Series 2 400i Vitaloni Mirrors

I knew I wanted to buy the two I saw on ebay for $78 the pair.

Oh, they were series one though.

Do you think they are that much less desireable? I like them more.

 

Or you could just buy it here for $200

http://www.eurospares.co.uk/searchResult_one.asp?S=257-44-361-00&TM=1&TMo=491&TA=2&TB=27863

 

You can't see a dam thing out of the series 2 mirrors. The series 1 mirrors are much better.

 

Fortunately it doesn't matter much because the visibility out of the 400 series is excellent in all directions.

 

Embarrasingly overpriced by Rutlands. I had to buy one a few years ago took about 8 months searching paid around £200.

Found out along this journey that there had been a fire at the Vitaloni warehouse destroying their stocks of them.

They are alo same mirrors as lambo Countach and one of the Ducatti bikes.

Reason they are so pricey also is the quality of the mirror is near optical and well made.

 

What's the difference in appearance between the series one and series two variant of this mirror ?

I've seen cars of the same year as mine (1978) and later cars with larger, squarer mirrors which look far less appealing and also later cars with this style of mirror - did F just fit whatever was available at the time OR was the style fitted regional OR would these have been replaced on the early cars I saw with larger mirrors ?

Another of life's many mysteries !!

 

Series 1 cars had the square mirrors with series 2 cars having the smaller mirrors

 

Well you learn something every day !

That means my 1978 (which has small mirrors) has the wrong ones fitted.

I much prefer them to the square mirrors but like things to be original.

I wonder who changed them, when and why ??

 

Hmm,all this talk of mirrors led to look back over all the photo thread pic's,none of the cars have the type that mine has.
I have aerodynamicaly designed('cos they fold in at 100MPH)dainty,rectangular,metal one's(pair)in black.
There is a pic,of sorts,in the garage thread,showing how small they are compared to everybody else's,excluding the chrome one's.

My mechanic should be posting some photo's when he pick's it up from the paint shop soon.

 

I understand that the change to the smaller, more aerodynamic mirrors was made because extensive testing in the wind tunnel showed that the smaller mirrors would increase the top speed from 149.9 mph to 150.0 mph and increase the gas mileage from 9.95 miles per gallon to 10.00 miles per gallon.

These two thresholds were extremely important to Ferrari at the time!

I checked Snopes and it doesn't refute this!



PS: Somewhere in the archives not too long ago I posted pictures of the mirrors on the 400, series 1 400i and series 2 400i.

 

BAWAHAHAHAHA

...for the win!

 

So that explains why a previous owner went to the trouble and expense of changing the mirrors on my series 1 car - it's probably WAY more economical than it would have been with the larger mirrors !

Hopefully he didn't buy them from Rutlands or it would take 300 years to recoup the outlay !

 

My mirror's may now be perused in the photo's posted today of the car out of the paint shop.