New Member Introduction

I'm a Ferrari newbie; kind of a wanna be. My cousin headed me in this direction with his 2001 Enzo-designed Mm 12 in shotgun smoke color. He's helping to put on a big event in Palm Springs in August for the FCA. Strangely, I'm in the PCA as prior sports car experience was limited to a 914 (see Classic Porsche issue #4) in the early 70's. So I thought that there were just 208's, 308's, 328's and like that. Only as I started to investigate did I realize there was a lot more variation that just coupes and Targas and colors. By the way, I like that part about welcoming them in and welcoming them out and some of the various other humors that must be in to only certain of the veteran F-chat guys (and girls?) (say, that reminds me, what's the scoop on generic male terms for both men and women?) such as my Dad once had...but alas I think the only exotic my father had was a Renault Dauphine just after the war when he was a kind of car-newbie and bought it from another WW II veteran who was letting it go because it wasn't all that reliable. Which brings me to passion. I see a lot of passion in the 308 community (whatever a "community" is), perhaps as much or more than for the rest of most of all of the other communities combined. So what I really was looking at was a 208 to be different but found that smog was a first hurdle and immediately wimped out on that and went to 308 interest. Then a known L. A. area mechanic advised that if I wanted my air to blow cold I ought to consider a 328 as well. Gave me a few other clues and that caused me to start to look at them, which led to me actually having given a preliminary down payment on a gold clear metallic 328 GTS. During my lone test drive, I started to almost immediately have way too much fun, so I decided that I was entitled to have a Ferrari and not just want one, first time behind the wheel but second time shifting a dog-leg transmission (remember the 1972 914?), Hmmm. But to tie in a first newbie point, I discovered that 308 have 2 and 4 valve versions and 328's, among other differences have pre and post-ABS brake versions along with every-other and sequential numbering differences. So where I'm at is trying to get this gold 328 to idle properly (this is all over the chat and everywhere else, I've discovered) and to get edge-rash off of the original star wheels, so that I can have it trucked to the auto gallery for a PPI; that wheel thing is the last cosmetic fix before the car is taken to Eric for a look-see. I'm an after-retirement guy so hopefully this 87 GTS passes its PPI and I can find out just how much maintenance really costs out of my own wallet and try to see how much I can do myself and ask the newbie question: what kind and weight of oil should I use? - Alex Ford

 

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