My First Ferrari!!

I have been a Porsche club member for 35 years and have had many different models over the years. They are great cars and my wife and I have enjoyed both the performance of the cars and the people we have met through PCA.

However, I have always wanted to own a Ferrari. I recently attended the Euro Auto Festival at the BMW factory in Spartanburg, SC. While there I struck up conversations with some Ferrari owners. Two of them had 348's while one had a 360 but had previously owned a 348. They talked about having some electrical issues and about having to remove the motor to do a major maintenance. They also mentioned that the motor was very durable if serviced properly. The 360 owner liked the steering feel of his 348 better than that in the 360.

I have always liked 308's but, after talking with these gentlemen, I searched for a suitable 348. I found one here in NC that caught my eye. At the same time, I was also looking at buying a Porsche 996 twin turbo. Familiarity with Porsches made the TT an easy choice and I drove a low mileage one that was very fast. After that test drive, I checked out the 348, test drove it and fell in love with both the looks and the driving experience. It has 33K miles with all the records back to day one. The tool kit and books were also present. Both the exterior and interior were in great shape, a price was reached and it now resides in my garage.

This past Saturday I drove it to the Cars and Coffee meet near downtown Charlotte. Later that day my wife and I drove it over 100 miles checking out the fall colors on some of the great sports car roads in this area. The more I drive it, the better I like it.

I had been lurking on this site for some time. It appears to be a great resource for Ferrari owners. I have a two post lift and do my own maintenance work. The car had the belt service performed in 2008 but only two thousand miles ago. My son and I plan on pulling the motor to perform this work during the winter months ahead. We are both looking forward to the project.
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Thanks for the compliments. I might change out the Alpine radio to a more modern unit with USB and AUX inputs. I joined FOC today. Looking forward to becoming involved with the club.

My wife and I both used to autocross and do PCA track days but have retired from that. So the car will be used for pleasure drives like the one we took on Saturday. I still like to drive hard on twisty roads but am wary of getting tickets. I can remember when having a good radar detector actually did a lot of good in that time before "instant on".

What I like about this car is that, other than ABS, it does not have all of the computer aids common to today's cars. The steering is very alive and the brakes have great feel. So even though it is much newer than my '67 Porsche 912 (it has an early 80's 911SC motor), it still has that feedback that is so much a part of driving an early 911.
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A guy in California bought this 912 in 1983 when he was 16. He and his dad took it down to bare metal to restore it. It had always been a California car so rust was minimal. He drove it for 11 years going through two 912 motors. He traded the last motor for the SC motor and tranny in 1994 when they did the transplant. He owned the car until March of this year.

It also has the gauges from the donor car so the odometer matches the mileage on the motor. He installed SC power windows, power brake booster, and gas tank with space saver tire. The car originally did not have a sunroof so he bought a '79 roof with a sunroof, cut off the old roof and installed the '79 roof. One advantage of doing this, besides gaining a sunroof, was that he also installed the three point harness from the '79 since the anchors were already in the new roof.

It had aftermarket Fuchs on it which were painted white in the centers. I recently found the steel wheels which makes it look very vintage, more like its 356 ancestor. It is a fun car and, because of the changes made, I am pretty much free to do whatever I want with the car. Since it was a California car, it had all of the emission equipment which I am going to remove by backdating the exhaust. I am in the process of adding AC (very hot and muggy here in NC in the summer).

Because of my restless leg syndrome, I also installed cruise control on the Porsche. My leg does not like long periods of holding down the throttle. It works great!! How blasphemous would it be to install cruise on the 348??
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Good looking car and gal. You are just a bit younger than me. Below is a photo of my wife of 45 years when we were freshmen in 1967!! And what a car that Ford was!!! The epitome of find handling and ferocious power! On the plus side, there was lots of room inside!!!
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I have never had one but I like GT6's as well.

I bought the car from an independent Ferrari dealer, Sport Auto, in Summerfield, NC. He used to own a high end dealership which included Ferrari but was not happy with the way things were changing on the business end. So he now has a very nice building, one mechanic who dresses exactly like the mechanic on "Chasing Classic Cars", a secretary, and a detail guy. This is the third time he has sold this particular car. They referred to it as their "Family Ferrari" as it always came back home. He told me that every owner thus far on this car had taken great care of it and that he did not think it had ever sat out overnight. Most of the history on the car was either with his current dealership or with the larger dealership he used to be associated with.

By the way, it was the best auto buying experience I have ever had. He was on the phone when when I arrived so he had his mechanic go over the car with me. He spent about 30 minutes showing me things I should know about the car, such as where the fuses are, the windshield washer reservoir, etc. We talked about my doing the timing belt service and he said he was only a phone call away if I had a question.

Once the owner had completed his phone call, he asked if I was ready for a test drive. And, by the way, he had some sick cattle and would I mind stopping at the farm supply store to get some medicine? After the medicine run, he took me on about 25 miles of great sports car roads. As we were nearing the end of our drive, he asked me to stop at the guy's business where he has his cars state inspected. This guy had had some legal problems and he wanted to let him know he had his support.

And so it went from there. No pressure and every question answered. I would highly recommend Steve and the dealership.