I know you guys in California probably see these all the time...

dmn23

Duller than cardboard
...but an absolutely perfect carb'd late 70s Ferrari 308 GTB identical to the photo below just drove past my house. I haven't seen a 308 on the road in years and I've forgotten how heartbreakingly pretty they really are. This was an early one — 14" wheels on metric tires, GTB configuration, no spoiler over the rear buttresses. Just gorgeous, and it sounded wonderful.

That is all.


1979-ferrari-308-gtb-tim-mccullough.jpg
 
Yeah, nice car.

You know.....you look back at some of those "exotics" of the time period, and compared to today's cars, they really weren't all that fast.

A new Challenger or Mustang would blow the doors off one of those.
But that being said, they sure are pretty!
 
A new Camry would blow the doors off one of those. But I know which one I'd rather own. :grin:
 
There was definitely a time when spotting a 308 on the road in SoCal was a common occurrence, but not these days. Now, they are a rare sight. I'm sure there are still plenty of them around here, sitting in a garage being well pampered and kept up for the occasional Sunday drive, but the high maintenance/low reliability factor along with the absurd cost and rarity of replacement parts has them relegated to such a fate.

There's an old man that lives nearby with a black 308 GTSi Quatrovalvel that takes it out pretty regularly for short trips to the grocery store and such. I love seeing it every time, and he always looks like a kid at Christmas behind the wheel.

These days, it's the 360 and newer Ferraris that are seen regularly roaming about. In the last two days while picking up kids from school I spotted a 355 Spyder (pretty unusual) and a 360 Spyder (dime a dozen) on back to back days.

430s and 458s are fairly common sights as are 550 and 575s for some odd reason.

I even had an Enzo pull out in front of me a few years ago that took all my strength and skill not to obliterate. If I had actually hit that thing, I wouldn't give two shits about my own car, but I'd have beaten the Enzo owners ass mercilessly for carelessly driving a piece of Automotive history and art to its doom.

I'll tell you what used to be incredibly rare, and is now such a regular occurrence that it's kind of sad. .. up until the introduction of the Murcielago and Gallardo, you NEVER saw a Lamborghini on the road. It just didn't happen. If you spent enough time cruising Newport Beach or the Super exclusive Hollywood establishments, you might get lucky and spot a Countach or Diablo, but you quite literally had to seek them out.

Since the Audi takeover, and the huge uptick in production, Lamborghinis are now a more common sight on the road than Ferraris. I shit you not. Gallardos are an almost daily sight. Even Murcielagos aren't in any way rare, and I've already seen more Aventadors than I thought I would see this early in their availability. As much as I adore them, the commonality has diminished their mystique.

Oh, and in terms of power differences between old and new, yeah. The 308 in particular was a lazy dog by today's standards. My new FIAT would obliterate a 308 :)
 
Same here in Nor Cal rarely do I see 308s. I saw a old Lambo the other day of around the same vintage as the 308 would be but did not get a close look at what model it was. Lately in fact I have been seeing a few McLeans around.

And once a Pagani Huayra drool0. With a Porche GT. About $2M in car drove past me...and there was only 2 of them :gah:
 
one of my favorite Ferarris.....but i'm a huge Magnum PI fan too.

and for those of you that say a current mustang or challenger would blow a 308 GTB off the road......not on Mulholland Drive they wouldn't.
 
Used to see a couple of 308s up in Coeur d'Alene, of all places. Down here though, I see about an equal amount of Lamborghinis and Ferraris. Agree with @OGG though - before the newest generation of Lambos, they were really rare.

I did see a Countach kit car the other day, unless there's a weird one that has a "Lambo" badge :lol:
 
I see lots of exotic cars out here in Boulder when the weather’s nice. Sadly the red Ferraris are being pushed out for Teslas, which are not nearly as cool.

I still want the Countach I dreamed of in the 80s, tho.
 
Cool sighting! There is a guy who I see with a yellow 308 parked in front of the local brew pub place. It looks to be in pretty decent condition. I have no idea what year it is or anything. I think it is a GTSi, so I guess that is early 80's.

That one stands out a bit, as it is old and bright yellow, but exotic cars are everywhere down her in Palm Beach. I probably see a couple of ferraris just driving to and from work a day. I see lots of other exotics too. My wife and I took the kids to see the horses at the polo matches in Wellington, and I swear I could have walked from where we parked to the gate just stepping from exotic car to exotic car (mostly big Bentley and Rolls cars, but there were some ferraris, lambos, and other sports cars in there as well). It is awesome to see all the awesome cars, but it is also pretty depressing to realize you are in a newish car that costs as much as the wheels and tires on one of those things.
 
one of my favorite Ferarris.....but i'm a huge Magnum PI fan too.

and for those of you that say a current mustang or challenger would blow a 308 GTB off the road......not on Mulholland Drive they wouldn't.
The early 308s with the 14" pizza cutters handled amazingly well in terms of their era, but as much as it pains me to say, yes, a modern mustang or camaro (gawd do I hate them) would embarras such a 308 even on Mulholland.

And for real, gut wrenching levels of embarrassment, you put an old 308 up against virtually any entry level modern sports coupe like a 370Z, Hyundai Genesis, or similar, and the ensuing ass whooping would likely find you before a panel at The Hague answering for war crimes.

But I'd still own one in a heartbeat.
 
The early 308s with the 14" pizza cutters handled amazingly well in terms of their era, but as much as it pains me to say, yes, a modern mustang or camaro (gawd do I hate them) would embarras such a 308 even on Mulholland.

And for real, gut wrenching levels of embarrassment, you put an old 308 up against virtually any entry level modern sports coupe like a 370Z, Hyundai Genesis, or similar, and the ensuing ass whooping would likely find you before a panel at The Hague answering for war crimes.

But I'd still own one in a heartbeat.

i guess i was thinking more along the lines of a 1985 308 GTSi....
 
i guess i was thinking more along the lines of a 1985 308 GTSi....
Certainly a far more capable machine than the early models. They had more power, far better suspension and virtually twice the contact patch of the older car. Night and day driving experience.
 
The early 308s with the 14" pizza cutters handled amazingly well in terms of their era, but as much as it pains me to say, yes, a modern mustang or camaro (gawd do I hate them) would embarras such a 308 even on Mulholland.

And for real, gut wrenching levels of embarrassment, you put an old 308 up against virtually any entry level modern sports coupe like a 370Z, Hyundai Genesis, or similar, and the ensuing ass whooping would likely find you before a panel at The Hague answering for war crimes.

But I'd still own one in a heartbeat.

I think something like a camry v6 could take one in a drag race. I imagine even something like a modern GTI could beat one on the track....but neither of those cars have the feel and style of the 308. The damn thing still looks good, and fast, 40 years after the launch date, and is instantly recognizable as an iconic ferrari. Pininfarina knows how to make automotive art. I'd spend my time just polishing the metal shift gate with a smile on my face and not care one bit that I might lose a drag race with a minivan.
 
I think something like a camry v6 could take one in a drag race. I imagine even something like a modern GTI could beat one on the track....but neither of those cars have the feel and style of the 308. The damn thing still looks good, and fast, 40 years after the launch date, and is instantly recognizable as an iconic ferrari. Pininfarina knows how to make automotive art. I'd spend my time just polishing the metal shift gate with a smile on my face and not care one bit that I might lose a drag race with a minivan.

Tiltsta knows what's up.
 
I think something like a camry v6 could take one in a drag race. I imagine even something like a modern GTI could beat one on the track....but neither of those cars have the feel and style of the 308. The damn thing still looks good, and fast, 40 years after the launch date, and is instantly recognizable as an iconic ferrari. Pininfarina knows how to make automotive art. I'd spend my time just polishing the metal shift gate with a smile on my face and not care one bit that I might lose a drag race with a minivan.
Agree whole heartedly. As I already mentioned, I'd gladly own one.

I honestly think the 308 is one of the top 3 most beautiful Ferraris ever produced. I know that sounds like heresy to many, but for people of my general age group, it is the Ferrari of our youth. It is the first image that comes to mind when someone says Ferrari. For my generation, it is the quintessential Ferrari, followed closely by the Dino before it and the Testarossa after.

Sure, the 62 California Spyder and the Daytona among others get all of the glory for their beauty, but that doesn't diminish the staggeringly bold and modern statement that was made with the 308.

Oh, and Teslas. I like them, a lot, but holy shit are there a ton of them on the road around here. It's crazy. I saw 3 within 5 minutes this afternoon.

I want to know where all these people with $100K to drop on a car came from.
 
I used to see a young kid (maybe 21 at most) driving one in Battle Creek occasionally. This was 12-15 years ago though. I haven't seen it in a while.

More recently, like in the last couple of years, I've seen a lime-green 328 in the little town of Mendon, MI several times. Again driven by a young kid in his early 20's. The 328 is a bit beat up though. Not bad, but not pristine by any means. I wonder where these young guys get their money from? I'm sure the parts for a 328 ain't cheap :embarrassed:
 
I used to see a young kid (maybe 21 at most) driving one in Battle Creek occasionally. This was 12-15 years ago though. I haven't seen it in a while.

More recently, like in the last couple of years, I've seen a lime-green 328 in the little town of Mendon, MI several times. Again driven by a young kid in his early 20's. The 328 is a bit beat up though. Not bad, but not pristine by any means. I wonder where these young guys get their money from? I'm sure the parts for a 328 ain't cheap :embarrassed:
One of the big problems with 308s and 328s is that they were produced in relatively large numbers, and once they fell out of favor, you could pick up a very clean example of either for $20-30K.

So, anybody with 30 grand in their pocket and a hard on for a Ferrari suddenly had access to one.

I've seen plenty of examples of young kids who get a little chunk of money from an inheritance or a trust or some other mechanism who drop the whole of it on such a car and then drive the piss out of it until something breaks and they are confronted with a repair estimate that makes their eyes pop out of their head.

At that point, the writing is on the wall. The car is doomed. Nobody will buy it because it's broken, and they know they can find one that isn't for next to nothing.

So these dipshits either try to mickey mouse them back together and ruining them, or they get parked outside to let the elements destroy them. Which happens shockingly quick because Italian cars from the 70's and 80's were basically biodegradable.
 
There's actually a big ass FCoA Concourse D'elegance that happens yearly about a two hours west of me..I always think about going but fail to follow through. There's a lot of them around & you can always spot their owners at car shows decked out in their S-F gear.
 
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Agree whole heartedly. As I already mentioned, I'd gladly own one.

I honestly think the 308 is one of the top 3 most beautiful Ferraris ever produced. I know that sounds like heresy to many, but for people of my general age group, it is the Ferrari of our youth. It is the first image that comes to mind when someone says Ferrari. For my generation, it is the quintessential Ferrari, followed closely by the Dino before it and the Testarossa after.

Sure, the 62 California Spyder and the Daytona among others get all of the glory for their beauty, but that doesn't diminish the staggeringly bold and modern statement that was made with the 308.

Oh, and Teslas. I like them, a lot, but holy shit are there a ton of them on the road around here. It's crazy. I saw 3 within 5 minutes this afternoon.

I want to know where all these people with $100K to drop on a car came from.

And Magnum Freakin P.I. drove one. That is all one needed to know to decide if it was a bad ass car.
 
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