Step one - Take stuff apart

So, to get at the clutch on a 355 you have to remove a few parts. Namely, the air cleaners, heat shield, muffler, and rear bumper. Not too bad. I took the air cleaner and heat shield off in about 15 minutes. Removed all the bolts, save one, which attached the muffler to the headers. One bolt is frozen. My guess is that is that it is cross threaded.

Tomorrow I hope it is cooler, Portland is experiencing a hot spell, and I still need to pull the bumper and muffler.

Time for a new clutch

On Saturday the 18th Barb and I went on the Ferrari Clubs Wine Country Drive. We are no longer members of the club but I helped organize the drive so I think the adopted a don’t ask don’t tell policy. I you are interested you can view pictures of the drive here. I did not bring a camera.

Aside from good wine the other most interesting aspect to the drive was how much the clutch on the 355 started to slip. It would slip if I gave the car gas in any gear over 3rd.
All in all I think it slipped about 10 times during the drive.

I parked it and considered my options.

1. Take it to a shop and let them fix it.
   


2. Fix it myself.
   


3. Take the tires off and park it in the front yard.
   


4. Take advantage of the governments CARS program.
   

I chose option number 2.

The clutch and the windshield wipers are the two bits of the car which do not require the engine to be removed to change. There are several good guides on how to change a clutch on the 355. I found one, memorized it, and dove in.

The car is now disassembled. Mostly. When it came time to jack the car up I had a problem. It does not have a jack and the jack from our Porsche will not fit.

Just in case...

Just in case you were wondering. Writing a book is a pain. Rewarding, yes. Sometimes pleasurable, yes. Pain, almost always.

I have 225 pages. I have an ending. I have edited it three times. I am right now 134 pages into my fourth edit.

On a lighter note I drove the Ferrari several hundred miles last week. It was my everyday driver.

Cheers.

David