Why do some F Cars have shields?

Typically and option 90% of the time. I personally love them!

 

back in the day, enzo put them on his racing cars for good luck....and to identify the marque i suppose.

 

To add to the above post: Ferrari has put the shields on special edition production cars for many years (cost free) ie F40, F50, Enzo, 360 Stradale.

I believe Ferrari deceided to make it an ($1250) option to install the shields on standard production cars with the F 355 and on (in around 97/98).

 

vref, sorry to interrupt your post, but your not an Airline Pilot are you? Just curious from your username.

 

Years ago, I was told the shields were put on the road cars that were produced in certain numbers to homologate a competition version for a race series.

 

the badges were put on a car if it had a Scaglietti work done to it.

 

the prancing horse on the shield with the letters S and F originally appeared on several Alfa Romeos when Enzo Ferrari was the Alfa race team manager before WWII. The S and F stand for 'Scuderia Ferrari', literally meaning Stable Ferrari, or Team Ferrari.

As far as I know, until about the mid-1980s the SF shield never appeared on production cars; only race cars. And even then, the only race cars the shields were put on were entrants officially sponsored by the Ferrari factory. Race cars originally sold to privateers generally did not wear the SF shields because they were not factory team cars. It made no difference whether the bodywork was designed by Vignale, Pininfarina or Scaglietti (the coachwork designers had their own badging on the cars). The earliest exception I've seen to this rule were the sports racers delivered to and raced in California in the mid-late 1950s by Johnnie Von Neumann, Richie Ginther, Carroll Shelby, et al. Given the tight affiliation between Ferrari and these early american Ferrari pioneers, Ferrari may have viewed them as factory cars.

The first production cars I know of to have the SF shields applied by the factory were the 288 GTOs. After that, I don't know of any rhyme or reason other than the shields became options. I think they look good and are a neat way to remind everyone of Ferrari's racing pedigree.

 

Reminds me of:

Q "How can you tell at a party if someone's a pilot?"

A "Give them five minutes and they'll be sure to tell you".


Or. A pilot's out on a first date with a girl and after about a hour of telling her how wonderful he is he says "right, that's enough about me let's talk about flying..."