Vintage Ferrari's in South Africa

Thanks to many years spent involved with the Ferrari Club here and having the late life president of the club as a friend I was drawn to the history of the club and the number of vintage Ferrari's which were imported into the country. An interesting fact was the importer for many decades was a company called TAK which basically supplied farming equipment like and imagine the irony here....tractors. Another sad irony is the records this importer had are apparently "missing" so the task I am trying to accomplish, tracing all the vintage cars which were imported into SA is much more difficult!

A good friend of mine is the member of the Lupini family and his grandfather imported the first road going Ferrari into South Africa which was I think 0811 GT. He also imported a 335s which was apparently driven by de Portago at one point but I cant seem to trace that SN.

There were various interesting cars here over the years, a lusso with GTO/LMB type front which I think would be 4385 GT.

Also here for a while was a 250 MM but again I cant seem to trace that SN.

There were a few 250 SWB, Lusso's and 275's here, not to mention Daytona's, some of these are still in SA but all of the 250s's barring one 250 are gone, the 250 left here sat under a cover for decades before being rescued about 3 years ago, mechanical restoration was done and the car shows great patina.

One of 250 Lusso's which was imported here was involved in a road accident whereby it went down a ravine, not too badly damaged apparently. Again no idea which SN that would be.

 

Thanks Marcel! Indeed the Motor Museum has quite a few Ferrari's, a great collection to see in one place!

Thanks for the information, there are still three 365 GT 2+2 that I know of, a friend of mine completed a very nice restoration on one of them recently. Very interesting re the Blue Dino BB, there are a few of these still in SA but as ever with vintage/older Ferrari's one is never too sure if they were resprayed red as particularly here it seemed to me trying to sell any Ferrari in any other colour but red was difficult even back in the 1970's and 1980's!

Also in South Africa for a brief period was the Dino prototype, I think 00106 if my memory is correct.

 

Correct I also have record (not very good records it has to be said) of him also owning a 250 MM and a picture of said car at at a show in South Africa in the mid 1980's.

 

I know of one 400 carb now sitting with a Chevrolet V8 in it, another is being stripped for a TR replica....sad. There are a few other 400i's around.

 

Interesting on the subject of 250 GTE's, I believer the are still three in SA and another has recently been imported via DK Engineering. There is one 365 GTC 4 that I know of painted in Nero but old pictures of past events suggests there may have been another.

There was one 365 GTC I know of still in SA, restored to show standard, another was also restored, owned by a fairly big collector here and then found its way to the UK and then I believe finally ended up in the USA

 

I thought it might be nice to add some pictures to this thread.

I suspect this GTC/4 in the pictures is #14655, sadly not in the original colour which was probably quite a nice unique colour.

Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Very interesting information, thanks for sharing. Pierre owned quite a few remarkable Ferrari's and as you say was one of the founder members of SEFAC.

 

As far as I know it is, pictures were taken a few years ago at a track event at Kyalami.

 

Wow.

 

11771 gt
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Interesting because this car was at one stage a very unattractive beige colour and a friend of mine bought it and wanted to spray it blue, this resulted in a full strip down and mechanical restoration. Not sure he even knows that it was blue originally.