is mike sheehan on here with us?

he will respond to this in good time.

 

I drew the same conclusions from reading his posts. I interpret his slant as a realistic assumption that the vast majority of Ferrari owners are not shade-tree mechanics but people in demanding industry to pay others to service their cars. With that in mind, people who want to 'get into' Ferraris, especially vintage ones, absolutely require an serious, no B.S. education of the financial commitment involved in that part of the hobby. People with this education, and the necessary finances to guarantee some level of 'success' with Ferraris, enjoy the Marque and the cars and have a great experience. People who do not possess this education (and MANY do not, if you read the posts in several sub-forums) OR the real finances involved, have a much-less positive experience and leave Ferraris with a very sour taste in their mouth that they share with others who express an interest in the Marque. In that vein, Mr. Sheehan does the community a favor by 'firing one over the bow' to people who are contemplating entering this hobby.

 

Mike and I correspond from time to time.

I think his email address is on his website, he's very personable.

Drop him a note and ask him about his opinions, he'll keep you busy with emails to read for a while.

Dave M

 

Interesting thoughts. On one level I do think that many have no idea what it can cost to fix a 456's Auto gearbox but I do agree that month in and month out it's become a bit boring and I'd rather see SCM have a wider spectrum of articles instead of re-plowing the same ground over and over.

 

I'm investing in a 348, well not investing, I'm buying it to drive the heck out of it. I'm a Porsche owner and have worked on several Porsches. If I can tear down and rebuild an air cooled Porsche engine, I'm ready for whatever the Ferrari throws at me,....I hope. But the cost of maintaining a Ferrari can be way out of whack when comparing it to like priced Porsches. Also a 60,000mile Porsche is a low mileage car, a 60,000 mile Ferrari is a high mileage car. Is the Ferrari more fragile? Another comparison, my BMW 635Csi was a very reliable bullet proof car, but the maintenance almost put me in the poor house. I guess Sheehan's role it to warn everyone of the possibilty of extremely high expenses if something, anything is not perfect. I'm ok with that.
Bee Jay
Old joke: When moving to Cali, you need to find two things immediately, 1) a good agent, and 2) a good Porsche mechanic. A place to stay and good restaurants can wait.

 

Yea, he posts here.....not often, and usually has little patience for the abuse he gets from the Peanut Gallery.

 

Ferraris break from lack of use......a hard driven one, IMO will break LESS often than the Pcar....

 

+1 my experience is that gremlins actually go away when you use your F car regularly.

 

While I agree driving a Ferrari helps prevent problems to some extent, I do not think a Ferrari is ever likely to be more reliable than a Porsche...and certainly not less expensive to maintain or repair...

 

Where is "reliability" on the list of things to design to for the engineers? I don't think it takes top billing. I don't think the customer places "reliability" tops on his list either when purchasing an F-car.
If the customer stopped buying F-cars because of reliability issues, I think the engineers would spend more time and money to address the problem. Right now, the customer seems to be buying the cars so Ferrari must be designing them apropriately.

 

In the past you are correct. However, with more and more cars matching or exceeding Ferrari performance levels yet with high reliability and less maintenance, Ferrari will need to step up to the plate and improve those issues IMHO....For example, the new Corvette Z06 is faster and has better handling characteristics(skid pad numbers) than any Ferrari road car currently on the market and still gets almost 30mpg on the highway and can be driven for 100,000 miles with virtually no maintenance other than fluid changes, tires, brakes, ect...all for $75,000...so, even if it depreciates by 50% in five years, you still come out ahead from a financial point of view...

 

I see him around town every so often, his daily driver has Sheehan-Ferrari information all over it.

 

I think they are designed to be reliable for 24 hours in France at full throttle...

With a gaggle of Pcars chasing them! LOL!

 

At least they were until 1965...until the Pcars got 12 cylinders & started running away from them.

Maybe they should make a bio-diesel.

 

Ferrari needs to be innovative and come out with the first diesel-hybrid sports car that gets 50mpg and puts out about 750 lb ft of torque...

 

and a redline of 2500rpm

 

And, we could just keep them running in the parking lot at the F1 watch parties - to keep the climate control on, and also to impress one another with the deep rumbling clatter and sooty smoke.