3x8GTB family starring at MEF in Modena

Live from MEF in Modena, the Enzo Ferrari Museum: 208 GTB turbo 40th birthday in the 75 th Ferrari aniversary exhibition, a one year long exhibition.

Pictures courtesy of the 208 GTB turbo owner, C.F.

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I want to point out that this is the very first time that Ferrari displays a 208 turbo, an Italian market only - and and very few else- model.

And not only: the 208 GTB turbo is displayed at the official 75th exhibition, an one year long display.

There is also displayed a wallpaper with the car's engine vith the "turbo" writing: this is the very first time that Ferrari official shows this.

Not many, outside Italy and Europe, even know that this model exhisted, and almost everyone still don't know which kind of engine was fitted in.

I think that now thinks are changing: 208 GTB turbo will stand exactly in the mid of MEF for one year, no less.

And Ferrari even displayed two models of the family at this very important 75th exhibition: a 208 GTB turbo and a 308 GTBi. They know how important was the 308 GTB family for Ferrari history, as without 308 GTB Ferrari story could have been very different.

Let me write that I'm VERY happy about this: the 308 GTB deserves respect as one of the most important and best looking Ferrari model ever.

And 208 GTB turbo, started the V8 Ferrari turbo era of the eighties: the 288 GTO came only two years later.

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Thank you Brian: also the fact that Flavio Manzoni - Ferrari chief design executive officier- owns a 208 turbo maybe helped a bit...

He also owns a copy of my book: I personally gave him by hands, during an official Ferrari event I attended.

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Sequentisl gearbox was a Ferrari engineer Fosco de Silvestri idea, who proposed it to the Ferrari race department principal Mauro Forghieri.

Mauro Forghieri words, spoken directly to me.

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You are doing a bit of confusion between a sequential gearbox (like every motorcycle has, means dogteeth gears without synchros, operated by a manual preselector lever) and an hydraulic operated semi-automatic gearbox with paddles at the steering wheel.

Ferrari, through Fosco de Silvestri, was the first in the world: it raced in 1989 F1 season with Nigel Mansell and Gerhard Berger, but they started the development in 1981. 355F1 (1997) was the first street car ever to have it.

Source: my books, "Ferrari - the turbo eight cylinders (1982-1989)" © 2019 and "Ferrari by Schedoni" English edition © 2021.

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Today, April 21, 2022, it's 208 GTB turbo 40th birthday, as it was introduced on April 21, 1982, at Turin Auto Show. It was the very first turbocharged Ferrari GT car ever and was produced for Italian market only: they wanted to have in their lineup a two liters version of 308 GTBi model but with the same power as the bigger three liters engine, who was fiscally disadvantaged on our Italian market, as happened with every other car who had a displacement exceeding the two liters limit. Actually they already produced the 208 GTB (with a carbed V8 NA engine), but it had a much lower top power than the 308 one, 60 hp less: so they decided to fill the power gap by adding a turbocharger to the 208 GTB engine (who was also fitted with Fuel Injection system), as already happend with Ferrari F1 engine since the previous year. It worked in F1 and the same happened with GT cars: the 208 GTB turbo top power tied the three liters 308 GTBi one and even went a bit over: 220 hp versus 214 hp (Italian market engine specifications) and was even a bit faster with 242 km/h versus 240 km/h for 308 GTBi (Italian market car specs). This car, despite being developed with a very low budget and without too many mods allowed, was the turbocharging pioneer for Ferrari: few years later they introduced the 288GTO (1984) and the F40 (1987), without forgetting the 208 turbo intercooled version (1986), based on 328. At Maranello the supercharging story started with this model, so Ferrari gave this car -not very well known ouside Italy- a big tribute in the present day 75th anniversary exhibition at official Ferrai Museum MEF in Modena, Italy, where this picture was taken: it shows the 208 GTB turbo aside its sister, the 308 GTBi.

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