575 F1 to manual conversion parts lists.....

Options:
1. Corvette transaxle and some engineering ... done
2. If they really are manual gearboxes with the gears just changed by hydraulics, could you not engineer a linkage system to replace the hydraulics?
Pete

 

I think rifle driver made a few posts on this topic...

 

Henry- Not that hard to do on a 360 with three pedal donor cars available. The 360 conversion documented in the 360/430 forum cost $5600 in used and new parts, plus the owner did all the work. For a 575M, likely no donor car would be available, but some used 550 parts are identical. Many are not. You would need two new Motronic DMEs, too, since the manual and F1 versions are different. Read the 360 thread first. Since you cannot do the work yourself, labor would be pretty high.

 

"Since you cannot do the work yourself, labor would be pretty high"

Sorry a neebie question. Why cannot the work be done by yourself?

 

All real issues. The thread referred to was 6 years ago. Quite a few of the parts have gone up considerably. Since at this point in time it is unlikely you will find a 6 speed owner who wants to convert to F1 the option of any kind of trade is out. Since F1 parts do have a real value in the used parts market making a deal with one of the few involved in that business seems like a real possibility. The good news is almost all the mechanical parts needed fit 550's and many fit 456's. The best plan would be to buy a totaled 550, strip what you need and sell it back along with the F1 parts as some prearranged package deal. Parts cost wise it would save a lot of money. The Motronic boxes are now somewhere near $7000 for a pair. That would be a big expense. Labor would be the other. If it was a home project it just would not be that hard but to pay someone $125-150 per hour It would cost close to $15,000 in the current market if you could do a straight across deal with a junk yard. The junk yard deal could turn out as a slight profit because they would be getting some very valuable parts that there is a market for in exchange for parts for which there is no real demand.

 

With 550/575 they seem to be at the bottom of their deprecation cycle. Such a conversion either way would be costly and difficult to ever recover your money out of. Instead of swapping 3 pedal to F1 or vice versa it would be so much more fun to own both a 3 pedal 550 and F1 575 and pick your poison for the day's drive. Then when you tire of your Maranellos you could sell them and recover most if not make a profit in the next 10 years.

 

Probably easier to put a 575 engine in a 550...but is it worth it??

 

That would be a pain, too, because of the differences in Motronics (7.1.1 vs 5.2) and architecture (throttle, instrument panel, wiring harness, accelerometers, ABS/ASR, etc, etc.)

Henry- You can figure out which parts are required by going through the parts catalog page by page. Lots of work, but I did it for my updates document and so can you.

Like Brian said, probably unaffordable unless you are a pro or really good amateur doing your own work.

 

People spend more for less so it depends on perspective. Personally if a 6 speed is desired I'd just get a 550.

As for the parts list I think the easiest way for just conceptualizing the scope of the job would be to read up about a 360 where it has been done. That will give you a very close idea. As far as actually performing the job, really no better or cheaper way than to buy a donor car. No way are you coming up with an every nut and bolt list until the job is actually done. There will almost certainly be some items, probably minor that will not get considered until faced with making it all work.

 

I would put that effort in making a totaled 550 into a "Aperta" - the performance difference is marginally at best, "air in the hair" is far more rewarding as a driving experience, especially with these V12.

 

For the money you are talking about in the current market you could get a great 550 and do a lot to it.

 

My understanding of henryr's original post was he was thinking of money making idea by converting some currently cheap F1 575's into more sellable cars ...

Pete

 

That may be true. If so I totally missed it.

Easier way to make money would be design a beautiful web site and contract out to China to build low cost custom parts like carbon fiber crap and ugly wheels that weigh 75 lbs each and claim all this "Tuner" crap will make the car faster.


Works for everyone else and takes far less work.

 

This appears to be about right from a conversation with a recent shopper for a 575 manual. He opined that in his shopping conversations the bid-ask spread was 125-150 for a nice car. Hgtc more. Now, it's a thinly traded market so....

I think we are seeing a desire for three pedal cars. I'm guessing this is why my dealer is telling me 550s are starting to move up in price. More accessible and easily observed.

To Henry's original question, I can't imagine doing the conversion unless someone produced a F1 to MT kit and with only a $30k spread feels like this won't happen any time soon.

Philip

 

^^^ I find this interesting.

We know that the factory, in its wisdom, offered HGTC kits and I spoke to a dealer in Switzerland claimed to have upgraded more than half a dozen cars. The retail price of these kits would have been eye watering (certainly expensive when compared to the cost of adding the kit as an option on a new 575M) and one might assume that there would have been very few takers but of course dealers had the possibility to pay the wholesale price and use their own workshop technicians to fit them with the result that they could turn out some highly desirable converted cars with a view to turning a profit. Everyone's a winner etc.

Now then, the factory could have offered Manual>F1 conversion kits on the 575M but didn't.

I guess that a factory F1>Manual conversion kit would never have been sanctioned as it would have sent out the 'wrong message'. e.g. Customers paid for F1 but 'disliked' it so much that they can be sold an 'upgrade' to junk it!

 

Never stop posting.

 

Well I actually had this conversation twice over converting CS's and when it came time to write checks suddenly they had a flight to catch. Present company excepted talkers out number check writers by such a huge margin you get really tired of having the conversation.

The smallest jobs I do are the most profitable so I really don't look for big projects. I turn down work on a lot of big time cars because at the end of the day it's a business that needs to make money and big high profile jobs that get attention sound good and impress people but it doesn't pay the bills.