Looking for service agency in Twin Citeis area...

GT Cars, and also the Maserati dealership will work on them (I think)

 

Maserati of Minneapolis services quite a few Ferrari's. I purchased a 355 and recently a 360 spider from them. They are working on getting Ferrari Certified service. They are very close and hope to have it this year sometime. If you have any questions on their abilities, you can call them and ask to talk to Steve Rand, he is their Maserati Service Manager.

Joe

 

As a former paying customer at two of the independent Ferrari service shops in the Minneapolis area, I can honesty say I would not use them to service a Ferrari ever again. IMO, one of them is very dishonest and totally incompetent. IMO, the other one is very honest and means well, but there are so few Ferraris in the Minneapolis area that they don't get to work on enough Ferraris to become really good at servicing them. Unfortunately, this has resulted in me paying for their learning curve at my expense and getting a Ferrari back that ran worse than when I brought it to them. In summary, my experiences were a complete nightmare.

On a positive note, I found a phenominal shop just outside of Appleton, WI called Motion Products which does top quality work in their 20,000 sq. ft. state of the art facility. I have found them to be completely honest and their rates to be very reasonable. Their reputation speaks for themselves as they have produced four 100 point Ferraris at the Pebble Beach Concours...something another shop has never done. Their website is www.motionproductsinc.net. Just visiting their shop is a treat as there are always extremely rare race and one-off coach built Ferraris on site.

I have also heard that Lake Forest Sports Cars does good work. They even make frequent route trips with enclosed haulers to Minneapolis where they will pick up a bunch of Ferraris at once and charge their customers a very reasonable shipping rate.

Yes, it may be inconvenient to get a Ferrari serviced at a shop far away. However, IMO even after shipping costs it will still be much less expensive than using the local shops in the Minneapolis area. More importantly, I believe the odds of your Ferrari being serviced right the first time at a shop outside of Minneapolis will be much greater, which will save you a lot of anger and frustration.

 

Sorry to hear this.

Not comfortable saying which is which?

I think can guess =)

 

Exactly. Despite having documentation to prove the dishonesty and incompetence of these shops; a Minnesota Ferrari owner with no mechanical aptitude or critical thinking skills had the nerve to tell the owner of one of these shops the comments I was making about them. The owner threatened me and tried to accuse me of slander. I ended up having a meeting with him where I presented documentation and evidence that proved his shop had defrauded me. Lets just say that he ended up consigning and selling one of my Ferraris for no commission to get me off his case. I have no doubt I could have taken him to court and won.

The other shop (who I believe means well, but is incompetent) is also terrible in that they won't guarantee or back the quality of their work. When they replaced a clutch in one of my Ferraris they didn't reattach the engine to the engine mounts. All that was holding the engine and transmission was one transmission mount. This caused the engine to bounce around in the engine bay and made a hell of a mess that cost a lot to repair. Worse yet, they didn't balance the driveshaft when they put it back in so the vibrations created ruined the transmission; requiring that I have it rebuilt. Motion Products fixed all of the problems they created and pointed out to me all of their hideous screw-ups. Despite writing a letter to the owner with documention proving they had done a poor job replacing the clutch on my Ferrari, he refused to admit any wrongdoing or do anything to remedy the situation. I should also note that this wasn't the only time they screwed up on my car.

In summary, worlds can't describe how angry I am with these shops as they made these Ferrari ownership experiences miserable. I feel very sorry for the Minnesota Ferrari community as I truly believe they do not have a competent shop they can trust in their community.

 

I would be very interesting in hearing who the shops you are talking about are. I actually have found a couple of different situations at the different shops. One in the area is very poor and I have a good deal of people that I know personally have had bad experiences with them.

GTCars in the past has always performed well for me in the past. However in the past few years under new ownership it has turned into more of just a regular car shop more interested in billable hours than customer care. I have really lost interest in taking my car there in the future because of my own reasons related to the above. To me the only reason to take my car there was and would be Jeff Flynn who is an excellent mechanic and very knowledgable in pretty much all of the Ferraris from 1978 to 1999.

What car did you have that a mechanic had to unbolt the motor mounts to change the clutch? The the transverse gearboxes have the clutch at the back and I know from personally changing them that you can do it without unbolting any mounts. I would have to imagine it was a front engine car but was just curious.

Anyway personally I think for a 328 GTCars could meet your needs and be a lot better than hauling your car to Chicago or else where to get it worked on for a fairly high labor cost.

I also don't think its slander to discuss or review businesses as long as you dont completely fabricate a story...I would love you to name names. Or just PM me to talk more.

 

Not sure if any of the shops is the Maserati dealer, but speaking first hand of purchasing and servicing a 355 and most recently my 360 from them, i'm very pleased with them. As I've mentioned earlier, they are working to achieve Ferrari Certified status which will allow them many benefits from what they have today.

If you'd like further information from me about my experiences shoot me a PM and I'll be happy to share.

Joe

 

Whoever you use or go to for service....stay as far away as possible from Donnybrooke! They are nothing more than a bunch of hacks. They will cover up shoddy workmanship & lie to you. I understand that they had their Ferrari franchise YANKED from them many years ago. GT Cars has said that they love Donnybrooke because they get so much business from them after they mess up customer's cars. Just a bad scene. When I lived in Minneapolis, I always took my 308 to Gt Cars; great shop, nice guys.

 

Or, if you wanted to drive it down to Madison, Cory at Collector's Choice works on my Ferrari and a bunch of other guys from all over the midwest. He has been doing them for years and always has a few Ferraris or Lambos in his shop. Not to mention Panteras, Rolls, and Vipers......

$80/hr for service. Not bad at all.

But Brandon is right. Motion Products is TOP NOTCH....
And I believe their rates are around $65/hr. Which is a STEAL.

 

We'll have to agree to disagree on your assessment. My experience has shown me that Motion Products' labor rate is substantially lower, the number of billable hours they charge for the same job is drastically less, and most importantly; they fix things right the first time. I still haven't found out yet if they back the quality of their work as I haven't had to. I certainly can't say the same for any of the Ferrari shops I have dealt with in MN. I have come to the conclusion that it is far cheaper to use Motion Products even when taking into consideration the cost of shipping your Ferrari to them.

I suggest you make a trip to Motion Products sometime and tour their shop. I guarantee you will leave thinking that their shop makes all the Ferrari repair shops in Minnesota look like incompetent dumps. Enthusiasts who own pre-war Alfa Romeos, 250 GTOs, pontoon TRs, 288 GTOs, F40s, and rare one-off coachbuilt Ferraris (i.e Gianni Angelli / Ingrid Bergman / prototypes) and can afford to go anywhere want to use Motion Products. They're just that good and trustworthy.

If you haven't yet, I also suggest visiting Lake Forest Sports Car some time and walk through their service department. The number of Ferraris you will see in their shop with Minnesota license plates (including the ones that are no longer under factory warranty) will likely lead you to the conclusion that the Ferrari shops in Minnesota may not be so good. Ferrari owners from Minnesota wouldn't ship their cars to Chicago if the local repair shops were any good.

 

I too will vouche for Motion Products and owner Wayne. Their chief engine guy Cliff Ebben builds his own motors for his race cars, and wins the GT1 class @ the June Sprints almost EVERY year. http://www.junesprints.com/eventresults/2005_race.html?all

They have EXTENSIVE Ferrari connections, and have an F40 race car in house as well.

They prepare many nationwide Ferrari customer cars for Vintage racing as well.

They are NOT just for engine work, they are untouchable to body restoration as well. They are exactly 4 hours from St. Paul. Take 94 east to Hwy 10 east to Hwy 76 south. They are a couple miles south of 10 on 76.

 

I honestly think you have me convinced that my next trip will be to Motion Products. I am contemplating an engine rebuild next winter so I planned to give them a call no matter what but this just might give me more reason.

Thanks for the feedback guys. I'm always happy to admit I am wrong.

 

Just called motion about looking at the Esprit I picked up last summer.

(920) 725-4688

Just in case anyone wants the number.

 

What's wrong with the Esprit?

 

Everything =)

Last July I found a white/tan "project" 88 T in Appleton, WI. I traded the guy straight up for an old corvette I didn't want anymore.

When I got it from the guy he said it ran poorly to not at all and had been taking it from shop to shop trying to get it running. Since I've had it I have yet to even try to turn it over. With spring on the way I thought I'd start looking to get it going.

The guys at Motion had a vague recollection of an Esprit there years ago and the car I now have may be the same one. The guy from Motion said it had major electical problems and at the time was going to be expensive to solve (5 years ago).

My plan is/was to install a new timig belt and make sure everything in that area is correct, replace hoses, etc and then crank it over and see where that gets me...

I notice you also have an 88 and I'll be looking for others close by or in the region that I might look to for tech advice since there is so little info out there.

I'm thinking that...

1. I may pull the engine to make it easier to change the belt and all the hoses that I want to change. Basically just see what the heck is going on in there...

2. Look into the possibility of redoing the entire wiring system with something more modern like a painless wiring kit. I switched all the gauges in my 308 to VDO and updated the fuse panel a couple years back so I'm not too affraid to dig into this area. Yet, this is why I'd really like to find some guys/owners I could bounce ideas off of since for instance I don't know if in 88 the esprit would have any computers, etc that would make this idea impossible...

Although my 308 was running when I bought it, it was in a similar condition...needing to be sorted out. That's where the esprit is, in need of major sorting.

 

Some pics in this thread

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=86777

 

Shoot me a PM with your e-mail address. If you are looking for Lotus info you should join the Lotus club here in MN and from there you will have loads of info. There are a couple of guys in our club that could rebuild the engine blindfolded. And for 12 bucks a year it is too bad for that info

 

I remember that car. I used to see it alot back in the day (even at the mall) Have not seen it for a few years, now I see why. On a side note, Geiger Auto (down the road from Motion Products) just aquired a V8 Esprit on a salvage deal and fixed it over the winter. It looks perfect.

 

I got the car from a guy named John Efferts. Nice guy, don't have any problems with him. He explained that state fo the car and we did the deal. I knew what I was getting.

Anyway, do you anything about the car?

Thanks, Scott

 

Sorry, no info about him or the car. I just remember seeing it a few times.