Buying tips

Wow, thanks for the tip David! Would you mind scanning/taking a pic of the article?

I know the car was resprayed 5-6 years ago by Bobileff in its present Blu Chiaro. The reason for the respray was some spidering and chips on the original black paint. No accidents apparently, but I'll let my trusty paint meter gauge determine this.

Cheers!

Ruben

 

Thanks Mike... Do you mind posting a pic of your car?

Cheers!

Ruben

 

So curious - has anyone seen this car in recent times?

One thing of concern I just learned: all cylinders show compression of 150-160... Except cylinder #8, which shows 100. I know that the car has not been driven much in th last 6+months, which could be affecting this.

I'm told that it runs smoothly with good power, no smoke or hesitation.

Thoughts?

Ruben

 

Thanks Sam,

Yes, indeed... proceeding VERY cautiously! I've arranged a PPI with Tom Yang (recommended by a few folks here via PM) and the first thing we'll do is a compression retest and go from there.

Will keep this thread updated.

Thanks all!

Ruben

 

Thanks David!! This is great!

Regarding the odometer, it's an open question I had as well. The speedometer has been clearly swapped to read mph... does anyone know if the speedo and odometer are separate entities where one could be miles and the other kilometers?

I'm flying out to NY later this week to do the inspection and check out the car overall. I'll look more closely at the paint sticker, which is present but says "Blu Chiaro" which it currently wears. Agreed that in the article, the car looks more like Blu Sera.

Ruben

 

Since I didn't find specific buying tips, I'll also include a link to this thread about registering cars in CA: http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/365-gt4-2-2-400-412/233297-smog-importation-into-california-400i.html

Good info, which is still relevant.

Fortunately 63321 has a BAR sticker, so registration should be as easy as going to DMV, after a smog check that is...

Cheers!

Ruben

 

John, great info - thanks for sharing! Curious how /where you gathered this info? Is it available online somewhere?

BTW, the current odometer reading is 60,0XX. I still have an open question on whether it's miles or kilometers... Gary Bobileff listed the car earlier 2015 and stated it as "60K km". If so, the mileage you quote as somewhere in the 30K mile range makes sense (give or take, depending on how good someone is at math). The odd thing is that the speedo reads in mph... is it possible that the odometer and speedometer read in different units (km vs miles)?

I'm currently flying from CA to NYC (currently somewhere over CO) and will try to figure this out tomorrow when I check out the car.

Cheers!

Ruben

 

Thanks Bruce for clarifying on the speedo... I think this makes sense: if you divide the stated odometer kilometers by 0.621 (i.e. - there's 0.621 miles per km) you get the 30K and 35K miles advertised.

In other words, the car currently reads 60K (which is in kilometers) which is equivalent to about 37K miles.

Cheers!

Ruben

 

It's official - 63321 is coming back to California!

As mentioned earlier, Tom Yang met me at Gullwing where they had set up a service bay for us to do the inspection. Tom is not only SUPER knowledgeable about all things vintage Ferrari, but he's delightful to spend 6+hours with pouring over every detail of the car. It was a highly educational day as Tom explained and talked about his findings as we went through the car.

The main concern was the supposedly low compression reading from one of the pistons. So the first line of business was to do a re-test and confirm/deny this finding... All Pistons hovered around 180, while the supposedly low compression one read 160. Right on the edge of the "10% rule", but close enough for us to feel overall good about the engine. I have hope that with a few "Italian tune ups" over the next few thousand miles should help bring that piston further back in line.

The rest of the car looked in very nice shape, as the pics suggested. This car looks to have been loved, for sure. Further evaluations of the car showed no real concerning findings and the car pulled very strong and smooth (both my uncalibrated butt-dyno as well as Tom's highly calibrated one). The sound is absolutely intoxicating.

So with Tom's invaluable guidance, I settled on a final number with Gullwing (they were very easy and straight forward to deal with) and the car will be picked up by Intercity next week, arriving to San Jose about 10 days later.

I'm super excited and very appreciative of all of everyone's input on this thread - thank you very much for the tips and suggestions!

I was also very glad to have Tom on my side... Would most definitely not been able to do this without him.

I'll post some pics when she arrives home. In the meantime, I'll be rebuilding the service history of the car which has been lost - So far I've made some good progress as the very kind folks at Bobileff have digged out records for the past 10 years that they've been servicing 63321 and I have some leads as to where to find older info... Just need to chase them down.

Cheers!

Ruben

 

Thanks guys for the well wishes and warm welcome!

I can't wait until sometime late next week when it gets home!

Ruben