insecurities.....the 348 and 355 stories gathered

+1 I have friends with each of the models he is analyzing that have been on the wrong side of 5 figure repair bills. That said I also have friends that have done nothing but maintenance. Just the luck of the draw. My 355 has been good once I got the headers and cats replaced as preventative maintenance during my major in 2008. I still love the 355 after 6 years of ownership.

 

To the OP: just like the title of this thread, most are a gathering of stories. There are plenty of the "Never Owned a Ferrari but Know it All from Read Other People's Post" peeps on F-Chat. I encourage you to do your own research. Sure, there are little things that could go wrong with a 355, but most of the "spectacular" repairs are usually from people who bought a "cheap" and/or not maintained Ferrari on the internet. I have own/owned two 355 Spiders (a 95 and a 98) and both were incredibly reliable. Little issues like fuel door got stuck - yes, but major issues, no <--- btw, I hope I didn't just jinx myself.

 

I think the feelings one has in the car when they drive it be it a 355, 348, 308, 328 or for that matter a 458 are what makes owning one worthwhile...

After saying that my wife would tell you always buy the newer one!

 

In a perfect world, yes, these should have all been sorted out before they hit the show floors. In a perfect corporate world, Ferrari PEGGED it with the 355. They lasted long enough to get out of the warranty period and then have the new model (360) on the show floors. The same can not be said about the 348, those were dying on the way home. A cutting edge technology car is designed to be a disposable commodity, make no mistake about that. It is left for the Aftermarket to figure out how to make these live a long life because Ferrari moves on to the next latest and greatest in the Super Car technology race.... just how it is. In today's disposable mentality world there is little incentive to actually fix complicated problems... fix it AGAP or throw it away and buy a new one. No two of the same model are the same, you need to drive a half dozen to make a 'statement'.

Given time and the fact the 348 was of a quite simple design... the problems were identified and solved for the most part. The 355 is anything but a simple design and changed how we had to think about servicing the model. I suspect the Ferrari bean counters are the ones that hold the responsibility for the guide issues as they took a step backwards some 20 years in the chosen materials. There might have even been some planned job security in the move because the material choices made were really quite obvious to be flawed. At the time, Fiat was showing Ferrari how to Make money building these cars, a requirement after the financial disaster the 348 was..... how much of an effect did that have on the end product? For the most part, other than the guides, I am now of the belief that most of the other issues could have been prevented had we better understood the whole package earlier..... heck, we are STILL learning.

Just this winter we identified what I believe is the last of the drawbacks to the 355 and for the first time I think we felt, seat of the pants, what the Ferrari Engineers knew they had on paper. There has long been a variable that I have been chasing and that needed to be identified. The performance results could not be duplicated one car to the next even when exactly the same spec's were used in the set up of each. There has always been "OK" 355's, there are "very quick" 355's and now we have felt the "What the heck was THAT, is THIS what the Engineers had intended?" 355. From my research on this model, I suspect that the results of this finding will show vastly improved longevity and reliability but only time will tell. I have long said not to write off this model..... I now mean that more than ever before.

 

Dave,

Mr. Helms,

You are going to spill the beans, no? I figure you must have finished your work since you are now back posting with us.

 

The F770 will be a great model in 2020.

 

+1

 

I spent 3hrs with the venerable Mr. Dave Helms on Friday...

He isn't ready to tell the world just yet.... (or maybe the world isn't ready for Dave...)

But I know that when my 355 goes to him next year for a major that all we discussed will be done to my 355.

 

So you took all of his time on Friday Wow your car is going to be awesome after that service, lucky you

 

Can you tell us how much this speed boost is going to cost us for our 355's?
Maybe hint?

 

unfortunately, you're probably not far off the mark at 7.7L, if we're already at 6.2L with the F12 in 2012.

 

Its not all about "speed boost" that is just a bonus. Its a combination of more power, reliability and the major bonus... extended intervals between major services. When Dave Helms is ready (meaning he has enough hard evidence to present that can't be disputed) he will provide more details.

 

It's amazing how much Dave Helms has already added to the collective understanding of the 355 and I look forward to hearing of his latest innovations in the hopefully not too distant future.

 

Twitching, babbling old fool in the back corner..... you pegged it Brock, no good can come from that! A real treat it was for us to have you stop by.... next time the winged red car will be back at its proper home and we can find time for dinner.

"" You are going to spill the beans, no?""

No, nothing to spill until I can duplicate the results at will. Until its duplicate-able it is nothing but a freak occurrence..... But it sure had us giggling as it is essentially a bone stock, fully emissions compliant, lower flowing late model heads... 355! I took two 355 owners who happened to stop by the shop, for a short spin..... just to make sure I was not caught up in wishful thinking. One reply.... "sell my car, I am taking this one", the other, "What the hell was THAT, that just happened?" The car owner came back from his first drive stating "you might want to consider warning people about the rear end now stepping out on acceleration (I had the same happen to me but discounted it to debris on the road)"... something that just doesn't happen at 5700 ft elevation here. What it will do where there is actually oxygen to burn the fuel... don't know. Not that anyone gives a hoot but the reported cruise MPG is in the mid 20's now on a number of the early test mules.

I have been chasing this Gremlin for a good many years now.... maybe we caught it.... maybe not. My MoleWorks design debate group wont buy into it until I have hard numbers.... Butt-O-Meter results dont fly with that group. The owner of the car in question is a very accomplished pilot/driver who has better driver feedback than many Pro Race drivers I have worked with, time will tell..... The point I am trying to make is that this model is not done improving yet, not by a long shot!

 

And I, like many others, cannot wait for this.

Dave's a paragon in the world of Ferrari.

 

I wonder Dave.. does it have anything to do with using Injector Dynamics injectors and maybe wide-band UEGO 02 sensors

 

I'm looking forward to what you are developing, Mr. Helms. I've been on the sidelines of 355 ownership due to potential O&M costs. Your increasing understanding of these cars is encouraging.

 

.. the 355 is an Italian mistress.. the reward is worth every penny you spend on it..

 

Nope..... I designed my own injectors and O2 sensors due to fundamental flaws in the basic design that I identified, the prototypes of those will be in testing this spring. The results spoken of do not include these bits at this point... those are yet to be put into the equation and is the reason I am highly optimistic that there is more yet to be gained.

I am still at a point where I consider our current efforts that of refining/correcting the base platform. From my racing background I am a firm believer that refinements and new innovations thrown on top of problems only masks the issues at hand and leads to worse problems down the road. As boring as it is, and has been, those issues Had to be resolved first. The fact we identified so many positive benefits in just laying the ground work, speaks highly of what I think we can end up with when the entire package is followed through on. It is fairly easy to build a "qualifying grenade" that makes gobs of power for a short time. Building a package that lives a long life in stop and go traffic and then runs up the mountain at the Speed of Heat when its requested to do so.... while still keeping the Feds and emissions folks happy.... that is my focus at this point..... the grenade version of that will follow later.

It all boils down to the theories I have come up with having merit OR its a case of the Blind Squirrel stumbling upon a nut... the jury is still out. Performance and driveability are the easiest part of this experiment, how they affect longevity and reliability is a far more difficult question to answer. Given, at this point I have only dealt with increasing efficiency of the package the Ferrari engineers designed and gave us, if my theories holds true, longevity is simply a natural and realistic expectation given the failures we have identified and now understand. Now... if this day job would get easier and I had some free time..... work just gets in the way of so many projects....

 

I really think this is the case, I know I usually only post about my car when something needs to be fixed. It's running perfectly right now, I took it for a drive yesterday just for the sake of a drive with no destination or purpose in mind other than to just have fun - which, come to think of it, I haven't done with a car in a few years. I have about a 30 mile loop I have on the back roads around my house and after completing that I decided I wasn't done driving yet and further explored some more back roads. When I got home an hour or so later I was genuinely sad it was over.
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Nice post and very nice car

 

.........oh I can relate to this when I picked up my 348ts from Zagame and I was 50.. !

 

.. that's brilliant if you can indeed improve them. J

 

One can't entirely reformulate the fuel that we now have forced to use in these cars and yet expect old technology, designed for an entirely different fuel, to operate as originally intended. A Very broad and encompassing statement that Very few take into account in anything from a tune up to an engine build.

The entire game has changed, designing compounds that could effectively contain this Rabbitpiss Hog Food fuel was just the first step. The second step was figuring out how to make an effectively non-flammable fuel... actually burn. Once those two steps were behind, then started the quest to actually make respectable power with this concoction of swill... the elusive end goal. Most are still in denial regarding the problems faced with the fuel, the reason I abandoned making the in-tank rubber parts.... there was no interest in vastly more expensive parts that deal with the problem. A rubber problem, that I can, and have dealt with, Denial... I cant.

The biggest challenge I am faced with is the lack of consistency of this new fuel, both locally and Nationwide. Summer/winter blends, fuel separation in the underground tanks, CA/FL blends.... the list of variables is endless. Tackle the entire list of variables and then someone will finally come to the conclusion that this alcohol crap is just a political ploy that is doing more harm than good... and change the whole game again. If that doesn't dampen the motivation to follow through with this quest of mine, then I have to face the Fed's for "tampering with emissions equipment". Expecting to employ Logic with a Federal agency that, they themselves are guilty of tampering with emissions by changing the allowed fuel formulas...... There are some pretty sharp folks there but they keep the blinders pulled in tight because their job is a lot easier when the sample group they are told to deal with is limited to two years old or newer. What color is the sky in their pink fuzzy world? GREEN, the vast majority involved have a strong political agenda to prove. Give me pure alcohol and I can deal with that (BW is running his Stil full time for sampling... at least that is the excuse he is using when the Fed's show up), a moving target, once 10%, then 15%, then 20% when it separates in an underground storage tank at the gas station.... Give me ANYTHING consistant... I can and will find a way to deal with it.

A topic for another thread as it is only remotely connected to the topic at hand.