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Re: [alfa] when did a Dino 308GT4 become a Ferrari?



Hi James:

I've always felt dismay upon seeing one of Pininfarina's prettiest cars, the 206/246 variants, with a prancing horse slapped on its rear fascia. Of course, the Dino is a real Ferrari, regardless of its lack of a V-12 and Ferrari badging, and plenty a Dino racing car won a Grand Prix or hillclimb event for the Ferrari factory team. But the real point is that the Dino's (and before that, the V6 Dino engines) were originally an homage to Mr. Ferrari's late son, and I always wondered if they were somehow more special to him, and thus kept as a separate line of cars for that reason. To me, that's what the Dino's are about, and that's what makes them almost more special than a Ferrari-badged Ferrari.

Then there were the 308's from '75 onwards. Not great cars, but they certainly all left Modena with prancing horse emblems on the nose, tail, wheel centers, and steering wheel hub, and they were sold as Ferrari's, not Dino's. It's not that the Dino's morphed into Ferrari's, it's that the Dino's died in '74.

Now, anyone want to re-open the debate about when Alfa died?

Regards,

Dean
Lutz, FL
'74 & '87 Spider Veloce's


At 05:47 PM 5/21/2004, you wrote:

Date: Fri, 21 May 2004 15:37:37 -0500
From: "James Tyson" <[email protected]>
Subject: [alfa] when did a Dino 308GT4 become a Ferrari?

In 1973/74,I belonged to the Deleware Valley chapter of AROC and I
attended several club meetings at Algar Enterprises.At that time Algar
was an Alfa & Ferrari dealer and was also the Ferrari distributor for the
entire East Coast.I distinctly remember there were two logos on
display-one for Ferrari and one for Dino.The 246 coupes and spiders on
the showroom floor had Dino badges.If you went to an auto show there were
two displays,one for Dino and one for Ferrari. They weren't Ferraris...no
one dared to refer to them as Ferraris.They were much cheaper and they
didn't have a v12. I'm no Ferrari snob,and I'd love to own either Dino
model,but I am curious as to when and how Dinos morphed into Ferraris.Did
Enzo issue a papal bull(which leads me to consider, what is the
automotive equivalent of ex cathedra....)?
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