-)
 
308s/Mondial are +30 years old. They were the poor step child of the Ferrari line up even back then. The 16 valve 80/81 V8s with the early CIS FI are downright slow.

The quad cam, 32V engine was a massive improvement. The 3.4L engine was even better. After that, the later V8 engines have good output, but are a real mess to work on and costly as heck.

Best of the older beast is the Fiberglass 308 with Weber carbs. Pretty good performance except in a straight line, and the sound is most excellent.

<edited; to correct valve arrangement>
 
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steingar said:
Sorry, all these things are slow compared to bikes I was riding around in the eighties.
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They're also slow compared to the plane I fly, which was flying in the 60s. What's your point?
 
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