"Haines" Ferrari Manual! Who wants one?

Yep, would love to have one.

 

Philip, your right. I've been a mechanic sence I was about 9 racing go karts. I have a hard time with the original Ferrari manuals. I'm in southern Calif. and running into other 308 drivers is far and few between. I also think that if we could put to gather the most needed parts and best fixes, we would all drive a little more than just now and then. I think we need to come up with a good brake system that doesn't cost more than you want for brakes. Also temp. sencers, latches, gauges, and performance products. I have most of a machine shop in my garage from building up old cars, but how many Ferrari owners would be interested in after market parts made in America. I get disapointed in not being able to find parts and when you do, I have to bit my toung. The other thing I would like to figure out is how many parts would inter change with other cars. I have Fiat and Mercides parts in my 308 that are a lot cheaper that dealing with some of the price gouging that I have seen. I think this will become an important idem for all Ferrari owners sooner or later.

 

If we take the available service books, there are several for the Dino that I have, for instance, and combine that with the working knowledge that exists for the car, and re-write the manual, we'd have a market of maybe 500 copies. And the Dino was relatively mass produced for a Ferrari.

308, probably 750-1000 maximum. probably less.

Remember, most folks who own these cars don't turn a wrench on them, they let the local expert handle it, and those guys have learned what's in the book, and then some.

So, to put the Dino book together would probably take 500 man hours. Printing or duplicating costs for a 300 page spiral bound book would be probably $15-20 each.

If you sold the book for $50, and sold all 500, that would net you $25,000 minus the $7,500 in production costs, netting you $17,500. 500 man hours netting $17,500 works out to $35 an hour for the job.

Anyone want to take the job???

Having said all that, I'd love to have a Dino repair manual that actually shows you the right things to do, and has instructions that were written without the assumption that you already knew everything there is to know about the car before you start the job.

 

I've been collecting material (photos, notes) from all of the projects I've participated on. At some point I'll have critical mass & compile them into a book. My wife is a tech writer & has expressed interest in helping with the editing.

500 hours sounds about right.

 

I'd buy one for the 308 and 348

 

Would a "V-8" manual that covers all the V8 cars possibly be realistic? Or perhaps a V8 1st addition that covered the 308GT4 through the 308 QV and GTO, and a 2nd addition that covered from the 348 and F40 up through the 355?

 

You would more than likely have to do it model by model. I thought about this a year or so ago but to do it in a computer program with easy to read procedures and pictures. The problem is Ferrari might have something to say about these manuals. You would have to talk with WHART about this ( I did when I first started to think about the software version).

 

I nominate the above for the biggest understatement of the year.

If we can ever convince Verell to write a 308 manual it would be the bible of the 308 religion.

Birdman

 

Who/What is WHART & how do they relate to Ferrari & Manuals?

 

WHART is a lawyer. and a member here.


anyway i would love a manual. carb 308, injected 308 and carb boxer.

 

You could probably collect a third of what you need just by carefully searching threads and archives here, and then PM'ing the guys who have doe work on their cars.

I've seen several nice photo essays on car projects in here, and many other blow by blow descriptions of work that has been done by our weekend mechanics.

 

Yeah, what Birdman said, let Verell do it. Unobtanium Press??? Cool.

I'd buy it for sure.

chris

 

Well, the old Haynes manuals were excellent. I have quite a collection going back over 20 years. The one for my MGB must have had two pages devoted just to adjusting the carbs. Its the later ones where they really start to fall down. I recently bought one for my sons Mazda MX6 and found it almost worthless, and worse. There is not only missing information, but MIS-information that could cost you a lot of trouble, like double torque figures!

And seriously, I dont consider the 308 GT4 service manual a true service manual. Its more specs than anything. Although I am sure the dealer or factory had something much better.

 

IO still have the manual for my old Triumph Spitfire: new owner was not interested...
I would pay even more than 50$ for a proper 308 / 328 manual. I just guess that it could be diffficult to have an omnicomprehensive one for all different versions. Anyway, having seen the level of details that is available in some threads (not in this site only), I guess that material is there. Count me in should the project take off in future.
Ciao
Eugenio

 

Don't forget that most 308 owners are by definition enthusiasts, (who else would own a car 20 + years old, pay twice what a similar performance japanese car costs, and put up with the electrical system ?) From my veiw here in rural Western Australia, the Ferrarichat group is the main source of information to keep my car running. I would happily pay US $200 for a good, well written and researched owner /mechanic manual. I would also sugest the Verell is the man for the job !
Don't underestimate what folks are passionate about, and Fcar owners have to really want one to make it happen.

Regards,

Peter.

 

I believe a single manual could cover the 308/328 varients incl the GT4 as they have an enormous amount of commonality.

A lot would also be applicable to the Mondials. Certainly all of the powertrain, ignition, etc. could be covered. There are certainly suspension & body differences.

I could see the manual coming out in a couple of versions. V1 would cover the most common service items & fund V2 which would be pretty complete, but might not cover nitty details & very infrequent high cost items like engine rebuilds which would be left for V3.

I don't see a single 'V-8' manual tho. 348/355 manual would make sense since there's a lot of commonality under the skin. Not sure about F40/F50, again, a lot of uniqueness to each & very low volume.

BTW, the GT4 & other WSMs are about all the factory techs got. Lots of hands-on tho.

Interestingly enough, the dealership factory trained techs during the '70s & '80s got surprisingly little 308/328 experience.

The cars were new, reliable, and didn't get a lot of mileage, so just didn't break much. Mostly they just performed scheduled maintenance & very occasionally delt with a part failure or collision damage! FNA had a handfull of very technical experts that were on call whenever something serious had to be delt with. These were the ones who saw enough of the big problems so that they were truly well trained.

It wasn't until the mid-'90s that most of the cars got enough mileage so that major repairs became prevalant.

 

Verell-
You know I would buy one. Heck- it would probably have pictures of my car in it!!

And, I could get it signed by the author!!

I wonder how many 308/Mondial/328 etc. owners work on their own cars?

Maybe 20%? Would more people be inclined to do the work if a manual was available? Yes.

I can see it now on FerariAds.com:

For Sale
1981 308 Red with tan interior
32K miles
all service, books (including Boaen's 308 shop manual)
tools
great car, needs nothing.

What do you think?

 

I wouldn't hesitate to pay 100 USD or more for the 308 info. As it is, I'm half inclined to print out some key posts from F-chat and compile them in binders that stay with the respective cars.

I bet there'd be a market for a TR manual too.

Now about the Countach

 

Man you guys are unbeliveable. I was thinking this same thing the other day. I'm seriously considering doing one. Nothing to technical at first..but will cover the basics.

 

Great minds think alike. I have had this same thought. Most of the Haynes manuals are made up of basic non make specific stuff. Almost everything else could be found somewhere in the archives of this forum or on the net and in the minds of Ferrari owners. I have a graphic arts degree and publishing background and have wondered myself if a very detailed step by step manual made up of photographs, pictures and exiting owners/shop manuals availible would sell. Of course the book would have to sell (like everything else F car) much higher then your average $15 Haynes manual.
Whats stoping me? My own Ferrari is on ramps in my garage, I don't think of myself as the Ferrari manual author type. I do have a background in publishing and photography if anyone is interested in a partnership?
To increase the market you could do a 208/308carb/injected 2v & 4v/gt4/328 manual. The price would (depending on the quality of content) be around $200 an issue. The market world wide would have to be in the thousands.

Rick

 

I wish I had the tech knowledge to contribute to such a project...but as it happens, I don't! I do plan to do my own work on my 328 and would kill for a good manual (well, I'd pay a good amount of cash for it). If anyone gets this going, put me down for a copy. Thanks, Battman

 

That's what I was planning. The 208 Turbo might be a tad hard to do tho as there's precious little info available.

Would help if I could get Ferrari to authorize using figures from the workshop & parts books.

Like you, I've got a lot on my plate between my 8-6 job, HoneyDos, homeowner projects, Unobtainium Supply business, & my cars.

I don't know the economics of publishing, but $200 sounds pricey. Altho, I've probably spent close to $400 picking up various 308 manuals from wherever I could find them.