Stan, I appreciate your view. However I have a different one. I acquired my Dino a few years back. I was a bit unsettled on whether to purchase a show quality car. It had won a few platinums and very high 90 scoring at properly judged events. For me this was a difficult decision. I don't like to treat these cars as show cars. The beauty lies in driving them as they were built to be driven. Owning my Dino down here in Florida was a let down. The roads are flat and boring. And lacking a big hp engine the Dino was not where it needed to be. I came close to selling the car. A friend and Dino expert talked me out of selling. Fortunately within a year or two we are going to have a home in the mtns of NC. He convinced me to wait to until we have the right home for the car. When that happens I intend to drive the stink out of the little car. Back on thread........this Dino may be one of the most original of cars out there. But if not driven how important is that? I actually prefer vintage cars with lots of mileage on the clock. Then the goal of keeping the mileage low never becomes an issue. I have just invested heavily in making my 330 GTC a real driver. And that is what is transpiring right now. Own 'em......drive 'em
Agreed on all points. Driving in Florida isn't the best. I miss Md roads. Enjoy NC when you get there. People that by them for statues, I'm OK with. It's just not my way. I really love the art of a Dino, but would buy one for more than that.
I'd love nothing more than to have a preservation candidate. But then that painful decision process starts. It's not for me.
I like to think that ultimately my cars will be preservation cars. Just not preservation as to being an original in a pickle jar. Rather my concept is making them beautiful and very functional followed by driving them hard whether on a local errand or a run in the moutains. After being driven I spend the time in the garage wiping them down and going over every inch of the car. Certainly they will age w/ experience. But they will have been preserved by me to be driven again.
Fred - I am not sure that I understand what you wrote. Does your Dino also have the "Tower Bridge" wipers? My confusion stems in part from your comment that "it [referring to the eBay auction Dino] has the OLD(???) 'Tower Bridge wipers that, I believe, were only used on LATER(???) Dinos with right-hand drive." My USA LHD gt, 03656 has the "Tower Bridge" wipers. It is an April 1972 build. They work great - maybe a little better than the wipers did on my September 1972 gts. Mark
How true about Florida roads.. Have a winter home in Sarasota on Lido, but truly only enjoy driving the roads up here in NY and CT. I recall when I had my Dino 08318 in miami, it really was no fun driving it on I95. Biscayne Blvd. and Collins Ave., especiallly when Datsun 240Z's could outpower the Dino
Mark, What I was referring to was the fact that even late RHD Dinos had the old "stacked" or "Tower Bridge" wipers, probably a cost consideration, to avoid having to have two different parallel wiper setups, for each drive configuration. My earlier Dino, 03964, has the stacked wipers, and my later one, 04808, has the parallel wipers. Fred
Having learned the hard way, eBay pics don't stay forever.... Here are the photo's attached to the eBay acution (notice the double manual in the book set and headlight covers)... Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
see vintage section thread titled "ferrari 365 p at paris" for a good close up picture of how the headlight covers were mounted originally. ed
and interesting that the Campagnolos did not have the silver center caps with blue "Campagnolo" script but had the yellow centers with "Dino" script that go on the Cromodoras.
Auction ended early with a bid of $150K, I'm thinking someone called with a much higher offer, no way to tell tho.....
So clearly this car benefitted from being both original and in great condition...but that begs the question of if you found a very original driver condition car, are you better off restoring the car or cleaning it up, servicing and leaving it as is? Is there a point where patina is more of a turn off then a turn on?
Each situation will be different, when it is your car, you do what ever you like. No formula. There is a larger group of individuals that like original (real) cars, from years past. The is also the restored crowd, Easter egg, concours crowd No group is better than the other Buy a car that fits your profile. Clean it, restore it, drive it, store it. Do what ever makes you comfortable, because after all, it is YOUR car!
It all depends on what you want in the end and what's available that meets your criteria. I came VERY close to pressing the trigger on this Dino. In the end I decided on a "rough diamond" that needed a bit of love and elbow grease. Tom is correct in his quote, "Buy a car that fits your profile. Clean it, restore it, drive it, store it. Do what ever makes you comfortable, because after all, it is YOUR car!" ANY 246GT Dino is an amazing car and is worthy. You'll know which is the right one. Somehow you'll connect with it! Freeman
Very well stated. It was a pleasure seeing you and your beautiful 250 TDF at Concours in Dana Point last Sunday.
Dino was (alledgedly) sold to a local man(Vito Bommarito) who owns a Sicilian/Italian bakery. details to follow Not falling into the black hole, yet
Aloha... Vito called me about my 206 GT.. I told him to buy it.. He found something else that worked for him.... Way to go Vito.... I think my car is still at Canepa....or maybe they sold it Gregg Blue #00350
I think it is important. I'm living in the vintage Porsche world right now, and in everything from original welds to upholstery/interior, etc., there are some very competent restorers who do quality work -- but if the original materials aren't available, it is hard to know exactly how things were supposed to look and function. Much like the 356, the 246 was a cheap car long enough to have suffered through restoration malpractice. It's great to find a time capsule. There will always be more usable examples out there to drive hard.
Dumb question, but, here I go. On a car where to odometer will only go to 99,999, how can you really tell how many miles a 30+ year old car has? Additionally, on a car where it takes about 30 seconds to disconnect the speedo/odo,who knows how many miles the car has? I know we all like to delude ourselves a bit on these things, but I'm convinced that many (perhaps not this car, but many) of the "low mileage" cars are really 100K miles or more low on their clocks. Surely we don't delude ourselves into thinking that these cars in general, have been driven less than a couple hundred miles a year during their ownership? Again, not a knock on this car, as I don't know its particulars, but I'm ALWAYS wary of super low miles cars. Just doesn't seem logical that the original owner of almost any of these didn't put 10K on it or so in the first couple years of ownership, long before it had any collector value. Am I alone here? Or does the quantity of low miles cars seem high for the number of total cars built? Only car I can think of with OVER 100K miles on it that anyone ever talked about was Corbani's car. DM
As some here know, I collect data on RHD Dino's offered for sale in the UK and now have 1057 data points over 36 years (It's a long story). Part of that data is the mileage claimed in classified ads. To date - There has never been a car that has admitted to having done over 100k miles in the data set; - There is a trend in rising mileages; they can't after all go down in the real world; - The data shows that "low mileage" is correlated with high average market price (significantly): i.e either higher price brings the low mileage cars to market or high price encourages faking of mileages. Most often it is disingenuous restored cars where the vendors don't highlight the 50-60k miles before restoration that claim very low mileages (Note: Age = 0 means I don't know how old it is) Image Unavailable, Please Login
Dave, I can speak for one 330 GTC I owned for 9 yrs.....I personally put over 90k miles after purchase in 1976. So if s/n 10857 ever shows up for sale I will inform anyone that needs to know to add a "1" before the ticks on the clock. My goal for my current GTC......break 100k......... I would like to do the same with my Dino, but I don't consider it as usable as an everyday car at the 330. So it might be a long time before it gets there. I respect others that think having unrestored examples with low mileage as time capsules is important to the classic car world. Just not part of my direction I guess.
