The 308 GTS outsold the GTB by a wide margin. I prefer the berlinetta but seeing this in action was plenty satisfying. Plus seeing it in grey helped overcome the dark patch problem of the open air model.
The dark patch on the roof.
I’ve got no problem with a red Ferrari; it’s when I see one in a chrome wrap that I begin to act churlish. But a bright colour only emphasises the black gap above the door.
Grilling the greenhouse does just as much to ruin the balance, but not as badly as the preceding 246 GTS did against its roofed variant.
This red one we’ve seen before; it’s an early example and carries the small chin spoiler.
Our hero car features a larger chin spoiler introduced around the same time as fuel injection.
Then there’s the 328, which looked like it swallowed a Mondial.
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I thought the 246 GTS did a better job with the targa top execution because it outright eliminated the quarter glass, creating two distinctive and equally attractive aesthetics between it and the solid roof 246 GT variant. Those louvers always bothered me on the 308 GTS, and probably because it looks exactly like a GTB in profile but with clutter added. I agree red only exacerbates it, despite it being the most popular color.
I love your description of the 328 front end!
Got a 246 comparo coming up. It doesn’t pander to the berlinetta’s greenhouse, but I like some window behind the driver.
With a solid roof I agree, but with Targas and T tops I like a solid thick pillar so the greenhouse terminates in the same line as the roof opening, it just flows better visually to me, be it the 246, 911 Targa, C3 Corvettes or second gen GM F bodies. It looks like an afterthought the other way, which is probably why the 308 tacked on those louvers in lieu of using the GTS quarter glass sections, just to make some effort to visually distract the eye but minimize production cost between models compared to its predecessor
I’m feeling you, but it doesn’t work all the time. Porsche 911 did it well with the chromed rollbar.
These, along with the Mercedes R107 and RR Corniche convertible, were ruined for me due to living in West Los Angeles just south of Beverly Hills. Both were seen constantly, and in profusion. And their drivers were movie/tv caricatures of themselves. Or of course quite often the real thing.
There’s nothing like excess (on several levels) to put a ding into a young man’s love for the intrinsic goodness of all of them.
It’s an icon, and safely here from in Eugene I can find some warmth for them again.
Here its G-banger 911s filling that ubiquity gap. 308 even in their day were not as common here as new Ferrari is now.
That’s how I feel about whale-tail era Porsches having grown up in Dallas: gaudy extravagances driven by dickish anesthesiologists.
I still remember the time I saw a red one of these just outside a tiny village in Michigan. I pulled out and passed it driving a minivan pulling a popup camper! My guess is someone just bought it and was paranoid driving it.
Bob
hehehe
I still love them, they look good, sound great, and are now a real treat to see, although like Paul above, I too saw them semi-constantly when living in SoCal back in that era. Good catches, and while red is probably the best color, and even better with Christie Brinkley behind the wheel, that charcoal one makes a good case for itself as well.
Did Christie Brinkley ever date Tom Selleck?
So much baggage around Ferraris new and old. I prefer to take these cars as they are, as cars. These 308s were…are…great cars. Drive great, sound great, look great. Not particularly fast, but consider the era. Reliablity? It’s an Enzo-era Ferrari, are you kidding me? It is what it is. And it’s still attainable by mere mortals. Who gives a crap who drove them back in the day and why? It’s a f*cking Ferrari folks. And a lovely one at that.
Still ridiculously fun to drive go-carts too. The 308 was really the last of the classic sports cars before sports cars needed to be supercar fast in acceleration and reach crazy top speeds too. Back then you want a Ferrari to do that you buy/import a 365/512BB or Testarossa to do the job.
I can separate the cars from owners quite easily if I already like the cars, I’ve realized that if I have a negative connection to a car from demographics I usually wasn’t that smitten with it to begin with.
I know that you may well seek an immediate divorce on my saying this, Dr, but it matters not one whit whether the roof is removeable and the sides grilled because the whole shebang is just not a special design whether it has windows and a painted roof or not.
It has a bad hangover, front and back. Despite it not being a Gothic cathedral, it has flying buttresses, which lend to it a most unbecoming hunchback profile. Despite it being a car, it hasn’t really got a face, just a front. It has the rear lights from semi-truck trailer, quite oversized and without integration. There is an inherent awkwardness about the way the cabin sits below the front AND back, as if someone at Pinin got concepts of “slingshot” and “sling” mistranslated in the design brief. And finally, the wheels are shy all the way under there, and shouldn’t be – they’re on a Ferrari, after all.
Other than these faults, and if it was redesigned from scratch to eliminate them, I quite like these. Very decent photos, too.
Serve the papers on my lawyers.
No chance.
The berlinetta is the last great Ferrari shape, even better than its 288 GTO offspring because someone thought rectangular lights were appropriate in 1984.
And funnily enough, I’ve always liked the GTO, as the tricks involved (a slight ducktail, wider-sitting wheels, wider guards) collectively had the effect of shortening and fattening, fixing most of my whinges.
And yes, if the 328 had swallowed a Mondial, the GTO had swallowed an Austin Kimberly. Those lights are decisively NOT part of the improvements.
And yes, I must concede – if only by way of that GTO – this was their last best shape. Not much of delight since.
The Ferrari 308 = Iconic. To me, these are probably still the most beautiful Ferraris sold new within my lifetime. Great shots.
Agreed.
I agree with your agreement.
Beautiful classic.
I think the 328 GTS looked nice in the US because here the 308 was saddled with 5 mph bumpers and the 328 was designed with them in mind.
When I used to ride bikes on Soledad Mountain almost every day with my girlfriend about a decade ago, we were passed by new Ferraris and Lamborghinis regularly. She never uttered a peep about them. One day a 308 GTSi passed us and she caught up with me to ask what it was.
Still my favourite Ferrari, with the small spoiler, probably as a GTB.
In red!
Just 255bhp. What’s a 488 got?
Just 255 horsepower? The US ones went as low as 205 horsepower, if not lower. The Porsche 911 SC was at 172 horsepower at the time. In 1984, the 911 Carrera 3.2 was up to 200 horsepower, making it about the fastest accelerating car in the states. 308s also weighed over 500 pounds more than Ferrari claimed during the model’s introduction, making for acceleration times that would be criticized today in a family sedan. 0-60 in 7.9 seconds with a quarter mile elapsed time of 16.1 seconds was reported by Road & Track for the 308 GTS tested in March of 1981. Today’s Ferraris are authentically fast and nicely assembled, but they aren’t attractive and people seem to assume the worst about their drivers. Is it because they once took skill to drive, while today they’re all nannies and automatic transmissions, or is it just creeping class warfare?
This has just appeared on-line
I remember reading it under the desk at school….
https://www.carmagazine.co.uk/car-reviews/ferrari/308-gtb/