That 1997 GTS has a steel protection plate on the underside that I have never seen before. Factory option for Euro cars or aftermarket?
I guess this one should sell for a good price. Schumacher's F355 GTS: https://rmsothebys.com/auctions/ms25/lots/r0001-1996-ferrari-f355-gts/
Reading and research says the engine was replaced. Apparently Ferrari gave him an uprated motor that did not stay with the car?? I find that really interesting.
As they wrote: "rumour has it". Here is a picture of the service book from another article: Image Unavailable, Please Login https://gocar.be/fr/actu-auto/essais-auto/ferrari-f355-gts-la-vraie-premiere-ferrari-de-michael-schumacher and a video:
In the article they said it has a higher compression ratio. I guess it's just a regular F355 engine. The rest is legend because of the owner...
“The car was granted Ferrari Classiche certification in 2020, confirming that it retains its original chassis, gearbox, bodywork, and is finished in its original colour combination. The Classiche certification also confirms that the car is no longer fitted with its original engine, but one of the correct type. Rumour has it that the car was equipped with an up-rated engine when delivered new to Michael Schumacher, but this has yet to be proven conclusively. The car was fitted with the current engine prior to the consignor’s purchase in 2004.”
Uprated motor:: Ferrari gave Michael an F355 with different cams and pistons making its peak power up near 10,000 RPMs.
We are supposed to believe that Ferrari engineered, tested, and manufactured four camshafts and eight pistons for one single engine? That's not how manufacturing works, especially not back then. I don't believe this tale.
They probably had the pistons and camshafts already. More than likely, they tested a few hotter set-ups than the final F355 configuration, then dialed it back somewhat for the production version that they had to cover with a warranty. So when Schumi asked, they complied. At the time, there was probably not a lot they wouldn't have done if Michael had asked...
Not that big of a deal to regrind cams and use pistons with a different compression ratio etc. the aftermarket does it everyday.
Especially for the guy you're paying $60M for his first 2 years driving a car you spent millions of $ to develop.
Pretty sure Michelotto had that stuff back in the day for the GT race cars they made. Could have been provided by Ferrari but it's not like the Dino V8 engine wasn't extremely well known at that point with tons of different racing and development versions. They could have just retarded the stock cams a bit, added fuel, and raised the redline, it wouldn't take much to push an 8250rpm power peak up a thousand or so rpm. Who knows though, but it sounds like a previous owner tested the reliability limits.... Good for them.
There is an old rumor that the F355 engine was supposed to be 10,000 RPM and 500 HP, but after valve train wear issues (and maybe other issues), they dialed it back to ~400 HP.
Carbon bucket seats in narrow for 550 Maranello but same as 355 only Daytona in the mid part https://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/threads/carbon-bucket-seats-narrow-550-maranello-possible-355.702128/
I've heard that several times, but the amount of wear/tear and exponentially greater forces between 8500 and 10k RPM is HUGE. I don't know the specs on the rotating assembly of a stock F355, but everything would need to be forged to hit that level of performance.
Everything already IS forged. { pistons, con-rods are forged titanium, crankshaft is milled from billet }
Life of belt would be shortened as well at 10k rpm. I believe at the time Ferrari was proposing 3 year belt intervals with a normal 355 engine.
