Front V12

The 550 Daytona, for sure, although mine is a 575M.

 

I thought that was what you asked. Have had a Daytona, but not a Barchetta. The Daytona is an all weather Ferrari and mine was a daily driver. The Barchetta is a fair weather car with fairly modern underpinnings.

 

The 575M is much better suited to daily driving like I use mine. AC works, power steering, good brakes etc, which were wanting on the Daytona. Mine has great aftermarket ceramic brakes.

Not an easy comparison between a classic worth $600K+ and a relative modern worth $100K+.

Daytona was easy to maintain for a knowledgeable owner, 575M requires a good diagnostic tool to maintain.

 

I vote 550 Barchetta, modern power, but still a very collectible open Ferrari.

 

This really comes down to budget and use case.

A vintage Ferrari (read Enzo era/Daytona and prior) are really old at this point (what 45 years minimum). That’s a very different driving experience than a ~2000 550.

For me, I would grab a 250GTE over a Daytona but that’s personal preference. I would also take a Daytona over a modern Ferrari.

Do you want a vintage car and all it’s headaches and rewards or a modern car that is much easier to live with?

 

Yup, except when it rains. But then, most folks do not drive their Daytonas in the rain, either.

 

Vintage is easier to diy if you can get the parts.

 

Affirmative, did all my own maintenance on my Daytona. A copy of Angelo Wallace's English translation of the WSM makes it pretty easy. You can pull Daytona distributors in less than 5 minutes.

 

Old cars are like a romantic fairytale. In theory they are glorious, in real life they can be a pain. Even a 90-ies/2000 car can give you challenges, but in my opinion, many more real life good experiences with a drivable modern car.

 

Much as I like Daytonas, I would think the Barchetta would be less trouble and more likely to appreciate. Ferrari hasn't made many 12-cylinder convertibles.

 

Every 5 years, you have to change the cambelts on the Barchetta. The Daytona has chains driving the camshafts, which are very easy to adjust and last a very long time. The Barchetta has hydraulic lifters while the Daytona has shim adjustment solid lifters that need checking every 6000 miles or so. Mine only had two out of 24 that needed shims while I had her. Very easy to change shims.

There were over twice as many Daytona coupes as Barchettas, but there are 5000 similar Maranello coupes. Since a Barchetta will cost somewhere around half the price of a good Daytona, might be a better deal. Nobody knows about appreciation, but the Daytona was a much bigger milestone for Ferrari than the Barchetta.

You need to do some serious research on this if you really are serious about one of these V-12s.

 

To your question about which will be more troublesome to maintain, there are many ECUs on the Maranello to control everything from engine management to something as simple as door windows. The ECUs worry me more than anything else on my car, because when they start to fail, I can’t fix them myself. Hopefully there will be people out there that can repair the ECUs that can no longer be replaced with new units. The Daytona may or may not be as reliable, and may require more tuning to keep running right, but it should be easier to diagnose and repair when something does go wrong.