I Bought a Cheap $19,000 Ferrari Bargain or TOTAL Nightmare !!

I did it for 6 years (308 GTS and 87 Z51 Corvette on different tours) and it is not too bad. Of course, that was in Suffolk and north Cambridgeshire, so may differ in heavy traffic locations. We, too, had RHD and LHD cars at the same time.

 

I'm in Kent, but I often drive up through Suffolk and Norfolk. My dear old mum lives in Dereham, you probably flew over it many times over the years.

 

Alan- Affirmative, in those days we could fly just about anywhere in the UK, so we did fly over Dereham. We had two ranges on The Wash (beached ships) that we used all the time.

 

Thanks again for your videos, Scott.
Sooo... All you need is a spare F355 and a spare battery to help with suspension system diagnosis ?

For those without a spare F355....

The actuator goes through a test cycle every time the ignition goes on. You really only need a helper to turn the ignition on while you observe the operation of the (unseated) actuator.

I found an obviously failed actuator on my car, so bit the bullet and bought a new one. The bad one I sent off to CaptainZ CNC so I would have a permanent spare for faultfinding. A few years later I needed it. If you're into long term ownership, I recommend having a spare actuator (cheaper than a spare Ferrari). In 4~5 years, I've had problems with 3 of my actuators.

Note that the suspension fault light resets automatically when you fit a new actuator. However, I haven't been able to confirm if all component replacements automatically reset the fault light, so you may be taking a risk swapping certain bad components to a good car (e.g. acceleration sensors). If the fault light does latch, then you will have to get the car to a Ferrari technician with an SD tool to reset it. The SD tool can also reset the fault memory (which doesn't erase automatically when you replace a component). If you have lots of faults in memory, it may make diagnosis more difficult when you have a suspension fault you can't fix yourself and have to take it to a technician. Scott, next time you do need to take the car to a specialist Ferrari technician for any reason, I recommend that you ask him to erase the Suspension ECU fault memory. You'll probably find that your F355 now has a record of a bad rear right actuator in memory.

For suspension switch faultfinding, if the wire harnesses permit it, you can disconnect the plug on the switch and transfer it over to the window heat or one of the other two position switches on the switch panel (not to a spring-loaded momentary type switch like the door lock/unlock switches).

It's also a good idea to record engine faults before you erase them. If you have an intermittent fault and end up having to take the car to a professional, at least he will know where to start looking.

Cheers.

 

Hi,

I have had mine now for almost five years and I love it. The stereo and all is doable. On mine the radio unit / front amp was repaired as the main (rear) amp and the CD changer was replaced with another compatible Sony nit. At the same time I added two heat controlled fans (that trunk gets hot if you drive fast) and an USB. charger and aux miniplug (with a Sony XA-300) to replace the rear seat cigarette lighter.

I used a normal electronics repair shop that is focused on vintage stereos and they found also a matching replace ment for one of the slightöy broken buttons. It sits just a tad high (the volume + button) but works perfectly. Of course also the speakers under the rear seat needed refurbishing but are also available for little money as original parts,

IMO the hardest part was to take out the complete interior to get the cable form the control unit to the radio / main unit in the trunk. The wiring is unique to the models Sony produced for Ferrari so the service needed all components. It cost me less than €200,- which was fine for me.

And I needed to take the complete interior out for two reasons any way:

1. to replace the worn / torn door seal.

2. to treat ALL leather with hide food (after a good cleaning with Connolly products) and to re-glue some parts of the rear window shelf

And also to fix the A/C evaporator unit, at least in my case, required the removal of the dash. but now it all works well, although I did disable the recirculation function from the A/C unit. IMO it is useless and it self destructs the ABS rods and flaps when the foam pads are dead and time and heat have done their part on the plastic.

I will watch that VLOG once I have more time.

 

Nice work Scott. Having the 355 as a test vehicle certainly helps test compatible components.

 

The recirculate function on the AC is equivalent to the Max AC setting on most climate control systems, except it does not max out fan speed. Likely not necessary in Finland, at any rate.

 

Would you know which vintage unit they borrowed the buttons from?

 

Hi,

Yes, the recirculate function in my car can be restored by just plugging in the wires I deliberately cut (the two servos) and fit connectors to.

The reason is that everytime the A/C unit is powered up, those two servos "make sure" the two flaps are closed. The rods that the gears operate are black ABS plastic. In time, when the foam sealing the flaps has turned into dust the rods can find excessive movement and in the end they will free themselves, leaving you with two nasty side effects:

1. the servos will keep on rotating and making that noise always when the A/C unit has power.

2. The flaps will never again seal tightly, until you remove the whole dash to see what's going on under there,

You're right I will not need it, last week it was almost +30°C in Frankfurt, Germany and we did not need it, just setting the A/C to 20°C or lower was enough to cool the interior to comfortable levels pretty quickly. In Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland we did not need it either.

 

Hi,

Sorry, no. But I have seen very similar looking Sony car stereos from the 1990's, usually normal units and not just control panels like the one they used for Ferraris.
But they are not that complicated mechanically, the sad part always seems to be with plastic, that once it breaks, it is pretty much unusable, no glue seems to fix them so they would hold together longer than a few days.

 

I was going to edit, but it did not work.

Here's the thread where I had the stereo repairs and modifications.

https://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/threads/1992-1998-ferrari-456gt-and-456gta-stereo-guide-ipod-and-more.222934/page-3#post-145794296

 

Scott, Technistrada now offer half price (and half size) aftermarket thermocouple ECUs.

https://technistrada.com/

A diode and a resistor can be used in place of a battery for faultfinding

https://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/threads/simple-2-7-slow-down-ecu-replacement-only-for-no-cats.538719/


Thanks for the tip on thermocouple ECU location on 456's!

 

I enjoyed the video as well. I was getting worried maybe you had lost interest in this particular car, but great to see it again. Please keep them coming, it’s a different take on an enjoyable ride. Every time I see one in a darker color like yours I like them even more.

 

Terry:

First, let me thank you for your service to our country.

In 1980, I built a 1049 foot TV tower on the boundary of restricted air space on the Maryland Eastern shore. Occasionally, I would see military jets (fighters of some sort) come in from the west, loop around the tower then blast off back east. I was told that these aircraft were coming from the Patuxent River Naval Air Station.

Maybe you know better.

Sometime they came in pairs. It was very cool to watch.

Not notwithstanding what these jets were designed to do and the risks pilots took, it looked to me as great fun.

Jim

 

Jim- Could very well have been Pax River, which is where the USN does test and evaluation. The tactical pilotage charts we used for flying low level had towers like the one you built well marked and the tall ones sometimes had keep-out zones to prevent hitting any guy wires. Some also had keep out zones for electronic emissions. Back in the early 80s, the aircraft would most likely have been F-4Ns, which did not care about electronic emissions. In the mid-80s, the F/A-18C started replacing them, and Pax River would have been the first place to receive them.

 

Thanks, Scott. Some very helpful information.

Just a few comments:

The 456M Workshop Manual shows 16 additional fuses in a box in the footwell and 5 or 6 maxi-fuses under bonnet on the right hand side in front of the battery cutout switch. Looking at your video, I couldn't see any of these. Does anyone know where they are on the GTA?

Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

The 16 extra fuses in the footwell are for seats, windows, doorlocks, turn signals, (rear) fog light control, starter, ABS (excluding ASR), Bilstein suspension system, and much more.

You seemed to be expecting the current to go down after replacing that radio fuse? To an ohmmeter, a good fuse is basically a short circuit. A bad fuse is either a high resistance or open circuit. The current can only go up with a new fuse (unless the new fuse blows).

Cheers

 

Great videos. Please keep posting.