Maintenance cost - 360 F1

You might get a better response in the 360/430 forum. I just bought a 2003 360 Spider and have spent a fair amount of time with the local dealership, its mechanic, and reading the comments of others. My car is in good shape (at least, so it appears) and I am budgeting between $4,000 and $5,000 a year for the general maintenance a car of this age will need. That does not include cosmetic costs -- if you detail your car regularly, have special paint or leather treatment, or replace or add 3mm covers, you can add quite a bit to that. With an F1 360 if you are hard on your clutch, you can add quite a bit to that. And, if your car is in great shape and has had a good bit of recent work, you can probably reduce that estimate!

 

I have a 360 coupe manual transmission with about 25K miles. I drive it about 2,000 miles per year.

I am on 'the four year plan.'

Prices are approximations - I am going high because other little things pop up.

Cam belts and full service all fluids once every 4 years $5,000

1 Additional full fluid service $1,500

2 additional oil changes $ 800

1 set of tires $1,200

1 Battery $ 300

Budget for 1 additional repair $1,000

So, that is a generous $9,500 for 4 years and about 8,000 miles of driving

About $2,500 per year

 

Mine will have cost me (in for major right now) $17000 over 3 years which comes out to $5667 per year. 6500mi over the 3 years. 360 spider.

 

This is a pretty good number but only if the car is in great condition to start, definitely not less, but I prefer to use 3K for a little more peace of mind, especially if the new owner is only using the dealer and no DIY.

I try to be as hands on as possible and constantly learning about the car which are also part of the ownership experience for me so I have saved myself a few smallish expenses and trips to the dealer.

Disclaimer: experience based on the simplest mechanical car to roll off the assembly line (coupe/gated).

 

You have paid forward here yes?

Clutch? and...
Some "other" big issue(s)? and...
Regular maintenance.

Mine has been yearly serviced by an authorized dealer except one year that I didn't drive much and performed my own oil change just to see what was involved and replace an oil temp sensor that was acting up.

I have put 10K miles on mine in 4.5 years and had one big major service of 6K. It was a full belt, FULL fluid service with differential oil, new cam seals and a couple other weird things thrown in. (bad alternator cable and a broken weld repaired on a muffler bracket).

The only way I could get to your number is if I needed a clutch, tires, perhaps a new leather dash installed and maybe a full set of brake rotors due to poor management of the pads and/or ???

What happened to your car?

 

Kevin: See his thread at:

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/ferrari-discussion-not-model-specific/557558-i-feel-taken-advantage-major-sponsor-do-i-out-them-here-ferrari-chat.html

 

Oh shoots! Thanks! I did just read that thread too but didn't realize it was the same guy! LOL

 

John: Thanks for your $2,500 estimate, and I hope you are right. But your numbers are a little low for where I live (and perhaps where others live). I have just gotten prices from our local dealership. Cam belts, etc. are about $4,000. Full service is about $4,000. That would bump your total up (where I live) by $5,500 to start. You also do not include the cost of clutch or brakes, which are both items that wear in the normal course. I have not yet had the pleasure of pricing those here. So, I hope you indeed average $2,500. If I can average less than twice that, I will still be happy!

P.S. Kevin lives where I live, but is obviously smarter than me and keeps his costs lower! That proves it can be done.

 

It occurs to me that some context might also be helpful. If I had bought a new Porsche for about the same price as my 360, in the first year I would have had zero maintenance costs, but the depreciation would have been about $16,000. (At this point I think the depreciation on the 360 bottomed out two or three years ago.) That makes my maintenance bill for the 360 more palatable to me.

 

Bob, the Cam Belt service is the "full service" at our awesome dealership (Thanks to our master tech Aron) and that number is right. So every 3-5 years (depending on your plan) you will see this. Then your annual service is about half of that for a gated car, little less actually. This is also a "full service" all fluids. It's a little extra to have them do the differential fluid and you will want to do this every other year. I don't know about the F-1 equipped cars though or convertibles. There is more to stay on top of for sure. So far each year "something weird" end up needing a look at just because of the age of our cars.


Non scheduled maintenance items I have encountered and tackled myself are:

Ball Joints, one was bad but I replaced both sides. Our roads suck so you will see this too one fine day. I DIY'ed this to the tune of about 1000 in parts but I dont think the labor from our shop would have been excessive. It's straight forward work if you are used to using tools!

Oil Pressure sensor went south. Cheap and easy to do but I used the excuse to buy an awesome hill engineering oil filter removal tool so there was ~300 bucks and an hour of my time.

Oil temp sensor was acting up (lots of movement in the readout) I had wanted to do an oil chance ever since I got the car and when I saw that the sender is accessed with oil drained I went for it. Sensor and Oil/Filter ~200. I think a straight oil change from the dealer is around 400 so that is within reason to me.

Headliner failed! This one I lived with for a while but finally decided to tackle it myself and was much easier than I thought and the results are awesome. Now I have a sweet alcantera one. ~75 bucks in parts.

Loose engine access cover insulation. I saw that the foil was coming off so I R/R the engine access hatch and re-glued it on. Dealership said they would have done it for me for nothing since I had taken it in for service a month or so earlier!

I adjusted the heat shield on my aftermarket air intake that was a little tricky for me. It was rubbing on my aftermarket exhaust. The dealer probably could have banged it out in a couple of hours but it was the first thing I did when I got the car so I was slow and methodical.

I have K&N specialty air filters that are part of my aftermarket intake. I clean and oil these every year myself. It would be a hassle to take it to the dealership for this. The worst part is waiting for the clean filter to dry before applying a fresh spray of oil.


EDIT:

Couple of batteries....

My front boot accessory straps failed so I bought some new ones in leather and installed them. More to this than I thought going in as you have to remove all the carpet parts in the boot and drill out a bunch of rivets, etc. The screws are different sizes and installation glue from the carpet got gummed up in the threads making the job not that fun but the results are good!

 

Yep, cam belt service is about $4,000, and that includes some other things like new seals.

But the full annual service (not including the belts) is also about $4,000. That includes everything (like AC recharge and filter). That's just the estimate I have in hand. Next week I can tell you exactly what was included in that, and it may include things that I won't normally need every year or every other year. I told Aron I wanted a clean start, so I think he is doing everything he thinks might be necessary. I am assuming I will need that every other year, but maybe I will be lucky and find the costs are reduced in the future. (Or maybe it is the difference in an F1 and a gated transmission). I suppose I will find out over time. But even if the annual service does run that high, it won't bother me much. What I would prefer to avoid is the unexpected $10,000 random repair bill, and it sounds like the 360 usually (not always) is not subject to those surprises.

I'm impressed with all you have done! And as you wrote previously, constantly learning about the car is part of the ownership experience.

Which is one reason I appreciate FerrariChat!

 

It probably includes some catch-up items then. I am thinking cam shaft seals and differential fluid at a minimum. You have to remove the rear bumper to do the later. Add in something else that is unique to your F-1 car and I see where you are coming from.

Ha! Me too! I would not own a Ferrari were it not for this place.

 

Any old ferrari can have a 5-figure bill in addition to the items listed above.

I had close to a $10K bill from a failed 360 header, which necessitated changing the cats in addition to the header.

430's can have header issues as well, or F1 issues

355s can have valve guide (though most have been fixed by now) or header issues (or F1 if an F1 car)
etc etc...

The guy you know should go into this with eyes wide open...helps to make the ownership experience better overall- these ain't Hondas!

 

Are you happy with the quality of the replacement straps? Would you mind telling where you got them? Mine are in sad shape.

 

There is a very large delta between dealer, independent, and self service. I own a 360 Challenge Stradale. I have the belts done professionally and the annual fluid changes done myself. The information is on this site if you choose to learn. Otherwise you will pay. Sometimes a lot. For example: you can buy Ferrari Cats for 10k, or choose an aftermarket version for far less. It's really up to you what you spend on these cars. There are ways to make the experience more economical, but you must learn. If you have no knowledge of the car and show up with your credit card at the dealership, they will help you use it.

 

I got them from the first eBay link in this thread.

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/360-430-sponsored-yellow-compass-group/527236-found-evidence-belt-failure.html

I saw that the guy "Stevecobra" doesn't have any listed right now but he was great to work with. We did a lot of discussion offline via email so reaching out to him at this hotmail might be the quickest way to move on it. They were very close to perfect and such an improvement over the stock cardboard ones that it's not worth mentioning.

"steve moore" [email protected]

 

Sorry but 10k for a header and cats is pretty damn high. I'm guessing you went with stock ones? Had you gone aftermarket you would have gotten better quality (imo) and a significantly cheaper price.

 

Thanks. I'll contact him.

 

This is exactly my point from above. If people would just learn about their cars and research what options are out there, the horror stories of huge bills would be far fewer.

 

Another example:

You can pay 20k for a new F1 actuator, or you can do research to find out that they can be rebuilt for $3,500. The choice is yours.

 

What I've spent to date:
1st year of ownership- $2096 (replaced tires, put new 12v battery, replaced leather strap securing tool kit, new flashlight)
2nd - $1937 (new 12v battery again...the Optima died, replaced all fluids)
3rd- $816 (oil change, f1 fluid change)

I am due for a major service the end of the year. Am contemplating on replacing the F1 pump (before it fails). Admittedly, am not a DIYer. All services done at dealer.

 

About $1600/year, that sounds reasonable.

 

Too low!
He hasn't figured in a major (with full belt service) that is ~4K.
Done every 3-5 years. FYI

Go thru a few of these cycles and you are going to need tires/brakes
Couple more and you need a clutch

You can get in and out of a car and miss some of this stuff. This is the main reason a car with a big number of previous owners requires more DD.

 

Agree that my numbers will be skewed up after factoring the aforementioned.