308 GTB Vetroresina

First delivery of our 308 GTB was Belgium - not a US-Version. Car has the old bumper with reverse lights integrated in the bumper, like all Vetro should have. Orange indicator lights without reverse light are still available in England.

 

I think your driver side wiper is wrong. To me it looks like your car has "two passenger side" wiper placed to close together.
Have a look at the picture.
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

I know our car isn't original, has 16' wheels, large spoiler, painted mirrors ...

 

Well, yes, but not comparable to a street car, this is a Michelotto 308 GTB #10, chassis number 19051.

 

If we are being fussy, your car should have a single pipe exhaust. I don't wish to be picky about your car, which is very pretty, I am just interested in what appear to be differences from what should be an Italian specification car. Thank you for the clarification about the seats. That is very nice to have the letter from the factory. May I ask the chassis number please?

 

Thanks Heinz, your car is quite early. Mine is #19329, Australian specification, RHD. Build #26. Completed 4/6/1976.

 

This is my UK car, original as they come. number 30 chassis 19333.
I always thought reverse lamps where in the bumper, but who knows.
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

I would like to know the answer too
Problem starts with correct production number ... I know 3 cars, that don't exist any longer, but don't know any chassis number.

 

712 is the total most often quoted, of which I believe 152 VGD (Vetture Guida Destra, Right Hand drive).
That leaves 560 VGS (Vetture Guida Sinistra), of which 100 were for the American market, i.e are Wet Sump cars.
Which leaves 460 Dry Sump with Left Hand Drive.

 

I don't know about the first part of the question! But the second:

Total number of 308 GTB's (Production 1975 to 1980): 2,897 of which 808 are glass and of all glass cars, 197 are RHD

 

The 808 figure comes from Ferrari SPA. The 712 comes from Maranello Concessionaires UK. Here is the breakdown according to Maranello UK:

308 GTB Glass LHD. Euro
458

308 GTB Glass RHD. UK
154

308 GTB Glass LHD. USA
100

Total 712.

But they haven't added a few markets. Australia, South Africa and Japan. Maybe some others as well but I'm not sure. Certainly Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia fall under the UK figures. Not sure about New Zealand.

Now there are supposed to be 197 RHD cars. If we add the Australian cars that I know of to the UK figures.........so 154 from the UK to 48 in Australia we get 202. Close, so I reckon some of the ones I have are UK or tourist delivery cars which would account for the extra.

So that leaves another 48 cars away from the factory claim of 808 in total, I wonder which other markets have not been accounted for if the factory figure is to be believed?

Updates and corections most welcome.


Regards,

Carl.

 

Erratum to the above post re: RHD cars. (Which is a copy and paste of a post from 2007) I have since revised my number of 48 Australian glass cars to 44. The 4 less is because I found 4 cars that were originally delivered to the UK in my database, meaning their figures were already incorporated in the 154 from the UK. So that makes 198 cars, the official figure being 197 RHD glass cars. Close!

 

Heinz, the Australian 308 GTB glass cars were an odd mixture. The bodywork was European however the rear section above the exhaust contained additional insulation like the American version.

The engine was a wet sump unit, effectively a USA specification engine but with a single air pump and R1/R2 points. No afterburners or catalytic converters. Australia at the time had very strict idle emission regulations, but once on the move, the engine could really be as dirty as you liked.

Exhaust was a 4 pipe unit and manifolds were wrapped in insulation as per the USA cars.

Like the USA cars, the transmission received the 308 GT/4 gearing (Shorter 1st and 5th gear)

Glass was not tinted and the sun visors carried additional padding. A full sized spare tyre was supplied. No mirror was supplied ex factory, this was a dealer fitted accessory. Air conditioning was standard.

Nice other cars BTW!

Regards,

Carl.

 

Carl,

Just for the sake of discussion, not that I have a claim to have the truth...which, we all know, is something to be taken with a large pinch of salt for Ferraris of that era...

The 808 number has always seemed to me a bit less trustful that 712, because it seems that 808 is in fact 712 plus the number of the first steel cars produced in 1977.
There is a break down by production year in Dirk Michael's Konradt book which seems to suggest that it is indeed the explanation. Happy to discuss further...

Regards

 

I don't agree because the 712 figure according to Maranello UK includes 154 RHD cars delivered through them. But there are an extra 44 Australian cars that are not part of Maranello's data. Perhaps the correct figure is 756!

 

...and besides, I remind everyone interested in production numbers for the glass cars of the "Okay...get out the calculators..." thread that began on 06-30-2012: six pages of discussions about the cars (yes, plural: carS) numered 20005, and we were not able at the end of the thread to know exactly which one of the three, then narrowed down to two, was the Real 20005...

Funny, isn't it?

 

It's always difficult to ascertain (perhaps someone at the factory is laughing at us right at this minute, because he is holding the exact figures in hand? Not that there must be many guys laughing at the factory today, they must feel pretty depressed after the brazilian Grand Prix).
I wonder if the 44 for Australia could come out of the 154 RHD? Because 154 for the U.K only, out of a production run of about 750 (let's say) cars would be 20% of production, and there was no single country that reiceved such a big slice of Ferrari's production of a model at the time.
Ferrari said that in the seventies and eighties Germany and the U.K received "about 8 to 10%", France about "7-8%"...
Ah, mysteries...

Regards

 

But doesn't the 808 figure come from the factory? In any case, the Australian delivered cars do not appear in the Maranello UK figures. So I know that the 154 does not include Australian cars.