Following from my Pre Purchase Research thread, I thought I;d do a proper hello!
A few years ago I toyed with the idea of a Ferrari 456 as a daily, at that point they were cheap. Alas I dallied a bit too long and prices rose considerably. Maybe it did me a favour, as theres a degree of trepidation for running an old Ferrari V12 as a daily.
However in my head it was going to be TDF Blue over Crema or Tan, tbf I'd still like a 355 in that colour combo as well, but I digress. I'm one of those funny peopel that never liked Ferraris in red.
Then I got invited to the MC20 Launch at Maranello in Egham, a car that I really like, but a price point my wallet did not. Whilst chatting with the sales rep I happened to comment that I'd always liked the Granturismo and she asked why I'd never bought one.
The sensible reason was I have too many bloody cars and always seemed to have something else in the stable that did on paper what the Granturismo would. But alas sense often fails in the face of that little nagging voice that tells you to do it anyway.
A year passed with a growing itch for a Blue over Crema/Tan Granturismo growing. The Pistonheads 25 year bash at Bicester saw an impromptu chat with a Granturismo owner showing his car and made it clear that space wise its was a practical proposition to replace my Audi. Then as luck would have it desire and cash flow came together and left me no choice but to give in.
So what to be, as a daily better the Auto box, Blue over Crema / Tan obviously and for me pre facelift always looked a cleaner car.
Initially I was looking at a 4.2 which are either stone cold bargains or huge money pits depending on your perspective. However the Variator issue and Dickys advice started me wondering if later 4.7s would be in budget.
I found a private sale 4.7 for a bargain £16k which on viewing turned out to be shall we say "Cosmetically challenged" Even had the mechanical service history have checked out as good as it looked I got that money pit feeling that several thousand would be needed to get it cosmetically straight. That put it in the same point as some seemingly much nicer cars and tbh another project was not what I'm after. I have more than enough of those already.
As luck would have it I was chatting all things Granturismo with George at Autoficcina and it turned out they had one coming in that as the perfect spec I was after and new enough to have an engine number unlikely to have variator issues.
FSH, 3 owners and it looked mint. Wasting no time we went for a looksee and the wife was as smitten as I was, (shes supposed to be voice of reason, but has pretty much always told me to buy whatever I end up wanting)
A deal was done and I collected last week
Some proper pics
The only thing not spot on my spec was I wanted the Neptune wheels and this has Tridents but the more I look at if the more they are growing one me, so I think they are staying! Absolutely mint
A few years ago I toyed with the idea of a Ferrari 456 as a daily, at that point they were cheap. Alas I dallied a bit too long and prices rose considerably. Maybe it did me a favour, as theres a degree of trepidation for running an old Ferrari V12 as a daily.
However in my head it was going to be TDF Blue over Crema or Tan, tbf I'd still like a 355 in that colour combo as well, but I digress. I'm one of those funny peopel that never liked Ferraris in red.
Then I got invited to the MC20 Launch at Maranello in Egham, a car that I really like, but a price point my wallet did not. Whilst chatting with the sales rep I happened to comment that I'd always liked the Granturismo and she asked why I'd never bought one.
The sensible reason was I have too many bloody cars and always seemed to have something else in the stable that did on paper what the Granturismo would. But alas sense often fails in the face of that little nagging voice that tells you to do it anyway.
A year passed with a growing itch for a Blue over Crema/Tan Granturismo growing. The Pistonheads 25 year bash at Bicester saw an impromptu chat with a Granturismo owner showing his car and made it clear that space wise its was a practical proposition to replace my Audi. Then as luck would have it desire and cash flow came together and left me no choice but to give in.
So what to be, as a daily better the Auto box, Blue over Crema / Tan obviously and for me pre facelift always looked a cleaner car.
Initially I was looking at a 4.2 which are either stone cold bargains or huge money pits depending on your perspective. However the Variator issue and Dickys advice started me wondering if later 4.7s would be in budget.
I found a private sale 4.7 for a bargain £16k which on viewing turned out to be shall we say "Cosmetically challenged" Even had the mechanical service history have checked out as good as it looked I got that money pit feeling that several thousand would be needed to get it cosmetically straight. That put it in the same point as some seemingly much nicer cars and tbh another project was not what I'm after. I have more than enough of those already.
As luck would have it I was chatting all things Granturismo with George at Autoficcina and it turned out they had one coming in that as the perfect spec I was after and new enough to have an engine number unlikely to have variator issues.
FSH, 3 owners and it looked mint. Wasting no time we went for a looksee and the wife was as smitten as I was, (shes supposed to be voice of reason, but has pretty much always told me to buy whatever I end up wanting)
A deal was done and I collected last week
Some proper pics
The only thing not spot on my spec was I wanted the Neptune wheels and this has Tridents but the more I look at if the more they are growing one me, so I think they are staying! Absolutely mint
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