Description
Paris Motor Show, 1973. After 20 years of exclusive collaboration with Pininfarina, Ferrari unveils the Dino 308 GT4, a model equipped with a V8 engine conceived by Bertone. In its Turinese workshop, Maestro Marcello Gandini achieved a real feat: designing an attractive 2+2 with a mid-mounted rear engine in a car just over 4. 30 metres long. The Dino 308 GT4 is Ferrari’s first completely new design since Fiat took control (in 1969) of Maranello’s production vehicle department. Following the 246 GT, it was shown at the Paris Salon of 1973. The 308 GT4 inaugurates a 3-litre V8 (a return to the displacement of the 250 GT), which would be used on the 308 GTB. Unlike the 246 Dino’s V6 built at Fiat, the 308’s mechanics are made in Maranello. One point should be stressed: the four overhead camshafts are driven by two timing belts – as in the flat-12 boxer. Mounted transversely at the centre of the car, this engine (with a wet sump) forms a unit with the gearbox and the self-locking differential. Fed by four Weber double-body carburettors, it develops 250 hp at 7, 700 rpm, with torque rated at 29 mkg. Another peculiarity, and not the least, is that the 308 GT4 is a 2+2. An audacious concept and a risky aesthetic bet! How to seat four in a compact mid-engined car without giving birth to a ugly duckling? Ferrari’s long-standing designer since 1953, Pininfarina, was hardly enthused by the brief. Nor tempted by risk. So Bertone got stuck with it! And one can only credit the Turin coachbuilder, who executed the task remarkably well. Not least because the car’s length is only ten centimetres more than that of the Dino 246. An achievement! According to Bertone, who had drawn the Fiat Dino coupe, this collaboration with Ferrari sprang from a Fiat suggestion. Slender, the car’s front end is characterised by its plunging bonnet and retractable headlights, while a large rectangular air intake sits under the slim grille. Beyond a very flat roof, a sporty tail ends with a short overhang. As for the rear screen, it is nestled between long C-pillars to allow two openings, one for the engine, the other for the boot. To accommodate two rear passengers, the 308 GT4’s driving position is moved forward and its wheelbase lengthened to 2. 55 metres. The multi-tubular chassis and the suspensions are inherited from the 246. When the production of the 246 GT/ GTS models ended in 1974, the 308 GT4 was the last model in the Dino range. It is also the only model that American Ferrari dealerships could offer to their customers, as the 365 GT4BB and 365 GT4 2+2 models were not homologated for this market. The only “Ferrari” they sold did not even carry a Ferrari badge and, to make matters worse, its performance was constrained by the emissions-control equipment. This did not help sales, so by mid-1975 the factory asked the American dealers to fit Ferrari badges to their stock vehicles. Vehicles that had not yet left the factory were fitted with Ferrari badges, the Dino name no longer appearing on the trunk lid. Some cars available on the American market therefore carried Ferrari and Dino badges. In 1975, Ferrari launched the 208 GT4, a version exclusively for the Italian market and reduced to two litres for tax reasons (reduced VAT). Power rose to 170 hp and top speed was limited to 200 km/ h. Externally, the car differs from the 308 only by the absence of fog lights in the grille and a single exhaust outlet. Although Ferrari entrusted the design of the 308 GTB – shown in 1975 and produced alongside the 308 GT4 – to Pininfarina, Bertone proposed at the 1976 Turin Motor Show a spider based on the 308 GT4. Named Rainbow, this strict two-seater with a shortened wheelbase by ten centimetres could have completed the Ferrari line-up since the withdrawal of the 246 GTS. Rainbow is an interesting exercise, very much in the Bertone bodywork style of the era. Ultra-modern, its sharp, linear design uses only straight lines and sharp angles (the wedge line inherited from the Carabo and the Stratos by Marcello Gandini), a bold choice echoed even in the wheel designs! Moreover, this concept car offers an ingenious feature: a hard-top placed behind the seats transforms the car into a coupé-spider; all that is required is for the driver to tilt it into the closed position with a simple control. The Dino marque reached its end in 1976, when, on the 308 GT4, now Ferrari-badged, the prancing horse...
