2011 California retractable top doesn't work properly

Be more specific. Sensors are usually the problem on a new car but on an older one, maybe something else.

 

Cleaning the sensors isn't going to work, they are magnetic hall effect sensors. On my car they had to hook the system up to a computer at FNA in NJ to get it correctly analyzed. Just looking at voltages isn't enough. If the sensors are misaligned that can also be a problem. I have a thread on here from a year ago where this happened on my car. Took more than one try to fix it.

 

I had the same problem on my 2011. Ferrari of LI first tried to adjust it but that did not work. They then replaced sensor(s) and that fixed it.

 

Did your roof just started to act up or have you always had this problem since you got your car?

 

Do your Ferrari mechanics work for a Dealership or independent shop?

S

 

Almost certainly a bad sensor ... or, more accurately, bad solder joint or wiring to a sensor. My understanding is the sensors are soldered into the wiring harness. My (former) 2013 had intermittent issues and generated "roof failure" warnings while driving over bumpy roads or occasionally operating the top, which I attributed to the wiring being jostled and causing an "implausible roof position" error -- i.e., the car thought the top was suddenly in motion when it was in fact fully open or closed. After a couple of ineffective attempts to fix it by guessing at which sensor it might be, the dealership worked with the factory and got it sorted out. There was never a mechanical issue with the roof, it would always open and close correctly, except when a warning was generated and the roof would stop to protect itself. Most often the failure notices occurred when the roof was not in motion. The good news -- if there is any -- is that if it's failing consistently it will be easier for them to figure out which is the offending sensor. When it's intermittent and they can't reproduce the error, they have to guess.

 

If it appears your car already had the problem when you got it and it was a used car then I would pull and examine the complete service record on the car before doing anything. Why? Because previous owner(s) probably already grappled with the problem and you do not want to waste money to duplicate what has already been tried and failed. You also want to see the notes from previous repair attempts and dissect them, to see if they missed something.

There are some very specific problems that can affect the roof. See if they have already been checked from the service records. Most importantly, you want to locate the service record which shows WHEN THE PROBLEM FIRST OCCURRED. If the problem appeared soon after original delivery, then it is likely due to a problem with assembly alignment or a defective but otherwise reliable component which may be different from the ones prone to fail due to usage, like the hydraulic pump or sensors.

I experienced serious, also intermittent, roof problems soon after I took delivery of my new car. It took several failed attempts and a very long time to sort out as it turned out to be a slight misalignment that occurred during assembly, possibly at the German factory that supplies the roof or at Ferrari when the roof was installed.

In my situation, there were no error codes and it was intermittent probably due to ambient temperature which would cause the fitment of the moving arms to be tighter, more prone to stick, when cold, something that indeed was my case. It happened on colder days - there would be a noise, "POP" when the arms suddenly unstuck and sometime struck the roof. It dented the roof panel, TWICE, hence roof panel was repaired twice. Very expensive repairs... luckily all paid for by the factory because the car was very much under warranty. This is why you want to own a car that has been used regularly by a picky owner(s). The owner has to complain and persist till the problem is fixed so be wary if the previous owner(s) flipped the car. I cycle my roof every time I drive the car so it will definitely fail if there is a defect. It's been fine since it was fixed in 2015.

Independent chops will not have access to the factory's trouble database or experts with notes on related failures, fixes or have fixed as many of the same model of car as a dealer. Some problems can be easily fixed by swapping parts but you cannot swap the whole roof. So this type of complex problem requires traditional troubleshooting skills and experienced mechanics with access to as much information from the current (and previous service records) as well as factory data.

 

They hooked mine up to an analyzer and sent the results to FNA who then figured out which sensor was bad. The first attempt the dealership made was to re-align one of the sensors but that didn't work. They hooked up the computer and ran the top through a full sequence then sent the file to FNA. I don't think the indy can do that.

 

The failure of the roof position sensors on the California/T is a fairly common issue. They are hall effect sensors and the alignment and output voltages of the sensor are critical in communicating the positions of the different parts of the roof to the ECU. This allows the ECU to move all of the pieces of the roof without having them crash into each other. If the roof ECU sees a problem with the output of any of these sensors it stops the operation of the roof as a fail-safe.
Your mechanic has to have a diagnostic computer that allows him to see the outputs of these sensors and know what the acceptable parameters are for the values of the sensor outputs. The sensors will also fail intermittently, work fine most of the time and then fail once in a while. I find that lightly tapping on them while watching the output voltages will reveal if the sensor is defective.
Finally the fault memory of the top ECU should list which sensor is causing the issue. If the top stopped working, then a fault should have been stored and your mechanic should be able to determine what the cause was by looking at the stored faults.