few questions about 308s to experts

hello

i'll be writing an article about 308 in polish classicauto magazine, i need some help concerning these issues:

1)why did ferrari swapped the body material to steel so fast
2)some say 308 GTB had dry sump oil pan, at least at the early cars. what's the truth?
3)what similarities bore 308 GTB chassis with the one of 308GT4 2+2?

looking forward to hearing from you

thanks in advance

 

The early 308s did have a dry sump.

 

99% of the 308s were steel. Only in 1976 did Ferrari do a fiberglass car. In 1982, Ferrari started doing rustproofing, but that is about it.

Only the 1976 and VERY few 1977 308s had the dry sump engine.

 

1) I have heard conflicting stories as to why there was a change of material and they are as follows:
- High demands of the cars could not be kept up by the fiberglass manufacturers of the bodies
- Perception was that people did not want a 'plastic' Ferrari or an 'Italian Corvette' and as such production was changed to metal

As I said these are the reasons I heard but cannot confirm it to be fact

2) Early 308's in markets outside of North America were dry sump. This continued from the beginning of production to the end of the carburetted cars (early 1980). 308 GT4's and all north american 308's were wet sump. This included both steel and glass cars. Also note that all 308 GTS cars are wet sump regardless of the market they were sold in. I do not know why this was done.

3) The engine and transmission are the same in both cars (except that all GT4's are wet sump) Other than that I cannot comment on the differences between the different chassis.

Some other points of interest:

The 308 GTB was the first non 12 cylinder Ferrari to bear the Ferrari name. Early 308 GT4's were Dinos and there are images of early prototype GTB bodies with the cut out for Dino badges. This was not put into production because of marketing pressures primarily from the growing US market for a more mass market car that carried the Ferrari name.

There is overlap in the production of Steel and Glass GTB's. My steel car with a January 1977 production date predates many glass cars. In fact I have seen steel cars as early as October 1976 production. Glass car production to the best of my knowledge finished in mid 1977.

Good luck with the article

 

Not correct:

712 of 2897 Carburetted 308 GTB's were fiberglass. Much more than 1%
Total production of all 308 GTB & GTS models is approx: 12,100 cars between 1975-1985

Refer to my previous post for information on the dry sump engine. I have seen European 1980 cars carburetted with dry sump.

You will find lots more information at the 308 GTB registry:

http://www.r-design.net/308/index_e.html

 

Here are photos of the discarded prototypes. Notice the Dino shaped badge opening on the bottom photo
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I heard similar, but I'll add one.
- Ferrari wasn't sure that the 308 GTS/GTB was going to sell big, so they started making the body in Fiberglass to save costs. Switched to steel when they were sure the cars were going to sell.

I'm not sure where I heard that (maybe the Top Gear Ferrari special?), but its not entirely plausible because the 308GT4 was always steel (to my knowledge), and did they know it was going to be a success?

James in Denver

 

A third story was production could be started earlier with the fiberglass cars. The assembly line could be rolling along until all the tooling was up and ready for the steel bodies.

It is interesting to me why no one knows for sure. Also, the 308 was probably going to be badged a Dino in the very very very beginning. I have a picture (that I posted here a long time ago) of a 308 front end clip form with what is very clearly a horizontal rectangular indention where the nose badge goes. Just perfect for the "Dino" plate. Who knows.

Also just in case you don't already know this, no GTS's were ever glass.

 

You beat me to it!

I have a different picture, though. I'll dig around for it.

 

Anybody ever do a retrofit to put the Dino badge on a 308?

Hmmm... if I ever pick up a 308/328....

 

You may also want to mention that those early glass dry sump 308's are the ones to have. Lightest and fastest of all the 308's, specially in Euro form.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe the rust proofing started in 1984.

 

Jan 84, to be exact.

 

It was associated with the tooling....glass molds could begin after the styling buck was done.....steel pressings required a longer lead time....

The 308GTB rides on a shortened GT4 chassis.

 

It remains to this day the only street model offered in 'glass, a common fabrication on the prototype racing cars......

 

I have a November 1976 steel...

The "1976" 'glass cars are 1975 -76 production.....

 

thanks all for your substantial help! i'll add all the info in the text

 

What is the weight difference between the glass and steel GTBs?

I too remember reading somewhere that the fiberglass was a stop-gap until tooling for the steel bodies was complete, and that the car was never intended to stay in production that way. I bet it cost Ferrari much more to produce those glass bodies than steel once labor is factored in.

 

Same here - #20425 - The Factory ( when I applied for my Heritage Certificate) told me to consider it having been manufactured in April, 1977

 

Strange because my #20783 shows a January 1977 build date

 

That's interesting.

 

serial numbers weren't given always successively; in fact there are situations like s/ns that should be marked in 70's weren't used till 90's

 

are you totally sure about that? my colleague said that analising the engine he couldn't imagine that can be true. any pic or proof just to make me feel safe please ?

 

Yes I am totally sure about this. You can always tell a dry sump car because it has a large oil resevoir in the engine bay and no oil filler cap on the valve cover. The dry sump cars hold a lot more oil than a wet sump car however I cannot confirm how much the differences are.

 

My chassis number is 20623 and was made in Nov-Dec '76. Steel US.