2013 Ferrari FF
Discussion
MDifficult said:
Looks outstanding!
Out of interest, do you know what product they used for your cheat-glaze? Looks like they use Gtechniq stuff normally but I don't think they do a glaze and I'm always interested in what pro places use.
Was Poorboy's black hole that I provided. As you suggest, a real detailer wouldn't be caught dead with that in their locker Out of interest, do you know what product they used for your cheat-glaze? Looks like they use Gtechniq stuff normally but I don't think they do a glaze and I'm always interested in what pro places use.
Fonzey said:
MDifficult said:
Looks outstanding!
Out of interest, do you know what product they used for your cheat-glaze? Looks like they use Gtechniq stuff normally but I don't think they do a glaze and I'm always interested in what pro places use.
Was Poorboy's black hole that I provided. As you suggest, a real detailer wouldn't be caught dead with that in their locker Out of interest, do you know what product they used for your cheat-glaze? Looks like they use Gtechniq stuff normally but I don't think they do a glaze and I'm always interested in what pro places use.
Perfect, thanks!Fonzey said:
Feirny said:
When’s the blyton evening session in it then?
I'd love to track this car, just for a laugh if I ever have a last minute Lotus breakdown or whatever. The FF is clearly not a track car, but I reckon for some gentle short sessions it would be a hoot.Some track days will let you take two cars won’t they and swap over, so you could just do a quick 15 minute session while letting the 2-11 rest up. All day in the FF could prove costly!
Well done to you though buying surely one of the most exciting 4 seaters available at any price. There is something nice about being able to take the whole family along for the ride and it generally means it gets more use than a 2 seater for that reason.
I collected my car from the detailer’s before the PH25. My Dad gave me a lift and hung around as we were chatting about the car… first thing he did when we were discussing stone chips was to put one of his huge fingers on the bonnet. He must’ve been working on something oily beforehand, as it left a huge smear as he left his finger. The detailer and I were looking at it in disbelief and it became a race to clean it off discreetly!
Fonzey said:
MDifficult said:
Looks outstanding!
Out of interest, do you know what product they used for your cheat-glaze? Looks like they use Gtechniq stuff normally but I don't think they do a glaze and I'm always interested in what pro places use.
Was Poorboy's black hole that I provided. As you suggest, a real detailer wouldn't be caught dead with that in their locker Out of interest, do you know what product they used for your cheat-glaze? Looks like they use Gtechniq stuff normally but I don't think they do a glaze and I'm always interested in what pro places use.
Used it on my Sapphire Black E39 and Azurite Black F01; they came up a treat 
Doesn't last long, but it does its job...The White Diamond works brilliantly on silver cars too
Fasinating, OP, to read the technical bits regarding the brake disc retaining bolts. Got me pondering. I assume a full car set is 40 bolts?
So a production run of a thousand is 25 car sets. Would the other 24 sets sell on to other owners within a sensible time frame?
Perhaps a speculative post on a Ferrari forum to gauge interest?
Lovely car, BTW, but if it were mine I would be banning food and sticky sweets!
So a production run of a thousand is 25 car sets. Would the other 24 sets sell on to other owners within a sensible time frame?
Perhaps a speculative post on a Ferrari forum to gauge interest?
Lovely car, BTW, but if it were mine I would be banning food and sticky sweets!
ferret50 said:
Fasinating, OP, to read the technical bits regarding the brake disc retaining bolts. Got me pondering. I assume a full car set is 40 bolts?
So a production run of a thousand is 25 car sets. Would the other 24 sets sell on to other owners within a sensible time frame?
Perhaps a speculative post on a Ferrari forum to gauge interest?
Lovely car, BTW, but if it were mine I would be banning food and sticky sweets!
Thank you! Yes the idea of getting some fabbed up at scale has occurred to me, but I'm reluctant at the moment for the following reasons:So a production run of a thousand is 25 car sets. Would the other 24 sets sell on to other owners within a sensible time frame?
Perhaps a speculative post on a Ferrari forum to gauge interest?
Lovely car, BTW, but if it were mine I would be banning food and sticky sweets!
1. I think the market is very small. The bolt design is common across many Brembo CCBs of that era (Ferrari, Mac, AM, etc) but the lengths differ - so I may have to get them made in 50mm, 55, 58, 60, etc. The FF alone has different sizes front to back. Further to this, not many people are proactively tinkering with Ferraris - and more often than not, these bolts are only flagged as an issue after it's too late and the disc needs replacing anyway. This may change though if the FF is going to linger in the <100k bracket for a while.
2. As we've all learned from this thread, making bolts is not just a straight forward affair. I'm not sure I could put my name on something and sell it on even if the correct materials are used. How can I verify that the fixings have been made correctly, to spec, etc? It's a liability thing.
3. Not sure I can be bothered
RD-1 said:
Lovely looking car and great thread.
These are really growing on me (is it an age thing?) and feels like the natural successor to my GranTurismo in time
Thank you! And yes they've grown on me too. For a long time the front engined V12 thing was a bit of an old mans choice. I'd have taken a V8 Mid/Rear track special any day of the week... but Lotus have spoiled me somewhat and I'm just not ready to give that up yet. These are really growing on me (is it an age thing?) and feels like the natural successor to my GranTurismo in time
Couple of small updates on the car over the last couple of weeks.
First up it was service time, after a lot of internal debate about main dealer vs indy specialist, I decided to go for a main dealer on this occasion. After summing up all of the pros and cons, it came down to convenience in the end - I could drop the car with JCT600 in Leeds on the way to my biweekly visits into the city centre, then collect on the way home without any real disruption.
It had taken a while, but I'd successfully tracked down the full service history of the car. Previous owners didn't quite keep on top of all the stamps but the Ferrari dealer network are very good at logging everything and don't hesitate to share with new owners - so I could work out that the car was due just a 'basic' maintenance service this year, which is a relief to the wallet.
The dealership didn't fail to impress, lovely place and as I say, a convenient location for me. Had some great eye candy inside too.
I'd asked that a technician come out for a quick drive with me, the car was making what I described as a rotational scuffing sound occasionally. It seems to speed up with wheel speed, so I wanted to demonstrate this so the service team could focus an inspection. As it always happens, the car was bloody silent during the test drive so he just had to take my word for it...
Should have brought an 8mm spanner with me to the showroom.
After going about my business, I got a call and a video around lunchtime. This was the first time during my ownership that the car was getting properly inspected so I was a bit nervous about the call - but the general comments and tone of the call was very positive, the car was in fantastic condition underneath.
...then came the 'but', the PTU (front gearbox) was leaking oil - it was badly staining the casing and the undertray was covered in it. Uh oh. Although this would send shivers down the spine of most FF owners (the PTU is really the Achilles heel of the platform), I really wasn't too concerned. I'd had confirmation from another dealer that the PTU was a brand new replacement back in March this year - so combining the Ferrari powertrain warranty with this fact made me believe that I was highly likely to get looked after in the event of another failure so soon.
I authorised a few hours' labour to investigate further, which meant JCT would keep the car overnight. A colleague gave me a lift home, and JCT kindly offered to deliver the car FOC the next day.
The report on the rotational sound, or possible contenders came back inconclusive. Everything was thoroughly checked around the suspension, brakes, driveshafts and wheel bearings and everything checked out. They failed to replicate on the test drive, so I'd just have to come back to that later... but it was a relief that the (expensive) wheel bearings had at least been ruled as unlikely.
My only theory at the time was a dragging handbrake shoe. They're inside the disc hubs like an old school drum brake, so perhaps were dragging on some pad transfer or foreign object inside the hub. Something I could check myself later.
Finally I asked JCT to perform a wheel alignment to put to bed the distorted tyres/handling issues. The diagnostic printout showed that the front tyres had some toe-in, and the rears had some toe-out. Both of which the reverse of what should be setup, so this was corrected.
Later that evening I got a call with a PTU conclusion. It was concluded that the box was overfilled a bit when the other dealer fitted it back in March, and the breather had since ejected the excess. This was remedied by a thorough cleanup, and refilling the box so we could be sure the level was now right. I'd now keep an eye on it, and hopefully that's that.
The following day I got my delivery, and some major trailer envy:
Oh, and the kind gent delivering the car also handed me the invoice.
By far the most I've spent on a car service, as you can imagine - and I've ended up stomaching the costs of the investigation/cleanup of the PTU. I probably could go after the other dealership for these costs but the proper response would have been to have the car sent to them for the investigation, and as they're in Central London it really wasn't worth my effort. That all said, the price wasn't *that* bad and considering the car delivery and the confidence I have that the car 'checks out', it's been worth the cost.
Though the PTU issue has turned out (hopefully) benign, it has really rattled me and my thoughts about self-warrantying after expiration in November...
To celebrate, I decided on an early start last Saturday to take the car on a run, meet some friends and hopefully get one of my service stamps retrofitted to my book. Ferrari in Wilmslow had confirmed a while back that they did indeed perform the 2022 service and would happily stamp my book if I was ever in the area.
6am
Headed down towards Sheffield then into the Peak District. IME not the best 'district in the UK for driving, but a convenient route for getting to Wilmslow and meeting some friends. We met up at Ladybower reservoir and then headed off on a load of routes that frankly I had no idea about. I was just following the leader.
Quite an eclectic mix of cars in a Ferrari FF, Jaguar XE (the V6 one), Tesla Model 3, Megane RS and McLaren 600LT. Funnily enough all people who met through Lotus ownership, and despite most of us still owning Lotus... not a single one showed up.
Did the usual touristy stuff, took some photos and got some pretty clear runs on some of the routes which was nice.
FF was a little bit out of place on some of the windy/tighter stuff, the long nose made it very difficult for me to throw the car in with confidence - as visibility is really hampered. On the longer flowing stuff it came into its own, and the V12 howl across the gorges, villages and hills was just a little bit sexy.
The car went through it's most sustained windows of 'push' since I'd bought it, and happy to say it did so without falter. No odd behaviours, warnings or lights - just performance, noise and a lot of petrol.
The handling characteristics since correcting the wheel alignment just felt all round a lot 'tidier'. Car wasn't bad before, but I think that was against the reference of it's original characteristics on the dodgy tyres. The alignment had given the steering a bit more feel, more stability under heavy braking but I was struggling for rear traction more than I had previously - but I put this down to the fact I was pushing harder.
In Sports mode, the rear allows a little bit of slip - I don't know what the ESC/TC system does when it triggers, whether it flashes up a telltale light or what but I never saw anything despite hearing the odd lockup of an inside rear (presumably the ESC stopping an inside wheel from spinning?) and though the rear gave me a few wiggles when powering out of a hairpin, It never slipped for long enough to know if some sort of TC magic was kicking in.
Thoroughly enjoyable drive though, and oh so comfortable. The leather Daytona seats do struggle a bit in the "bum grip" department compared to the condom-fitment bare carbon Tilletts of my Lotus, but the ventilated seat cushions are bloody lovely when things all start to get a bit hot and bothered.
SatNav just being particularly useless and just deciding I was out at Sea for most of the morning.
Upon arrival at Wilmslow some hours later, we met for breakfast before I peeled off to Ferrari with McLaren and Jag in tow. The experience compared to JCT in Leeds was really quite frosty. I'd screwed up by not actually checking service dept was open on a Saturday (it wasn't), so no book to be stamped on this occasion - but what could have been a pleasant 20mins window shopping and talking cars with the sales team was the three of us feeling like we were just messing up their quiet Saturday, so we left.
Next door was McLaren Manchester which could not have been a more different experience. Show room was much nicer than the Ferrari one next door, and the customer service there was fantastic. They came out to meet our McLaren convoy member by name (they'd clearly done a lookup on his plate, nice touch), and after we explained we were just here for a mooch around they stopped at nothing to throw coffee at us and a staffmember to walk us around all the cars just geeking out with us. Ended up being there over an hour, and it was a great way to spend a Saturday morning.
Learned loads about the McLaren lineup, they showed interest in the FF but at no point tried any sleezy sales tactics on any of us. Other than opening the doors for just about anything we wanted to look at.
To my eye the 720S is looking like a serious supercar bargain at the moment.
Enjoyed oogling their Artura too, but the older stuff looked a bit more appealing to my eye. The peak of course being:
I took the motorways home and it gave me plenty of time to try and work out what this 'rotational' noise was. When driving "on it" all morning, it had been inaudible. It seemed to reliably stop beneath 25mph (probably why I couldn't hear it with the JCT tech) and it would get faster and faster with wheelspeed before going quiet again above 80ish, probably because other noises simply drown it out at that point. Opening any window even a crack completely drowns it out, but I know that the double glazed glass is very, very effective at sound deadening which makes me think that the sound must be reverberating through the chassis into the interior rather than being an external noise heard through the glass.
Clicking the gearbox into neutral doesn't influence the noise, nor does gently covering the brake pedal. Accel vs Decel no difference, nor does applying lateral load to either side (lane changes etc). It seems quieter some times more than others, but really struggling to apply a pattern.
Some hours later I got back to my local fuel station just in time for juice. The days fun had cost me 75litres of vpower, yikes.
One thing I wondered about the noise was whether or not it could actually be just airflow coming off the wheels into the arch buckets. It has a sort of "undertray gently flapping" sound to it. After I got home, I poked my hand into all of the wheel arches and found that the carpeted liner on the OSR was a bit loose, and I could tap it - making a sound that very closely replicates what I'm hearing at speed.
I'll look at getting that off and refitted this week, by the looks of it at least one fixing is missing - so if it ends up just being a flapping arch liner I'll be really quite chuffed.
First up it was service time, after a lot of internal debate about main dealer vs indy specialist, I decided to go for a main dealer on this occasion. After summing up all of the pros and cons, it came down to convenience in the end - I could drop the car with JCT600 in Leeds on the way to my biweekly visits into the city centre, then collect on the way home without any real disruption.
It had taken a while, but I'd successfully tracked down the full service history of the car. Previous owners didn't quite keep on top of all the stamps but the Ferrari dealer network are very good at logging everything and don't hesitate to share with new owners - so I could work out that the car was due just a 'basic' maintenance service this year, which is a relief to the wallet.
The dealership didn't fail to impress, lovely place and as I say, a convenient location for me. Had some great eye candy inside too.
I'd asked that a technician come out for a quick drive with me, the car was making what I described as a rotational scuffing sound occasionally. It seems to speed up with wheel speed, so I wanted to demonstrate this so the service team could focus an inspection. As it always happens, the car was bloody silent during the test drive so he just had to take my word for it...
Should have brought an 8mm spanner with me to the showroom.
After going about my business, I got a call and a video around lunchtime. This was the first time during my ownership that the car was getting properly inspected so I was a bit nervous about the call - but the general comments and tone of the call was very positive, the car was in fantastic condition underneath.
...then came the 'but', the PTU (front gearbox) was leaking oil - it was badly staining the casing and the undertray was covered in it. Uh oh. Although this would send shivers down the spine of most FF owners (the PTU is really the Achilles heel of the platform), I really wasn't too concerned. I'd had confirmation from another dealer that the PTU was a brand new replacement back in March this year - so combining the Ferrari powertrain warranty with this fact made me believe that I was highly likely to get looked after in the event of another failure so soon.
I authorised a few hours' labour to investigate further, which meant JCT would keep the car overnight. A colleague gave me a lift home, and JCT kindly offered to deliver the car FOC the next day.
The report on the rotational sound, or possible contenders came back inconclusive. Everything was thoroughly checked around the suspension, brakes, driveshafts and wheel bearings and everything checked out. They failed to replicate on the test drive, so I'd just have to come back to that later... but it was a relief that the (expensive) wheel bearings had at least been ruled as unlikely.
My only theory at the time was a dragging handbrake shoe. They're inside the disc hubs like an old school drum brake, so perhaps were dragging on some pad transfer or foreign object inside the hub. Something I could check myself later.
Finally I asked JCT to perform a wheel alignment to put to bed the distorted tyres/handling issues. The diagnostic printout showed that the front tyres had some toe-in, and the rears had some toe-out. Both of which the reverse of what should be setup, so this was corrected.
Later that evening I got a call with a PTU conclusion. It was concluded that the box was overfilled a bit when the other dealer fitted it back in March, and the breather had since ejected the excess. This was remedied by a thorough cleanup, and refilling the box so we could be sure the level was now right. I'd now keep an eye on it, and hopefully that's that.
The following day I got my delivery, and some major trailer envy:
Oh, and the kind gent delivering the car also handed me the invoice.
By far the most I've spent on a car service, as you can imagine - and I've ended up stomaching the costs of the investigation/cleanup of the PTU. I probably could go after the other dealership for these costs but the proper response would have been to have the car sent to them for the investigation, and as they're in Central London it really wasn't worth my effort. That all said, the price wasn't *that* bad and considering the car delivery and the confidence I have that the car 'checks out', it's been worth the cost.
Though the PTU issue has turned out (hopefully) benign, it has really rattled me and my thoughts about self-warrantying after expiration in November...
To celebrate, I decided on an early start last Saturday to take the car on a run, meet some friends and hopefully get one of my service stamps retrofitted to my book. Ferrari in Wilmslow had confirmed a while back that they did indeed perform the 2022 service and would happily stamp my book if I was ever in the area.
6am
Headed down towards Sheffield then into the Peak District. IME not the best 'district in the UK for driving, but a convenient route for getting to Wilmslow and meeting some friends. We met up at Ladybower reservoir and then headed off on a load of routes that frankly I had no idea about. I was just following the leader.
Quite an eclectic mix of cars in a Ferrari FF, Jaguar XE (the V6 one), Tesla Model 3, Megane RS and McLaren 600LT. Funnily enough all people who met through Lotus ownership, and despite most of us still owning Lotus... not a single one showed up.
Did the usual touristy stuff, took some photos and got some pretty clear runs on some of the routes which was nice.
FF was a little bit out of place on some of the windy/tighter stuff, the long nose made it very difficult for me to throw the car in with confidence - as visibility is really hampered. On the longer flowing stuff it came into its own, and the V12 howl across the gorges, villages and hills was just a little bit sexy.
The car went through it's most sustained windows of 'push' since I'd bought it, and happy to say it did so without falter. No odd behaviours, warnings or lights - just performance, noise and a lot of petrol.
The handling characteristics since correcting the wheel alignment just felt all round a lot 'tidier'. Car wasn't bad before, but I think that was against the reference of it's original characteristics on the dodgy tyres. The alignment had given the steering a bit more feel, more stability under heavy braking but I was struggling for rear traction more than I had previously - but I put this down to the fact I was pushing harder.
In Sports mode, the rear allows a little bit of slip - I don't know what the ESC/TC system does when it triggers, whether it flashes up a telltale light or what but I never saw anything despite hearing the odd lockup of an inside rear (presumably the ESC stopping an inside wheel from spinning?) and though the rear gave me a few wiggles when powering out of a hairpin, It never slipped for long enough to know if some sort of TC magic was kicking in.
Thoroughly enjoyable drive though, and oh so comfortable. The leather Daytona seats do struggle a bit in the "bum grip" department compared to the condom-fitment bare carbon Tilletts of my Lotus, but the ventilated seat cushions are bloody lovely when things all start to get a bit hot and bothered.
SatNav just being particularly useless and just deciding I was out at Sea for most of the morning.
Upon arrival at Wilmslow some hours later, we met for breakfast before I peeled off to Ferrari with McLaren and Jag in tow. The experience compared to JCT in Leeds was really quite frosty. I'd screwed up by not actually checking service dept was open on a Saturday (it wasn't), so no book to be stamped on this occasion - but what could have been a pleasant 20mins window shopping and talking cars with the sales team was the three of us feeling like we were just messing up their quiet Saturday, so we left.
Next door was McLaren Manchester which could not have been a more different experience. Show room was much nicer than the Ferrari one next door, and the customer service there was fantastic. They came out to meet our McLaren convoy member by name (they'd clearly done a lookup on his plate, nice touch), and after we explained we were just here for a mooch around they stopped at nothing to throw coffee at us and a staffmember to walk us around all the cars just geeking out with us. Ended up being there over an hour, and it was a great way to spend a Saturday morning.
Learned loads about the McLaren lineup, they showed interest in the FF but at no point tried any sleezy sales tactics on any of us. Other than opening the doors for just about anything we wanted to look at.
To my eye the 720S is looking like a serious supercar bargain at the moment.
Enjoyed oogling their Artura too, but the older stuff looked a bit more appealing to my eye. The peak of course being:
I took the motorways home and it gave me plenty of time to try and work out what this 'rotational' noise was. When driving "on it" all morning, it had been inaudible. It seemed to reliably stop beneath 25mph (probably why I couldn't hear it with the JCT tech) and it would get faster and faster with wheelspeed before going quiet again above 80ish, probably because other noises simply drown it out at that point. Opening any window even a crack completely drowns it out, but I know that the double glazed glass is very, very effective at sound deadening which makes me think that the sound must be reverberating through the chassis into the interior rather than being an external noise heard through the glass.
Clicking the gearbox into neutral doesn't influence the noise, nor does gently covering the brake pedal. Accel vs Decel no difference, nor does applying lateral load to either side (lane changes etc). It seems quieter some times more than others, but really struggling to apply a pattern.
Some hours later I got back to my local fuel station just in time for juice. The days fun had cost me 75litres of vpower, yikes.
One thing I wondered about the noise was whether or not it could actually be just airflow coming off the wheels into the arch buckets. It has a sort of "undertray gently flapping" sound to it. After I got home, I poked my hand into all of the wheel arches and found that the carpeted liner on the OSR was a bit loose, and I could tap it - making a sound that very closely replicates what I'm hearing at speed.
I'll look at getting that off and refitted this week, by the looks of it at least one fixing is missing - so if it ends up just being a flapping arch liner I'll be really quite chuffed.
Went a whole post without directly referencing brake disc bolts, but hot off the press I have an update on that too.
Quotes I'd had to get these bolts remade in the UK ranged from £26/bolt to £90/bolt and everywhere in between. Some in some rather exotic materials that I'm sure would be an improvement over the originals but the expertise outlined in skwdenyer's posts made me really second guess the idea of getting replacements made.
Thanks to the excellent work and posts from skwdenyer, the original manufacturer of the bolts was tracked down as Ferriere di Stabio in Switzerland. Over the last few months I've reached out to them and many, many other companies about replacements.
After about a month they finally got back to me, just as I was boarding a plane for holiday - it was a generic holding email so I didn't think much of it. A few days later I had a reply that really caught me off guard. The reply was along the lines of:
"Yes we still have a few of these lying around, send us your address and we'll post them out". After querying costs, the reply came back as "nah we'll just send them to you, our treat".
As of a few hours ago, these landed at home:
I'm still pretty shocked I finally managed to get hold of them. Obviously as OEM items, they're going to have the same corrosion concerns that the originals had - but frankly if these last another 10 years, they're really not going to be my problem, or the problem of anyone else - as the discs will probably need changing by then.
Not sure what to do yet, whether to just swap out the two bolts that I had donated from an old disc - or swap out all ten, or even do all ten on both front discs.
I feel like just swapping the two out will be most likely, the others all past the visual corrosion check and I'll always have this box of spares in case I spot problems in the future. My reluctance for swapping them all frankly is that I want to minimise my opportunities for fecking something up, torquing something wrong or whatever - as the tolerances seem to be so fine.
Quotes I'd had to get these bolts remade in the UK ranged from £26/bolt to £90/bolt and everywhere in between. Some in some rather exotic materials that I'm sure would be an improvement over the originals but the expertise outlined in skwdenyer's posts made me really second guess the idea of getting replacements made.
Thanks to the excellent work and posts from skwdenyer, the original manufacturer of the bolts was tracked down as Ferriere di Stabio in Switzerland. Over the last few months I've reached out to them and many, many other companies about replacements.
After about a month they finally got back to me, just as I was boarding a plane for holiday - it was a generic holding email so I didn't think much of it. A few days later I had a reply that really caught me off guard. The reply was along the lines of:
"Yes we still have a few of these lying around, send us your address and we'll post them out". After querying costs, the reply came back as "nah we'll just send them to you, our treat".
As of a few hours ago, these landed at home:
I'm still pretty shocked I finally managed to get hold of them. Obviously as OEM items, they're going to have the same corrosion concerns that the originals had - but frankly if these last another 10 years, they're really not going to be my problem, or the problem of anyone else - as the discs will probably need changing by then.
Not sure what to do yet, whether to just swap out the two bolts that I had donated from an old disc - or swap out all ten, or even do all ten on both front discs.
I feel like just swapping the two out will be most likely, the others all past the visual corrosion check and I'll always have this box of spares in case I spot problems in the future. My reluctance for swapping them all frankly is that I want to minimise my opportunities for fecking something up, torquing something wrong or whatever - as the tolerances seem to be so fine.
A great update, thank you.
A number of positives, the investigation for the fluid top up aside -- perhaps you could write to them with a copy of the invoice and report -- perhaps they may offer a goodwill gesture, whether it be invitation to an event or an accessory etc...
The seats sound comfortable and to consider that the arch liner could be at fault for the noise would've been the icing on the cake... until, the brake disc bolts! The entire conversation smacks of legendary thread material to me, it's just such a specialised outcome that is only possible in particular nooks of t'internet. Fabulous stuff and I have no envy for you whatsoever, given that you're doing such a good job of ownership. However, that slogan on the wall of JCT makes me puke, a little.
A number of positives, the investigation for the fluid top up aside -- perhaps you could write to them with a copy of the invoice and report -- perhaps they may offer a goodwill gesture, whether it be invitation to an event or an accessory etc...
The seats sound comfortable and to consider that the arch liner could be at fault for the noise would've been the icing on the cake... until, the brake disc bolts! The entire conversation smacks of legendary thread material to me, it's just such a specialised outcome that is only possible in particular nooks of t'internet. Fabulous stuff and I have no envy for you whatsoever, given that you're doing such a good job of ownership. However, that slogan on the wall of JCT makes me puke, a little.
Fonzey said:
Went a whole post without directly referencing brake disc bolts, but hot off the press I have an update on that too.
Quotes I'd had to get these bolts remade in the UK ranged from £26/bolt to £90/bolt and everywhere in between. Some in some rather exotic materials that I'm sure would be an improvement over the originals but the expertise outlined in skwdenyer's posts made me really second guess the idea of getting replacements made.
Thanks to the excellent work and posts from skwdenyer, the original manufacturer of the bolts was tracked down as Ferriere di Stabio in Switzerland. Over the last few months I've reached out to them and many, many other companies about replacements.
After about a month they finally got back to me, just as I was boarding a plane for holiday - it was a generic holding email so I didn't think much of it. A few days later I had a reply that really caught me off guard. The reply was along the lines of:
"Yes we still have a few of these lying around, send us your address and we'll post them out". After querying costs, the reply came back as "nah we'll just send them to you, our treat".
As of a few hours ago, these landed at home:
I'm still pretty shocked I finally managed to get hold of them. Obviously as OEM items, they're going to have the same corrosion concerns that the originals had - but frankly if these last another 10 years, they're really not going to be my problem, or the problem of anyone else - as the discs will probably need changing by then.
Not sure what to do yet, whether to just swap out the two bolts that I had donated from an old disc - or swap out all ten, or even do all ten on both front discs.
I feel like just swapping the two out will be most likely, the others all past the visual corrosion check and I'll always have this box of spares in case I spot problems in the future. My reluctance for swapping them all frankly is that I want to minimise my opportunities for fecking something up, torquing something wrong or whatever - as the tolerances seem to be so fine.
Well done for perseverance! Purely out of interest, if you end up with a not-totally-knackered take-off bolt you're not using, I'd be intrigued to take a look at one Quotes I'd had to get these bolts remade in the UK ranged from £26/bolt to £90/bolt and everywhere in between. Some in some rather exotic materials that I'm sure would be an improvement over the originals but the expertise outlined in skwdenyer's posts made me really second guess the idea of getting replacements made.
Thanks to the excellent work and posts from skwdenyer, the original manufacturer of the bolts was tracked down as Ferriere di Stabio in Switzerland. Over the last few months I've reached out to them and many, many other companies about replacements.
After about a month they finally got back to me, just as I was boarding a plane for holiday - it was a generic holding email so I didn't think much of it. A few days later I had a reply that really caught me off guard. The reply was along the lines of:
"Yes we still have a few of these lying around, send us your address and we'll post them out". After querying costs, the reply came back as "nah we'll just send them to you, our treat".
As of a few hours ago, these landed at home:
I'm still pretty shocked I finally managed to get hold of them. Obviously as OEM items, they're going to have the same corrosion concerns that the originals had - but frankly if these last another 10 years, they're really not going to be my problem, or the problem of anyone else - as the discs will probably need changing by then.
Not sure what to do yet, whether to just swap out the two bolts that I had donated from an old disc - or swap out all ten, or even do all ten on both front discs.
I feel like just swapping the two out will be most likely, the others all past the visual corrosion check and I'll always have this box of spares in case I spot problems in the future. My reluctance for swapping them all frankly is that I want to minimise my opportunities for fecking something up, torquing something wrong or whatever - as the tolerances seem to be so fine.
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