kare wrote:This is exactly why I am all against replicas. The parted out cars now turn into fakes which consume the hard to find parts, instead of providing them for the survivors.
Best wishes, Kare
Completely agree Kare: It is true in the low end production car collector market also. How many restorable 32 - 48 Ford V-8's have provided parts for a "Street Rod" instead of being restored or at least helping restore a real Ford. And to make it worse - most end up with Chevy running gear!
I am new to this topic but was curious to see pix of "Job Number 50000" and found this:
Due to the ongoing Facts and History...
This Car is NOT for Sale at this time!!
Salute to all of the True Ferrari Historians
"1961 250 GTE Ferrari with Job # 50000"
...and a long email exchange that makes very little sense to me.
Also, I googled "Kittie Lombardo" and found some interesting background.
I'm not trying to start a soap opera thread, just interested in GT/E history.
Art S. wrote:
I'm trying to guess who the 'expert' is.
Might be Sheehan.
From the email string..
<<Is it your site that says Enzo's 400SA was crashed...or was it that second prototype GTE that crashed? Do you know the factual s/n or job numbers behind these stories?>>
You've got to love the emails on that site! does this now mean that the owner thinks the car is something based on Enzo's 400sa?.......couldnt understand if that was the case or not
400 "30897" " Mondial "45461" & lots of other peoples toys at work
I think the owners decided that $95K was much too cheap in todays market. It would be nice if they discover something unexpected to justify their belief, but I will not be holding my breath.
2947 is listed as the first 330GT prototype. However as you can see from this string here - there are those who feel that is unlikely as it's a pretty early number in the GTE's and years before the 330's arrived. So when Kare says he thinks it is instead 2257 you can read Mike Sheehans comments about that car:
Fast forward to the 1960s and a pair of cars that have occupied much recent internet chat within our group—s/n 1287, the prototype for the 250 GTE, and s/n 2257, a 400 Superamerica with a one–off 250 GTE–style body. The prototype 250 GTE, s/n 1287, was registered by the factory on plates MO54083 on November 19, 1959, and featured seven small louvers in the rear sail panels, no side marker lights, and no louvers in the front fenders. It was tested extensively by the factory as the platform for the upcoming 250 GTE 2+2 then restamped to s/n 2257 and sold in September 1961 to Egidio Galbani, a personal friend of Ferrari, with Galbani paying for new and expensive Italian registration. This car is currently undergoing restoration in Italy.
Meanwhile, a second car bodied by Pininfarina to look like the upcoming 250 GTE—which should have been s/n 2257 in the build sequence—was built in November 1961. It was stamped 1287 in order to keep the prepaid MO54083 registration as used on the earlier “look–alike” 250 GTE prototype. This car was fitted with a 4–liter 400 SA engine, 1287 SA, and became the personal hot rod of Enzo Ferrari. This 250 GTE “look–alike” 400 was later sold to France where it was destroyed in a crash in Paris in 1972 and ceased to exist, aside from the engine (and to complicate matters further, s/n 1287 had been fitted with two different 400 SA engines during its testing).
I was recently offered a Ferrari 250 GTE with the s/n 1287. It was presented with the history of the 400 SA hot rod, which is certainly more valuable than the 250 GTE prototype. However, from the pictures that were sent along and the research I conducted, it was clear this s/n 1287 was the 250 GTE prototype, with a standard 250 GTE engine. As Ferrari’s personal car and as a one–off 400 SA, it would be a very attractive car. But as the surviving prototype 250 GTE, though desirable, it was not worth the price of a unique 400 SA. Which points out why it’s important to do your homework.
Tom Yang points out that this car also has a GTE engine and not a Super America engine Kittie's dreams of a Ferrari fortune buried in this GTE hay loft will probably remain just that, dreams...and ones that the U.S. government may determine the disposition of.
The Ferrari world is so interesting isn't it? Best, Yale
Ex - 1964 330GT #6097
1963 Abarth Monomille
1970 Porsche 911S
1974 BMW 2002turbo
I took a look at the CL post when it first came up, forgot about it, then found the updated post the other night. I don't know what your experience was like, Tom, but after reading the "new, improved" website, the owner (or the owner's wife) sounds like a lunatic. It has been my experience that owners like this ALWAYS overprice their cars and ALWAYS think they have something special. Even at half the asking price, it will be a VERY expensive restoration.
I took a look at the CL post when it first came up, forgot about it, then found the updated post the other night. I don't know what your experience was like, Tom, but after reading the "new, improved" website, the owner (or the owner's wife) sounds like a lunatic. It has been my experience that owners like this ALWAYS overprice their cars and ALWAYS think they have something special. Even at half the asking price, it will be a VERY expensive restoration.
Hi Keith,
I dealt mainly with the husband, but I still walked away. At least they removed my pictures from their website!
T308,
Good detective work on naming Sheehan in the e-mail exchange.
Yale,
Stories like this don't happen with Mustang owners! (O.K., maybe GT350s)
Bill Preston and I were discussing Frankie’s GTE this weekend and it got me to wondering why it had 50 mm added to its wheelbase (same as the 330 GT 2+2, I believe). I had all along thought that the car had a standard GTE body, but now realized it couldn’t, as it would need to be 2 inches longer.
I came up with two logical reasons why you would want to lengthen the car; first to make room for a 330 engine (though the America didn't) and second, to add leg room to the rear. This being the case, if Frankie’s car was lengthened as a test vehicle for the 330 engine (though it currently has a 250 engine), the hood should be longer than normal. If it was done for added leg room, the logical way to stretch the body would be to lengthen the door.
This in mind, I printed a good side view of the car and started taking measurements. I used the air vent to compare to my car, from which I determined that 1 inch on a real car equaled 1.821 mm on the photo. As the photo did not include the very front of the car, I started with the door. Measuring a line parallel to the ground at the same height as the top of the air vent, I found the real door to be 46.5 inches and the photo to be 88.13 mm. Using my conversion factor, I found Frankie’s door to be 1.89 inches longer than mine. By the way, I started by comparing the door to the wind vent and found the proportions to be the same as mine. However, when I started comparing the door to other parts of the car, I realized the vent had been lengthened as well,
Now measuring a photo is not as precise as measuring the real thing, but if you look at a photo of a GTE, the painted stripe in the vertical windshield support is ¾ of an inch. I believe that my margin of error was better than 2 ½ windshield supports, so I am willing to conclude that his door is in fact longer than usual. My wife, on the other hand, concluded that I have way too much time on my hands.
I am sure that all of us (especially those of us over 6 feet tall) would appreciate another 2 inches of leg room in the GTE. However, Ferrari and Pininfarina obviously decided not to continue this modification. I would assume that it was a problem with the handling, but without driving it, we will never know…
Tom Wilson - Series III 250 GTE, SN 4247 GT
Curator of the 250 GTE Register http://www.250GTE.com
Your wife is absolutely correct. You have too much time on your hands. There's a GTE in your garage that is beckoning to be worked on. The next blog on your web site needs to show some elbow grease.