458 RFATM3F - New Owner Rehab + Build

I have never done a dedicated thread for any of my cars but this seems like a good place to start. I’m going to keep it less about the car and more about the tweaks.

As I drove the car home for the first time, the weather was nice enough to have the windows down. It was fine leaving the neighborhood but as soon as I got on the highway, 15 year old foam swirled around the cabin and into my eyes. The next day I pulled apart the rear interior and removed the lower firewall panel. I evaluated a few options but figured a used carpet version from eBay was the best for now. I may try to fix the oem leather one at some point with new foam and a mdf backing, but we’ll see.

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The next project was to replace badges, lights, and emblems on the front of the car. One thing lead to another and here we are. I removed the front bumper, cleaned up a mouse house, and started planning to fix a bunch of little things I found along the way.

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One of the next items I addressed was front bumper protection. It was a bit scratched up but nothing too terrible. I looked at all the options and decided on the auto mods product. Not sponsored. It’s expensive.

Pretty happy with it overall. I think it’s made in the US. Comprehensive kit with everything supplied. No drilling. They suggest you start with the rear side pieces, which I understand, but it left a super tight fit for the front part. It wound up being perfect for me, but I can see some pain if it was too narrow.

Did I mention it’s expensive?

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Next item up is going to be swapping out the clapped novitec springs for some Novelli Competizione. My novitec seem to be missing some spring isolators in the front at the bottom and the bump stops are shot. I ordered new oem bumpstops.


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Got the Novelli Competizione springs in today. I can’t wait to get these installed. They come with printed instructions + tools.

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Tonight’s progress. Springs largely look the same length but missing that spacer really limited my ability to adjust the height. The novitec bump stops crumbled taking them out.

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They use hyperco. The rest of the parts are derlin instead of whatever cheap plastic novitec uses.

 

This is what else they had to say vs novitec

More travel, more consistent rate it will possibly be a little bit stiffer but will ride better

I also discovered the tools aren’t really necessary for the 458. Standard deep 17 and 18mm sockets work fine. One side of the lower strut bolt is a 12mm hex. I had to go out to get one of those.