This time last week I was on the Leeds to Kings Cross train on the first leg of the journey to pick up my new 997.2 C2. Excited didn't cover it, sleep had been in short supply for the previous week leading up to the PPI on Good Friday
The search started in early Feb, focused on a manual gen1 2S, with a full Hartech rebuild a must. Early on I missed out on a good one by a day or so over in Liverpool, procrastinating over the millennium falcon mileage it was running. In hindsight it was a definite miss of a very well sorted car. Lesson learned early and reinforced many times throughout the search- move quickly in the current market or miss out.
Armed with much knowledge from the forum, talking to sellers, Grant at Hartech and various other specialists the criteria widened to include cars being sold with engine issues with a view to organising the rebuild myself, but the asking price for the few available base cars meant the figures never really stacked up.
As is the way with these things the budget was creeping up, fueled by some solid man maths, until early gen2's were within reach. I had also developed an unhealthy 4 time a day habit scouring Autotrader, PH and Ebay.
A small price reduction on my car brought it within budget and after a bit of toing and froing with the (private) seller, who was great, a price was agreed and the PPI booked. Just in time really, he then took another 5 calls in the following day or so all wanting to see it over the Easter weekend.
The PPI highlighted a couple of bits to be done, none particularly urgent so after a bit more negotiating on the price I was on my way down to collect it from Egham in Surrey. The seller picked me up from the station and after a quick spin everything was good to go.
The bank transfer took an age as it got caught in various fraud checks so rather than take up the sellers day I headed out for a look round... and soon stumbled across the large Ferrari dealership just down the road. A good day was getting better, so an hour was spent browsing what they had on offer while the money went through, but it finally did and after some rather expensive (£1.47/litre) V Power from the local Shell I was on my way.
It's a bit of compromise in many respects being a PDK non S. Maybe I will always think what if I'd got a manual, or an S, or both, but i didn't want to stretch that far, plus there are not so many available at the moment, especially at my price point, but after a week of driving it I am certainly not seeing it that way.
The 3 hours back home up the M1 after picking it up were dull and, dare I say it, it felt a little heavy and unexciting... but things improved North of Sheffield once the avg speed cameras disappeared and I could open it up a bit... then once I turned off at J38 Yorkshire Sculpture Park and put it in Sport it just came alive. Plenty quick enough and wriggling with feedback I haven't stopped driving it since, and with a massive I might add
She's not perfect by any stretch and I have a couple of things on the to do list: red calipers, -20mm Eibach springs and some wheel spacers and it will be getting there but for the foreseeable I'm just going to enjoy getting to know it and how to get the best out of it.
Big thanks to all on here who have helped me along the way and provided some much need advice, it's been an adventure in more ways than one.
Anyway, enough rambling, most are probably asleep or haven't got this far.
I couldn't resist stopping for few snaps on the trip back so here they are, including some highlights from the rest of the day
The search started in early Feb, focused on a manual gen1 2S, with a full Hartech rebuild a must. Early on I missed out on a good one by a day or so over in Liverpool, procrastinating over the millennium falcon mileage it was running. In hindsight it was a definite miss of a very well sorted car. Lesson learned early and reinforced many times throughout the search- move quickly in the current market or miss out.
Armed with much knowledge from the forum, talking to sellers, Grant at Hartech and various other specialists the criteria widened to include cars being sold with engine issues with a view to organising the rebuild myself, but the asking price for the few available base cars meant the figures never really stacked up.
As is the way with these things the budget was creeping up, fueled by some solid man maths, until early gen2's were within reach. I had also developed an unhealthy 4 time a day habit scouring Autotrader, PH and Ebay.
A small price reduction on my car brought it within budget and after a bit of toing and froing with the (private) seller, who was great, a price was agreed and the PPI booked. Just in time really, he then took another 5 calls in the following day or so all wanting to see it over the Easter weekend.
The PPI highlighted a couple of bits to be done, none particularly urgent so after a bit more negotiating on the price I was on my way down to collect it from Egham in Surrey. The seller picked me up from the station and after a quick spin everything was good to go.
The bank transfer took an age as it got caught in various fraud checks so rather than take up the sellers day I headed out for a look round... and soon stumbled across the large Ferrari dealership just down the road. A good day was getting better, so an hour was spent browsing what they had on offer while the money went through, but it finally did and after some rather expensive (£1.47/litre) V Power from the local Shell I was on my way.
It's a bit of compromise in many respects being a PDK non S. Maybe I will always think what if I'd got a manual, or an S, or both, but i didn't want to stretch that far, plus there are not so many available at the moment, especially at my price point, but after a week of driving it I am certainly not seeing it that way.
The 3 hours back home up the M1 after picking it up were dull and, dare I say it, it felt a little heavy and unexciting... but things improved North of Sheffield once the avg speed cameras disappeared and I could open it up a bit... then once I turned off at J38 Yorkshire Sculpture Park and put it in Sport it just came alive. Plenty quick enough and wriggling with feedback I haven't stopped driving it since, and with a massive I might add
She's not perfect by any stretch and I have a couple of things on the to do list: red calipers, -20mm Eibach springs and some wheel spacers and it will be getting there but for the foreseeable I'm just going to enjoy getting to know it and how to get the best out of it.
Big thanks to all on here who have helped me along the way and provided some much need advice, it's been an adventure in more ways than one.
Anyway, enough rambling, most are probably asleep or haven't got this far.
I couldn't resist stopping for few snaps on the trip back so here they are, including some highlights from the rest of the day
