Guys, I'd like to do a research on the first owner of this Oct 1976 built steel body GTB. It is believed to be a California car, where should I begin? CA DMV? Thanks! Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Would you mind telling us more details about 20181 ? It is one of the first batch of US market steel car (the 5th), I have seen 20189 here which were imported in Europe 2 years ago so it is quite exiting to see cars from that period.
Would love to after I completed my full research. She is mostly original & a very special car indeed.
Great! I have 20189 from october 1976 with a F106A-01986 engine, you should be close to that. I have plenty of minor details to compare when you will post some pictures. That a great research you're starting. Your car is really one of the first steel car, 20189 was the car used for the homologation so 20181 was on the same line.... Do you know your body number ?
Thanks! This pair 1st 76 & final 89 years of GTB are important milestone of the company. Interesting comparing the two in Innovations & driving experiences.
CA DMV is a good bet, however they only go back so far. They were not much help with #21039. We have a guy in PA that does this sort of stuff if you are interested, Bryon Shook Esq. Contact me if you want his info. Market Letter might have something. Kathy runs the publication now and I'm sure she will be happy to help if she can. Very nice car you have there!
Thanks for the compliment & suggestions George. The CA DMV office is only a few miles away, I'll visit them in person in a few weeks after return from my overseas trip. The oral 1st owner worths all my effort, I'm going all out to reconstruct the entire history.
I really look forward to the results of your research regarding the first owner! Safe travels, Robert www.308gtb.de
Cool find! I had #20405. But it's history was lost to time, never did track it down. Enjoy the drive! Alan #22127
Ahh... the '76 Steel Club! The cars every Ferrari book I owned (not mention many legitimately smarty-pants owners) claimed did not exist. Wish I was still a member... Mine was 20577, had been turned into a "track car" (not full-on race car). PO great guy from North Carolina, had the car for about 10 years. I brought to Los Angeles, Only owned from about 2003 to 2005...ish). Fantastic car. (Besides the puckering-inducing "0" oil pressure in Turn 8 at Willow). Sold to Spain (exact location not at fingertips - and new owner would not even return my emails about a buy-back). Biggest car sale regret of all time (and I've got a few). Good luck to you on your quest.
Back about 2000-1 there was a guy that was quite active on an early Ferrari e-mail based forum (Ferrari List?) that had one of the very early steel body cars. IIRC, it was black and was located in the mid Atlantic area of the east coast. He sold the car and eventually left the forum. Some other old timer with a better memory may have more info.
At the beginning (at least in 1976), US steel 308 were made in batches like the vetroresina. The first batch of car has 32 chassis from 20173 to 20235 (maybe 34 cars, the border of the batch are not clearly market identified) on october 76. There are 2 other batches in November and December, then in 1977 US market cars are mix with the others markets (even if there are 2 or 3 cars in a row, sometime there is only one). I am working on them to collect datas but there are rare as you know...so they are less documented than the vetroresina.
Thanks for all the comments, just return from Overseas trip, my buddies in Hong Kong never heard of a steel body 76 308 GTB TripleBlack: According to your information, 1st batch starting s/n: 20173, mine is 20181. Does it make mine 8th car produced ? I remember you mentioned 5th previously. How is the Ferrari algorithm? I was told she is a California car from day 1, I'm hoping with Smart city, Open Government Big Data, 1st Owner history can be found from California DMV.
There is no even number so before your car, there is: 20173 20175 20177 20179 then yours is 5th except if 20171, which is a 308, is an US market car. I don't have that information. I mean, this is the 5th chassis assigned, doesn't mean it is the 5th out of the production line. Depending of the option, color or test, cars were not always in order at the end but for sure, they were all together in the ship to US! Good luck with your search in California, I can't help you from here.
Yes, street cars used only the odd numbers, until "modern times".....like PenP, who I traded street parts with, I hated to let go of #20405. It went to NYC and to my knowledge was not resold.... It was originally blue. I hope it shows back up that color!!
miked (post #18) I may be the owner of that car. Mid Atlantic, Black, early 2000’s could match my PO. TripleBlack (post #19) do you have anymore info on batch 2 and 3? Thanks, sorry for the thread highjack... Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Went to the local DMV & got a vehicle record request information form, ownership history should be public records, let's see what happens. Image Unavailable, Please Login
