Right, this is going to start with a bit of a story.
A while ago I bought a 348 foldable roof from another owner. It fit the bill for what I wanted - an emergency top so I could go out with no roof on when I didn't think it would rain but have an option if I had got it wrong. It folded up and fit on the parcel shelf so I could have my seat all the way back, which at my height made driving the car with the roof off far more pleasant. It also meant my colour coded targa didn't get scratched or marked from being behind the seats. It was pretty old having supposedly been made by Ferrari at the tail end of the 348 production run.
Fast forward a year or so and I was looking for a good condition original black targa. I like my car bling'd up but wanted to be able to return it to original if the mood took me. Jeff wanted to get hold of a foldable soft top but had a black targa in good nick. Although I quite wanted the black targa I didn't want to loose the foldable option.
Then, again pretty much out of the blue, Matt dropped me a line saying he had seen something about foldable roofs on a site from over on the continent, sadly the site wouldn't load any more but he was sure it had had something about foldable 348 roofs on it. I spent the next week intermittently trying to get the site to load then all of a sudden one day it loaded up. I got contact details off the site before it stopped working again. No one answered the email or phone so I tried the fax. Eventually I got in touch with a chap called Henk who told me the following story:
Henk is a Ferrari restorer over on the continent, his site backs this up. Both he and a friend also deal in Ferrari parts and memorabilia and on a trip to the factory where they picked up some F1 tool cars (think he said they were called) they came across 5 sealed boxes. They asked what was in them and got a shrug in return so they asked for them to be opened. Inside were 5 foldable roofs marked for use on the Ferrari 348 TS. Now at this point I asked Henk to send me a photo of one of the roofs, I was a tad sceptical. He did and it was absolutely identical to the roof I already owned, and I do mean identical right down to the same catches and same font on the silver speed restriction label - it was exactly the same roof only brand new.
I spoke to Jeff and told him my old foldable roof may be available as a swap for his original black targa, told him the outline of the story, and we swapped. In the meantime I agreed to buy one of the new roofs from Henk for myself as well as 'reserving' the other 4. Another 348 TS owner got in touch with me who had an inkling about what was going on so I upped my initial order to 2 roofs, reserving the other 3. Those 2 roofs arrived this morning.
The main difference between the new roofs and my old one is the fit, it is perfect on the one I opened for myself. There are no gaps above the window - the roof overlaps the windows all the way to the rear and just 'flicks' the roof edge as you close the door, the parts that should follow the contour of the arch are perfect and the front bits that go in the clamping areas on the 348 fit perfectly:
Now, can I confirm the above story and say definitively that these are OEM roofs? No, I can only pass on what I have been told - it's all 2nd hand. I can say that these roofs are absolutely identical to the other European foldable roofs out there that claim to be OEM and I do mean absolutely identical not a good copy - if they aren't OEM then none of them are. As far as I'm concerned I don't care a great deal, the one I've got is perfect.
Right there are 3 left, they each cost about £1665 (I say about because you pay in Euros). I'm not interested in making a penny out of this, I'm just passing on the opportunity to get hold of one to other members of the Brotherhood here on CS. If anyone is interested, the first 3 PMs to hit my inbox get one. Unlike my old one (which I'm sure Jeff will mod to rectify this) the one I received really could be used as a total replacement for a hard targa top. Over to you all.
Pete
A while ago I bought a 348 foldable roof from another owner. It fit the bill for what I wanted - an emergency top so I could go out with no roof on when I didn't think it would rain but have an option if I had got it wrong. It folded up and fit on the parcel shelf so I could have my seat all the way back, which at my height made driving the car with the roof off far more pleasant. It also meant my colour coded targa didn't get scratched or marked from being behind the seats. It was pretty old having supposedly been made by Ferrari at the tail end of the 348 production run.
Fast forward a year or so and I was looking for a good condition original black targa. I like my car bling'd up but wanted to be able to return it to original if the mood took me. Jeff wanted to get hold of a foldable soft top but had a black targa in good nick. Although I quite wanted the black targa I didn't want to loose the foldable option.
Then, again pretty much out of the blue, Matt dropped me a line saying he had seen something about foldable roofs on a site from over on the continent, sadly the site wouldn't load any more but he was sure it had had something about foldable 348 roofs on it. I spent the next week intermittently trying to get the site to load then all of a sudden one day it loaded up. I got contact details off the site before it stopped working again. No one answered the email or phone so I tried the fax. Eventually I got in touch with a chap called Henk who told me the following story:
Henk is a Ferrari restorer over on the continent, his site backs this up. Both he and a friend also deal in Ferrari parts and memorabilia and on a trip to the factory where they picked up some F1 tool cars (think he said they were called) they came across 5 sealed boxes. They asked what was in them and got a shrug in return so they asked for them to be opened. Inside were 5 foldable roofs marked for use on the Ferrari 348 TS. Now at this point I asked Henk to send me a photo of one of the roofs, I was a tad sceptical. He did and it was absolutely identical to the roof I already owned, and I do mean identical right down to the same catches and same font on the silver speed restriction label - it was exactly the same roof only brand new.
I spoke to Jeff and told him my old foldable roof may be available as a swap for his original black targa, told him the outline of the story, and we swapped. In the meantime I agreed to buy one of the new roofs from Henk for myself as well as 'reserving' the other 4. Another 348 TS owner got in touch with me who had an inkling about what was going on so I upped my initial order to 2 roofs, reserving the other 3. Those 2 roofs arrived this morning.
The main difference between the new roofs and my old one is the fit, it is perfect on the one I opened for myself. There are no gaps above the window - the roof overlaps the windows all the way to the rear and just 'flicks' the roof edge as you close the door, the parts that should follow the contour of the arch are perfect and the front bits that go in the clamping areas on the 348 fit perfectly:
Now, can I confirm the above story and say definitively that these are OEM roofs? No, I can only pass on what I have been told - it's all 2nd hand. I can say that these roofs are absolutely identical to the other European foldable roofs out there that claim to be OEM and I do mean absolutely identical not a good copy - if they aren't OEM then none of them are. As far as I'm concerned I don't care a great deal, the one I've got is perfect.
Right there are 3 left, they each cost about £1665 (I say about because you pay in Euros). I'm not interested in making a penny out of this, I'm just passing on the opportunity to get hold of one to other members of the Brotherhood here on CS. If anyone is interested, the first 3 PMs to hit my inbox get one. Unlike my old one (which I'm sure Jeff will mod to rectify this) the one I received really could be used as a total replacement for a hard targa top. Over to you all.
Pete
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