308 Dino

One or two owners on this site. Dont know that much about the car, tell us about your ownership experiences and your opinions on the car.

Also interested to hear experiences from mondial owners.

 

I think there are a few of us lurking here!
For my part I just love my GT4. When I bought it I had various options, a relative had left me a load of dosh, and even after the tax man relieved me of a large chunk I still had enough left over to pay a bit off the mortgage or get a 360.
However when I left home back in 1978 my landlord had a brand new GT4 and I just remember my first ride in it, the exhilaration of when he floored it, that left me with a lasting impression of the GT4. For my 40th i was given a Ferrari trackday, when I got to drive a 360, and I really didn't like it at all! So that kind of made my mind up for me - I went off to buy a GT4 and pay off some of the mortgage - a 1978 Ferrari 308 GT4 chassis 13838.

I bought mine off ebay for £12400 it is an ex Donnington track car, has had 1000s and 1000s spent on it and a stack of receipts that fill a large filing cabinet; all from Maranello. For the 20 years before me you can count the number of times its went round the track on one hand between MOTs, it also has full HR Owen service history for its early years

My GT4 is my daily drive, I take the kids to school in it, use it to drive to Ipswich for meetings as a company car and by the way, it also does car shows and enjoys being valet parked at Harrods and sitting out side the LV shop in Sloane Street (my wife’s thing).

It featured in Practical Performance Car magazine and was professionally photographed by the guy that does Top Gear.

It’s a very easy car to drive, tons of torque, very forgiving if you get into trouble. I have lost it a few times in the snow, ice and rain, but every time it sorts itself out, straightens up and carries on, even when you see your life flashing past you!

I have tracked it once at Goodwood, where it was like driving a go-kart, albeit with a V8 in the boot.

I do all the maintenance, so far that has included the clutch, tappets, cam belts, suspension, Birdman fuse boxes and air con (converting it to the new gas) and the best “mod” of all was the black stallion ignition conversion from Superformance.

It is also self supporting, everything you take off to replace sells on ebay, from the old clutch – now a clock, the distributor £300 to a guy in the US and bizarrely getting £15.00 for the old cam belts. The GT4 is also appreciating in value at some say 20% per year, so even sitting on the drive its making money – how cool is that??

The most radical change were my lovely wheels, I learnt a lesson early as an F car owner, never tell a prospective shop owner you own one, as the price trebles in a heart beat! I found out the Ferraris have the same wheel nut configuration as a Volvo and bought a set for a Volvo (10” +18” rear 8” * 18” front) after paying 550 including 40 profile rubber the salesman asked what kind of Volvo do these fit. I think he was genuinely gutted when I told him what car they were for.

The down side…
Finding large greenies on the bonnet outside the kids school, anoraks at car shows, being ripped off and the FOC

The up side..
The noise it makes, it truly does make the most F1 like noise on the road as standard, which means I use more fuel than normal because I just have to keep it in a lower gear, why use 3rd when it makes such an adrenalin pumping noise in 2nd!! Also driving through Windsor on a sunny Sunday evening watching all the tourists franticly grabbing their cameras to photograph it.
It also transpires that my car has a racing gearbox, which I only found out this weekend.

 

Great review Nick, thanks.

 

I've got some running cost info on pistonheads:

http://www.petrolheads.co.uk/members/showServiceHistory.asp?carId=5198

One tip, make sure the water hoses are ok.

 

Hey Dan

Sorry to hear of your probs yesterday, trust it is all sorted ok now?

 

Rob, I haven't fixed the water pipe yet as having seen the state of the fuel lines, I want to do them too. So need to get hold of some fuel hose first. Shouldn't take too long or be too difficult once I've got the bits.

 

I've had my GT4 almost 16 yrs, and nothing major has gone wrong. Biggest headache was one of the alloy water pipes that go through the chassis chafed through, so rather than take out the engine both alloy pipes were replaced with rubber hoses.
I have changed the cambelts twice, brake pads once and do the oil & filter every other year on a milage of 1000 PA.
Tyres don't seem to last more then 3k .
My ANSA exhaust is now very ropey and I'd like to replace it with another but I can't find anyone in the UK who sells them, so any advice will be welcome.

 

As far as usability is concerned, I do not use it as daily transport as a modern car with auto 'box and up to date heating/air con is far more comfortable. Also, although it attracts a lot of favourable/friendly attention and comments in familiar circumstances, there is still a lot of jealousy and hatred to be experienced - which is odd as you can pick these cars up for less than 8 grand on Ebay! These idiots should be venting their anger on VW Polo owners on that basis.