Has anyone driven or owned a 250 GT PF ?

It's been almost 25 years, but an inside plug, drum brake 250 I drove EARNED the epithet Farinabird. A little ungainly, but beautiful no doubt.

That said, I recently drove a completely done 250 SWB California Alloy car. Wow.

A little bit of clever upgrade work and a 250 PF could be a good car, but as is? Difficult to justify the price for the enjoyment factor. Just my opinion, as I said, it's been 20+ years.

 

Never driven a convertible but driven several PF coupe's and now own a 250 GTE. Summary is that Drum brakes got replaced by DIsks for a bloody good reason - they are next to useless. There are some PF COupes that were factory Disk not Drum, I believe, so if you can land one of them then you are in much better shape. Porblem is that Inside Plug/Drum cars are far the more desirable amongst te e"community" - but then they don't ahev to drive them. As with all older Ferrari's if you buy well up front maintenance is very reasonable considering. Less electrics means less trouble is my mantra.

Summary - beautuful car - not a great daily drive.

Cheers,

Darren.

 

Good point Darren.

FWIW, I have always thought that the 250GTE was a quantum leap in driveability over the 250PFs.

 

I have owned both the PF and the GTE. Both had disc brakes and outside plugs. My impressions from driving both of these cars are that they feel pretty big and old fashioned. The turning circle is large and the hoods are pretty long. You are also on tall, skinny tires. I would own another PF in a minute. Both the coupe and cab have classic lines but I consider them more as relaxed cruisers than race cars. I like the older feel of these cars and they are relatively simple to work on. The 250 engine sound is one of the greatest around also. The first Ferrari I had the pleasure of driving was a Series II PF cab. I was hooked immediately. As long as you can put the car in perspective as to the era in which it was produced and don't expect modern conveniences from it, it will be a great car to own and a lot of fun to drive.

 

The 2 Ferraris I have owned were a PF coupe and a GTE. Loved them both, but I agree the GTE is more modern....but both are rather ancient feeling in comparison to any modern car. If you are interested in a car that drives that way, but doesn't have to be a Ferrari, consider an Alfa 2600.

 

I've had a 250 GT PF Cab II for a bit over twenty five years. If I had to describe driving it in a few words on the back of a cereal box I'd have to say that it is a bit like driving a friendly farm truck on a dirt road, great fun.
To expand a bit: When you are going slowly a 250 GT is a handful, having a rotten lock and a heavy feel to the steering. When you pick up a bit of speed it feels much better, only you have to make it take a set when you enter a corner, not sit back and marvel at it's ability to motor around a bend, say the way you would a new 360 Modena. Furthermore the PF II is a big car to drive, only becoming small when it's working hard. All the small touches of luxury make it heavy, but they also make it wonderful to sit in. I'm lucky in that the one I have possesses disk brakes and an outside plug head, so it stops and runs well (actually you can bend and snap a few spokes if the tires are new radials and somebody's granny is diving under the front bumper).
It has always been dependable, indeed it always got me to where I wanted to go even if it wasn't pulling with all twelve cylinders at the time. Come to think of it, the car once got me home in a rainstorm in Kent outside of London even though it briefly seized along the way. It is a great car if you remember that it was sold by Ferrari to fund a racing team, not to be driven and certainly not to last into the next century. I suppose in today's terms it was just under developed. The welds on the chassis are horrible compared to the work you see on contemporary motorcycles, the body was lashed together by people who knew that within ten months the car would be wrapped around a tree by someone in a white dinner jacket, and the ergonomics of the interior are pretty poor. Oh! There is also the small matter of the electrical system which was designed by Ohm and not Volta, or so I suspect. On a daily basis the most prominent fault lies with the men who drew up the body and the interior: They probably never met. With the roof folded down the seat won't go all the way back, so as an owner it behooves you not to be too tall; then again if you are short and need to sit forward the arm rest will foul with the seat back and prevent you from closing the door all together, so you had better not be small either. Mechanically the machine also has several design weaknesses. There is the famous one concerning the electric over drive: I hear tell that the unit needs 40 weight oil, the gear box 90; there is no gasket between the two: Does one blow up the gear box with 40 wt. or fry the over drive with 90 wt.? Personally, well, damned if I know. I've never taken the two units asunder and they've always worked! I’m a firm believer that with gear boxes let sleeping dogs lie, particularly if you like the lies the dogs on the shafts are telling you.
There are other problems than the general mechanical or corporal longevity of the car. The float chambers on the carbs are in front of the Webbers, facing the radiator so to speak. This gives you fuel surge under serious breaking, which in turn makes double de clutching difficult. You just have to hold the throttle down and wait for the engine to pick up RPM, at which point you slip it into the gear you need - forget about running down through the box. On the other hand if you just potter about you oil up the plugs in no time, but that’s to be expected.
Speaking of driving slowly, well, traffic makes it difficult to do smoothly. The motor is all about horse power at 3,000 plus R.P.M., not about torque. This makes pulling off from a stop difficult in that one uses more RPM and clutch than one would wish. Revving the engine and slipping the clutch is not a cool thing to do, it makes one look incompetent, and worse still the inching traffic one now encounters makes one look consistently incompetent. I hear tell that it also isn't good for the clutch or the flywheel, but as the alternative is to drive something else those components just have to put up with the mild abuse.
On a final note if you are fussy about your garage floor then you will have a problem. The car drips oil, and always will, unless you like taking it apart all the time. The aluminum engine alters shape after each heat cycle - it's microscopic, but the movement is there, and as the years pile on the shape changes. The result is that over time flat surfaces cease to be flat, and as the sump is the thinnest and least bolted up end of the engine, it becomes a permanent small leak. On the plus side unlike an early Lamborghini or an E Type it will not overheat, the radiator being man enough for the job in any weather. It will also happily cross the U.S. with a cracked block and a broken main bearing, which is the condition I bought it in, but then I guess if Bugatti 35 could win races with eight cylinders and three roller bearings a V12 Ferrari with six and a half shell bearings is fine on the freeway.
I’m sorry I’ve rambled on so much in reply to a simple question, but the more I thought about the car the more I had to say. It’s fun to drive, you can use it as a daily car, but it is a bit like going everywhere on a unicycle: hard work, a touch eccentric, but very satisfying to drive.
kram

 

Fanstatic comment! You really nailed it the vintage feel. Please keep em coming. We need more posts like yours for folks to understand what driving a 40-year old car is really like. It's neat to get all sentimental about these cars, but they are old cars. Warts and all!

Thx, DrTax

 

I agree. That was a great story. Over 20 years ago I drove my GTE all season with a blown head gasket. The water temperature would rise very rapidly after starting but the oil temperature was always normal. I had heard before to not worry about water temp as much as oil temp so I just drove it and tried to be careful. I rebuilt the engine over the next winter and found no other damage. With this same car one time at a Ferrari gathering southwest of Chicago I broke a bearing arm in the clutch and ended up driving about 60 miles home on a Sunday afternoon without a clutch. This was through traffic, stoplights, toll booths, etc. Again later teardown showed no additional damage. The point is these older cars were pretty strong mechanically and could definitely stand up to some abuse. My current GTC had half of each tooth worn off the flywheel from a problem starter. I had no idea of this condition until the car came apart. At some point there probably wouldn't have been enough of the teeth left to engage but I hadn't quite reached that yet.

 

Kram,

That was awesome! Thanks for sharing.

 

I'm adding kram's post to my pile of favorite speeches. Like this one... I have seen the face of God.

 

I am a first time poster and the owner of a Series I PF Coupe. I've had it for about 1 and 1/2 years and have driven it quite a bit, mostly over long distances. The car has ample power, but as you would expect the chassis cannot cope with that power. The brakes are barely adequate and the suspension is archaic. But, all said, it posesses loads of charm and it can be gorgeous in the right color scheme. I love mine.

Those who are critical of the early cars' handling (myself included) may just be displaying their naivete, as these cars were essentialy TdF's under the skin, and as you know the TdF was a highly revered sports racer.

John Vardanian

 

John,

Welcome to F-chat. Hope all is well ! My GTE has now arrived, and is everything I had hoped.

Regards from England as always.

Darrten Jaffrey.

 

John - nice to see you here at Ferrarichat- Vintage!
People, John has some of the most beautiful PF Coupe shots I have ever seen - his car on a wet road on a foggy morning . . .

I think I still have them, John. With your permission may I post some of them here??? Let me know.

Bryan Phillips

 

John V.,

Welcome to the dark side! If all is quiet at Tom's, this is a fun place to waste time.

Regards,

Art S.

PS. Your PF is one of my favorite cars (your other Ferrari isn't too bad either!)

 

Bryan, Art and Jeffery,

Thanks for the warm welcome. There is a lot going on here and I don't know where to begin, but just give me time. I am glad to have found this site.

Bryan, it is very nice of you to compliment my car so. Please feel free to post whichever photo you like.

Are any of you going to come to Monterey this year?

Regards,

john

 

John,

Welcome aboard, always nice to read some new faces in this section.

best,

 

ok, brace yourselves . . . John Vardanian's PF Coupe

 

Gorgeous car, love the color.

 

a knockout - that color is great