308 GTB Vetroresina

Carl,

Factory figures are notoriously wrong for at least some years, for instance the case most often discussed here is for the production of the first two-valve injected cars in 1980, where the official numbers given by the factory are incredibly low, and much less than the actual known cars counted on this forum.

On the subject of factory figures for the glass cars, see post #14 & #16 by yours truly in this thread. I wish I knew the true figures...

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?p=139955682

Regards,

 

as you said: "greetings from Vienna" - i have to ask if the car is located in Austria?
what s/n is the car?

 

Michael, Heinz's 308 is 19231.

 

thank you! do you know if the car is located in Austria?

 

Let me try and explain another way!

1. The factory records, or in this case, a claim, is the only thing we have. Just because the factory have given incorrect information about the injection 2V cars doesn't mean that the figures are wrong for the glass cars. Of course it doesn't mean that they are correct either. In the absence of information to the contrary, I would accept the factory figure of a little over 800 units for the glass cars at present. To my knowledge, the factory themselves have never quoted 712 units. It is only third parties that claim this figure.

2. Fact. The figure of 712 units cannot be correct. As I have explained before, the reason is that in this figure of 712, the number of right hand drive glass cars included is given at 154. These are the figures provided by Maranello UK. According to Maranello UK, no Australian delivered glass cars are included in this figure. I have contacted them and confirmed this. The number of Australian delivered glass cars is about 44. If we add the 154 and 44 we get 198. Just one unit away from the factory claim of 197 RHD glass cars in total.

I don't know how I can explain this any other way. Your assumptions are based upon what you think may be the case yet I have seen no reasearch on your part! I don't know the answer to the number of glass cars in total, but I can tell you that through my reasearch presented above over the last 16 years, if you chose to accept 712 as the number, you MUST at at least 44 cars for Australia. As for other markets such as New Zealand and South Africa, must these be added too? The answer is yes, but how many? I don't know.

Regards,

Carl.

 

Carl,

The only thing I was trying to say is that I do not fully trust "factory figures", and that's all. The rest is wide open to interpretation and research.
There are multiple examples of "official figures from the factory" that were time and again proven wrong; another example, just for the sake of it, was the number of 328 GTB produced which, for years, was stated in many more or less offical publications as "1095", until a few years ago everybody decided to quote "1344".
Only the factory could put and end to the question by publishing an offical register, and this is something they will never do, of course. In the meantime, every snippet of information is useful. I would of course be delighted to have information on the markets you mention.

In the meantime, I take due note of your observations; I have knowledge of the two production figures most often mentioned, that is 712 and 808; I still think that the figure 808 includes the full production of all 308 of the second year of the glass car production (it is easy to add the production figures for these years) and that's there were indeed already steel cars also produced that year, so something is probably wrong with that figure.

As for research, the situation is very easy here: you will get no answer whatsoever from the official network other than the production figures quoted. Nothing by market, nothing on the history of one of your cars, nothing. Period. It does not help...furthermore, are we sure that the number of Left Hand Drive cars, European standard, is correct? I agree, there is nothing verified; there may even be more than 808 glass cars...in the meantime, the only solution left is to collect chassis numbers; even if for "20005", you will find more than one car.

Regards,

 

Why is value that important, you have one, enjoy it. Value is only an issue when you want to sell, no other time. Or for insurance, ok.

 

My car is one of the US cars (19425) and does not have the wrapped manifolds.

 

Not of the engine bay, but others on 308 Glass Register.

 

There is a 308GTB registry that of course includes the 'glass cars..

 

Have you tried the factory? Don't know if they are willing to find out but it might be worth a try.

 

http://www.nickcartwright.com/carsales/showroom/view/FERRARI-308-GTB-Fibreglass-78.html

There is another one for sale in the UK