"Low Grip"

Welcome to the 612 world! It's a great car and I'm sure you'll enjoy it immensely.

One of the fun facts of owning a Ferrari is that the owner's manual seldom fully reflects the state of the car with which that manual is shipped. The printing department and the manufacturing departments at Ferrari are often out of synch with each other. In your case, you have a manual that shows information for early 612s that had the Ice Mode feature, which started the car off in 2nd gear and limited revs to under 3,000 RPM. It worked fine the few times I tried it in our 05 612, but apparently Ferrari decided to discontinue this feature, and apparently based on your description of your car, in 06.

The F1-S button activates programming in the transmission that reduces the time of shifts in the transmission. Below is a snapshot of that page of my manual that also describes the "Sport" mode and the interplay of Sport mode and F1-S. And of course, is not an accurate reflection of how my car works as it says nothing of the Manetino in my car.
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Eric, does the F1A transmission do anything special in sub-freezing or low-grip conditions, or did they just eliminate the low-grip mode entirely?

And as the only guy I know who drives his 612 in snow, did it make a difference?

 

Denver- The early owner's manuals published in 2003 (yes, 2003) did show a low grip mode, similar to that on the 575s. This was eliminated in later versions of the owner's manual published in 2006, and the low grip pushbutton was replaced by the F1-S button, which selects sport mode and is not recommended for low traction conditions.

No great loss, since the low traction mode was rough on clutches.

Incidentally, when you shift from reverse to 1st gear, I would recommend using the paddles. Using the F1 selector switch has caused some problems and that panel is $4K or so.

Go to this site and you can download the 2006 owner's manual. Sounds like some cars were delivered with the 2003 published edition.

Not sure if any of the 612s had a low traction mode. Anybody with a 2005 care to comment?

Taz
Terry Phillips

http://www.ferraridatabase.com/The_Downloads/Downloads.htm

 

Our early 05 612 had the low grip button. That car was a very early model.

The few times I used it, it worked well. Was mostly unsettling in that it shifted so soon and so slowly, seemingly slipping the clutch more than in normal mode so as to reduce the possibility of breaking traction. Attempts to shift manually when the computer felt that was inappropriate were ignored. It had a mind of its own and did what it felt best. Definitely not great on the clutch, but then again, it did manage to control the car well in the rare times we needed/used it, and better to beat up the clutch a bit than sliding off the road.

As an aside: when we sold the car at close to 50K miles the clutch still had well over 75% wear left.

One time on our way to work on I-405 near Kirkland we hit a large stretch of ice on the freeway, so I switched to low grip mode and it seemed to be working. So after a bit I tried switching it out of low grip mode while on the ice and could definitely feel a difference in control. I went right back to low grip mode and had enough control to get the car up and down mild hills on the ice and to work. Between the ABS brakes and CST I could get where I was going. When we got to a large empty parking lot at work where I could safely play around with it I found that I almost couldn't drive the car in normal mode, but in low grip mode was able to do a lot more than I would have thought possible. Not the same as having snow tires for sure, but it was impressive how well it handled really bad conditions.

In the new car, when we've been in ice or snow I just switch it to 'comfort' mode on the manetino, and with a light touch on the throttle it gets close to the same behavior as in the low grip mode in our 05. Not as smooth in the shifts as the low grip mode was, nor as adamant at controlling things as the low grip mode was. Overall, the 05 was probably a better snow and ice car.

 

Eric- Good stuff. Kept me from having to look at a bunch of E-Bay photos to find out, since I was curious. The early 612 shared the F1 control panel with the 575 Superamerica. They were on the production line at the same time, so that makes sense. 612s selected Sport with buttons on the steering wheel and the SA used a toggle switch above the center console. Thanks.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

OK Terry: now, at what S/N did they change?

 

Eric- Unfortunately neither the parts catalog, technical bulletins, nor workshop manual I have are late enough to show the change, so I have no idea. Would have been by Assembly Number and not serial number, most likely. Cars were equipped by the Assembly Number assigned when they reached the assembly line. You frequently have cars with higer serial numbers and lower Assembly Numbers because they reached the assembly line before other cars with lower serial numbers. Serial numbers (VINs, really) are a part of the ordering process and cars can be delayed for parts, paint or leather well past their sequential VIN neighbors.

Taz
Terry Phillips

 

So where do you turn on or off traction control? not that I want it off, but would be nice to be able to get a little more aggressive with the throttle if I wanted...

 

612s have stability control, which is more sophisticated than traction control and operates on more than just the rear wheels and throttle. To turn it off, press the CST button on the steering wheel. For the least invasive throttle incursions, press both the Sport button and the F1-S button, which still gives you the stability control safety feature at a lower level of interference providing the CST is on. With CST off, no safety nannies.