How the heck do you guys work on these cars?

So, I'll preface by saying, I don't mean "how do I use a wrench?". I'm used to working on japanese cars with robust workshop/FSM's. Like my Lexus service manual had a reference in each chapter listing every kind of body retainer used in that section and how they could be opened without damaging them. Torque specs for two-piece plastic bolt covers. Part number summaries at the end of each section. Really well documented stuff.

The joke I had made for Italian cars is torque specs are one of three things - "poco" "mezzo" or "molto". I have learned this is not true; most fasteners simply aren't shown in the workshop manual whatsoever.

I'm going to be gearing up to do some work on my 456 in the fall (sorting the windows and seats definitely will come first), and am probably gonna start assembling my to-do list with part numbers and such over the summer. So I was curious... when you guys are setting out to do a project, what's your workflow like? Is this a "tear into it now, order parts later" sort of car? Do you use the illustrations from scuderia/ricambi? Do you have other documentation? Do I just have the wrong FSM? I'm a pretty good wrench, but stuff like the door cable issue when doing the window regulators with no procedure for correcting it in the FSM has me a little spooked. That, and breaking the plastic clips that were fragile when they left the factory, let alone after 30 years.

Separately, I'm sure this won't be my last thread. Sorry I haven't added vanity pics yet, but the rain has been following my planned driving schedule.

 

My answer is very simple I don't
Luckily I have two wonderful master FERRARI technicians that do all the lovely work for me....

 

Diagnostics first (with help from the forum). If someone has done the job before, there may be a tutorial (which explains better than the WSM). Order parts to see if they exist, then dive in.

 

Ha. Anything that makes the car go or stop I'll be leaving to the pros. Fortunately there's nothing on the car rising to imminent need - one or two rotors are a little wobbly but that's about it. But in the meantime, I can spot tons of stuff I'll have fun sorting through. Window gaps/microswitch function adjustment, seat function, the suspension actuators are off the struts and probably sheared, the radio only has one speaker working, tons of engine bay cleanup stuff like missing hardware and battery tray, I can sort through the vacuum lines and rubbery bits, fuel tank stuff since it's pretty smelly, maybe adjusting the closers for trunk/hood... replacing plastics for switches... seriously no shortage. It will take me years but once I finish my shed and basement I'll need new projects anyways.

 

The manuals and technical information for cars of this age group is better than at any point in the companies history. It is assumed you are a competent, experienced mechanic.
The manuals are to provide specifications and in some cases to explain theory of operation. Not to instruct you how to fix the car.
I find American, German and Japanese manuals to be hundreds of pages of needless information.

Ferraris newer manuals on the other hand will tell you in detail how to remove and install a wheel or an oil filter but little or nothing on how the car works. But then Ferrari no longer really wants anyone fixing cars. They prefer you just buy a new one.

 

Oh I get the “tech vs mechanic” theory independent of whether I agree with the approach - I mean I do agree it’s probably overwrought to have 15 pages to change an alternator - but I was looking more to hear about how you personally plan your workflow.

For something like the door rods where the factory clearly set them with a certain procedure, I do think it’s silly they don’t include the info on replicating that. I know if they fall out of alignment it can take a very long time to correct. On a Mazda it would take 10 minutes because they gave you a procedure. Yeah, it can be fixed, but this is some of why simple jobs turn into multi-thousand dollar repairs even at experienced shops.

 

The Ferrari manuals are just a guide, not a cookbook, which is where they and their philosophy differ from American and Japanese manuals.

IMO, it all begins with the ability to diagnose, which differentiates people who are successful working on Ferraris from your average dropout working at an American dealership with a cookbook to tell him exactly what comes next. They are little more than parts changers, and in fact, many of them don’t even understand what the parts do and would be totally helpless without the aid of the diagnostic computer

It’s a real pity that the auto industry has gotten to the point where the procedures have to be dumbed down to meet the skills of the technicians rather than the technicians ability being elevated to meet the technology. This was never more obvious than when GM discontinued the LT5 engine because its “complex” DOHC, V-8 developed by Lotus couldn’t be supported by its dealers.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Japanese engines more than most. They are well engineered jewels, and I love to work on them. It’s just that Ferraris offer more of a challenge and more opportunities to improve than the Japanese do.

 

I have been working professionally on Ferrari for over 45 years and have never heard of a door rod.
You are suggesting a book might save bad mechanics from themselves. Not possible.
That book was printed for me....not for you.

GM books are full of flow charts instead of raw information. Start with "Engine does not run" 5 pages and 150 steps later I find out a crank timing sensor is bad. Great if you have an 88 IQ and not sure if water runs uphill or down. A Ferrari book teaches me the theory of operation of the engine management system and now knowing how it works in a few minutes I can find a bad crank timing sensor. Or at least they used to.
Nothing replaces a brain. Now when I started in this business the mechanics in my first Ferrari dealer we all had higher educations than company management. All had college, some had advanced degrees, one was a physics PHD dropout from Cal and one had a law degree.
Now we are lucky to have high school diplomas. Such is the state of skilled labor nation wide.

Kleenex cars (use them once and throw them away) and all manner of consumer goods make a great deal more sense since I see zero happening to fix education.
The adult woman at the grocery store has to ask me how much 2 50 dollar bills are so she can punch it into the cash register. Our problem is not shop manuals designed for the educated.

 

I had one of the shops I use replace the glow plugs on my ‘92 diesel Ford Centurion.

it has a turbo timer on it….i had incorrectly assumed most people and surely mechanics would know what that device is….

when I picked up the truck the notes section of my invoice said something like “after test drive truck did not shut off immediately, further diagnosis needed”. 8-(

Shame on me for buying an analog truck and not the 7.3L power stroke which is computerized and just retards everything electronically so even a child would have a hard time blowing one up.

 

I could have a philosophical discussion on this all day because there's a lot I agree with and a lot I don't. I had a VSS error getting thrown on an older, possibly pre-OBD Nissan (can't remember if it was a 95 or 96). Nissan's docs included a pinout for the sensor and resistance tests across the sensor for 0 RPM and at idle. It ended up being a problem with my instrument cluster, which I only figured out because the wiring diagram said it went to the tach in series before the ECU. So I had the multimeter with like 10' backprobe leads until I found it. This error did not have a diagnosis procedure, but on the other hand, with no published resistance spec I would have just kept changing **** and pulling it in and out of the trans because everything had continuity/open where it should have, and a new sensor would probably have had the same resistance.

So yeah, I agree a good mechanic needs to be able to take some rudimentary information and run with it. But I disagree that Ferrari has published sufficient information as it relates to electronics and interior work for people who do not work on these cars professionally. Knowing where blind clips are on a $1000+ piece of trim shouldn't be information available only to people who were trained by Ferrari and worked on them since they were new. It shouldn't be incumbent on the community to document that on Ferrari's behalf. But in my opinion that's sort of where we are now. I'm still grateful there's as much information as there is, but "hire a pro if you don't want to break anything" is sort of unfair when there's plenty of high-end shops that break clips too.

If you want to make the argument that people who haven't worked on cars at a professional level just shouldn't work on a Ferrari at all, I'm not ready to have that discussion until I've started going through mine. Again - I'm just trying to make that a successful endeavor by hearing how other people prepare. Not how to turn a wrench. I am sure others don't want their cars down for 3 months waiting for parts, or buying a bunch of stuff up front they didn't end up needing. So I'm trying to learn how other people balance that. You're saying the state of the world is people have no interest in learning to be better mechanics... but here I am asking "how can I be a better mechanic" and your answer is "try working on these cars for 45 years"? C'mon man.

And w/r/t "door rods" I suppose "door lever connecting rods" would be the technical term. Actually Ricambi calls them "handle connection rear rod for door". Thought it was sufficiently clear in the context of the window regulator repair. Sorry.

 

My toolbox is a credit card.

 

Ferrari doesn't want anyone other than franchised dealers working on the cars. I guess you missed that memo. They work very hard at depriving all but their dealerships any technical information, special tools or equipment. The don't give a **** about helping you

 

That’s a very good point - and yeah I needed to be reminded.

 

- Check the part diagrams to understand how things are put together and which items wear out
- check which of the wear items are still available and which are the "expensive" parts that will be manipulated to pay extra attention when manipulating them
- when everything is apart, assess the condition of each part and list which should be replaced
- order new parts
- fit/reassemble new parts
- enjoy the results that cost you nothing in labour and probably better done yourself than by a so-called pro mechanic paid by the hour who most likely doesn't give a **** about your pride and joy

 

If your mechanic doesn't give a **** about your pride and joy thats your fault. You have that choice to make and there are plenty that can and will do a better job than you on your best day. But since you are lazy as well as cheap you are not picking those.

 

Lol, you are so easy to turn on, it's always a joy to have a dig at pro mechanics if only to piss you off.

FWIW one of my best friends I learned wrenching with turned into a pro mechanic 10 years ago and folks drive all the way across the country to bring him their cars. This just tells how many crooks and inept professionals there are around these days.

 

And your profession is full of saints.

By the way. Thanks for proving me right.

 

You are welcome, my friend.

 

Thanks for the helpful and unusually on-topic response. Breaking something that is NLA is my biggest fear - not being an "actual mechanic" instead of a tech.

 

There is no reason to break anything if you are "on it". It is all about taking as much time as one needs to do things right, a luxury that many pro mechanics may not have with several customer cars lined up and said customers calling in regularly to ask if things get moving and not necessarily caring about the time needed to source parts hard to find. The very few times I ever needed to have something done by a pro mechanic I HATED having to wait and wonder if things were going smooth or not and that stress vastly prevailed over the results. Just my approach but I prefer to also bear the responsibility for my own failures (which thankfully have never been dramatic) than having to pay someone do something that I enjoy and can do myself as regardless of the results there is always something to be learned in the process. These are connoisseurs' cars, not Kleenex cars as rightfully said earlier and in my opinion, and not putting my hands in them would be for me missing the point. Each to their own anyway, and I will always respect pro mechanics who have the business side to manage in addition to the wrenching. I love wrenching on my cars and on friends' cars but not on someone else's cars who don't have the same mindset, regardless how exotic their cars can be.

 

Good advice. I haven't dug into how the interior of this car is put together (e.g., bolts, vs plastic perimeter clips and locking tabs, vs christmas trees, vs metal spring clips) but breaking non-replaceable locking tabs on upholstered trim is the biggest thing I'm worried about. Any advice for removing interior panels? Am I making too much out of it because they're all serviceable clips?

 

Op sounds like you never work on Italian cars. Best tip is to figure out how the system you are trying to fix works. Start on small projects and work up to bigger ones. Ferraris are tough to do on a time schedule. Sometimes you do get things apart and have to wait for parts. It’s Italian. There was a time we could only get Chinese oem Ferrari timing bearings. Cars either had to sit or use the fast to fail Ferrari bearing to get them on the road knowing the job would need to get done again soon. After about a year Hill made us a quality timing bearing everyone now uses. That’s just Ferrari.

A little research on fchat can save pain. You can take knowledge of other car wrenching skills like rebuilding a water pump. You can buy the seals for a 550 water pump for example from ricambi. But you need to know Ferrari quirks that the seal is made so fragile they fracture on install without a special tool. Sometimes the installer does not realize the crack in the seal and installs it only to have leaks out the weep hole. Work slow and methodically….aka…measure twice cut once.

 

This is the last of the real Ferraris. You need to work on them the way you would a vintage Ferrari. These are the real deal.

 

how do I work on my car? VERY CAREFULLY Review the WSM and parts diagram, research forum and if I will need a Ferrari diagnostic tool or reset tool or if the car must be on a lift to do work, it goes to a Ferrari mechanic-like for F1 fluid change, or clutch position sensor.

 

Yup, first Italian car. I always knew there was gonna be an adjustment, so just trying to figure out some of those nuances before I tear the car apart. Stuff in-season will be very small (hood struts and fixing at least parts of the seats, maybe sending out the suspension actuators since they don't appear to be doing anything anyways) with bigger stuff after fall is over because of the timeline stuff you mentioned.

That's about where I draw the line as well. I might get ramps to try and do the O2 sensors and tuck the wires a little more cleanly, but I'm not looking to get involved in fluids or the inner workings. Any other tips for avoiding breaking trim pieces?