I thought F8 spider was a mess for flex
A lot of the rattles on the 458 were just bad build quality. Dash rattle happened on the coupe also. Once I had the dash removed for sticky button repair, the tech was telling me how it’s basically just a collection of shims and screws underneath. One or two of my screws were loose. That fixed my particular dash rattle, but for others it was the shims. Never got the driver side mirror to stop, and don’t think many other did either. That occurred at even school zone speeds.
You’re not wrong, but for most buyers are they approaching 150 on an often enough basis for it to ever matter? Some guys use it in an argument that it’s a bad car just like 0-60 times. For the general buyer it’s not significant. At least that’s my opinion but I’m also not spider guy.
Maybe I have not been in one going fast enough. At what speed did you notice the flex in your experience
I had two 458 spiders and two coupes (Speciale). Lots of flex but the car is sooo brilliant I don’t care. Such a better driving experience over the coupe. And the 488 Spyder I bought was pretty rigid but super boring.
I think the problem with the 458 spider is that as the car flexes over bumps, the roof panels clunk rather inelegantly as they bounce off each other. You solve this in part by driving exclusively top down, but it makes the worst sounds doing 13mph over the wrong pothole. At triple digit speeds in a straight line or on the highway, I don't think flex is an issue. Maybe 458SA/488/F8 are better; certainly 296 is (or at least near new 296 GTS felt much stiffer than 10 year old 458 with 20kmi). 458 was definitely less stiff than same era Boxster (987).
Ah, interesting. Thanks for sharing. That’s the price you spider owners should have to pay for destroying the great engine bay art piece back there so you can tan your bald little heads! Kidding, kidding…
The suspension is stiffer in the 458 speciale and aperta over the standard 458 but there is no additional bracing in the body to reduce flex. So the flex is the same. The flex in the Pista spider is also terrible, reported from an owner i personally know who has tracked their spider only to later sell and go back to the coupe version as he couldn’t stand how flimsy the body felt when the car was pushed hard. If Ferrari has finally paid attention to reducing flex in 296 spider, its certainly been long overdue.
I cannot believe so many of you find the spider to be better looking! I am intrigued by this; honestly. To hide the engine bay like the opening scene of Inglorious Bastards is sacrilege, but it is the opinion of so many, I’m shocked. I thought spider owners just bit the bullet on the looks (unnatural curves, ugly buttresses, no engine view, etc.) because the ends justified the means.
IMHO (looks/design only) 296: both look great (spider does not compromise the design/lines of the coupe) 458/488: coupe looks better (spider design looks compromised from certain angles, top up or down) Look at the lines from different angles. Top up and top down.
This isn't strictly accurate. More downforce at the back of the car helps breaking effectiveness as it allows a larger contact patch for the rear tyres and hence allows the disc brakes to grab harder. Hence the 296's cute pop up lip spoiler or the 720s / 750s dramatic pop up bat wing. While more weight bias towards the back of the car also increase the rear contact patch it also has a detrimental effect on handling as it creates a polar moment of inertia that is back heavy while rotating around the front wheels. So the point here is to differentiate between mass and weight (which is bad for handling balance) and downforce (which is helpful for on limit handling). You want to minimise the former while optimising the latter. Think about this from the POV of a 1980s 911 driver: those that didn't drive backwards through a hedge well understand that with all that weight bias towards the back of the car and without any modern traction controls they needed to brake early with steering near straight ahead, turn in and hit the apex of the turn on totally neutral throttle and they could power out of the turn early relative to other cars with the 911's rear weight bias. This dangerous and unwanted on the brakes squirrelyness of these 911s was due to the rear biased polar moment of inertia of the cars.
@rsguy I can personally attest that the 296GTS has no cowl shake vs the previous generation of GTS mid-engines.
The reason that the rear wings deploy under braking is not so much for downforce purposes, but to function as aerodynamic brakes. Regarding the polar motion of inertia, there is of course a sweet spot, you cannot go 100% rear (or front) biased. More weight on the rear wheels is (to the effect of 60%-40%) is beneficial though, regarding the overall handling. That is why even front-mid Ferraris utilise a transaxle gearbox, so they can achieve rear weight bias. The problem with the 911 is that its engine is outside of the wheelbase, thus creating very high polar moment of inertia values.
Just lowered the offer to $20k under list on my 296 GTS and still no takers. Not sure if it's the time of year or the market is soft, or both. https://rocklandcounty.ferraridealers.com/en-US/a/used-ferrari/296-gts/ZFF01SMA4R0309870-1733126932962 Image Unavailable, Please Login
I'm getting told by my dealer that there are too many of them on the market and not much demand. The wholesale value is apparently 50k below MSRP for GTS and 100k for GTB. That's not good.
Covid aside, it’s probably historically in line and even better than normal. I bet there are a lot of buyers when the GTS is transacting $50k below.
I find the touch panels on the steering wheel extremely annoying to operate, the car itself is so complicated with all the modes, I don’t want a car that is a plug-in hybrid, I know it shouldn’t matter but I don’t like that it’s a V6 and the car is way too powerful for such a little car. I know this last one is a silly criticism for a sports car but we are talking 800+ horsepower in something the size of a Porsche boxter. Objectively it is a great modern car, but I just wasn’t feeling it. I couldn’t wait to get back in my 2011 911 with a stick shift, naturally aspirated engine and 400 hp. It’s just not for me. I hope it goes to a good home.
