To clarify, I had issues with my previous 2 Ferraris as well, I just never requested FNA to help reimburse me for the expenses incurred with them. If it were an 8 year old car with 85,000 miles on it, I would not have questioned the repair cost. This is an 8 year old car....with less than 16,000 miles on it...which has not been tracked or abused. Of course it's out of warranty, so they're free to say Take A Hike. The question is, is that the right thing to do? This problem does not fall under "normal wear and tear". From everything I've learned, failing manifolds are a known problem, and ultimately these were diagnosed as "bad" by Continental. Those were still under warranty. There are a limited number of things which could have caused the valve problem, and right at the top of this list would have been a failing manifold. A spring or a guide was ruled out. So yeah, I don't think it's a crazy notion to think FNA might do more than cover 1/2 of the transport cost. How about ~all~ of the transport cost, because when I bought the car, part of what figured in the equation was that they had local authorized repair? What do I "expect"? I expect them to either not reply or tell me to go pound sand. But I do think there is something to the notion that if this car were owned by an FNA executive, the notion of connecting the manifolds to the valve issue wouldn't have been a pipe dream. I assume my note went to Italy, I will give thought to the London thing. Not that I give any of this much of a chance of changing anything.
The thing I was trying to get to before was, yes you had a valve problem. What kind of valve problem was it? To my knowledge you were not told. There are lots of valve problems for lots of reasons and yet no mention of what this was. Next you had a manifold problem. Manifold problems manifest themselves in many ways and evidently you do not know what that is in your case. You have no case unless a connection can be made and you have no information to make it. I suspect at this point that information is no longer available to you but you need it for any semblance of even suggesting causation. PS Don't write London. That will at some point become the address of Fiat Chrysler Auto but it is not now. They only just made the announcement.