imported_Shaun Carollo
New member
I have had the pleasure of spending 30 hours over the last four days working on this beautiful machine. I met the owner on another forum after finding out that one of his family members was one of my favorite teachers from high school. We exchanged emails after fall hit and arranged to have the car done in the spring. Fast forward to last Thursday and the customer dropped the vehicle off at a shop I have close ties with so we could utilize their twin post lifts to remove the wheels for cleaning and also to detail the underbody, wheel wells, and suspension components. I knew I would be pressed for time so I couldn’t take as many pics as I would like, but I did finally learn how to use my DSLR towards the end so hopefully my next write-up will show it.
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A little history on the 360 Challenge Stradale:
The Ferrari 360 is a mid-engine midsize two-seater sports car produced from late 1999 until 2005. The 360 replaced the Ferrari F355 and was itself replaced by the fairly similar Ferrari F430. For the 360, Ferrari partnered with Alcoa to produce an entirely new all-aluminum space-frame chassis that was 40% stiffer than the 355, yet 28% lighter despite a 10% increase in overall dimensions. Along with the new frame was a new Pininfarina body styling that broke ranks with the last decade's sharp angles and flip-up headlights, replacing them with a rounded appearance that harkened to the 1960s. The new V8 engine, common to all versions, was only slightly larger and more powerful than the 355's at 3.6 litres and 400 bhp (300 kW) of power, but the lighter frame and added stiffness improved performance; the 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) acceleration performance improved from 4.6 to 4.4 seconds, and in the Challenge versions it was as low as 4.0 s. An engine replacement resulted in the V8 road model that followed, the F430 (internally referred to as the evoluzione or evo) which came out in 2004.
• Maximum power: 425 PS (317 kW; 420 bhp) @ 8500 rpm
• Maximum torque: 373 N•m (275 lbf•ft) @ 4750 rpm
The Challenge Stradale is a more track day focused car than the Modena, it was inspired by the challenge racing series and can be thought of as a Challenge car for the road. Ferrari engineers designed the car from the outset with 20% track day use in mind and 80% road use. With only a small 20 bhp (15 kW) improvement in engine power from the Modena but with substantially improved power to weight ratio, the Challenge Stradale accelerates from 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) in just 4.1 seconds.
In total, the CS is up to 110 kg (243 lb) lighter than the standard Modena if all the lightweight options are specified such as deleted radio, lexan side windows and fabric cloth (instead of the leather option). As much as 94 kilograms (207 lb) was taken off on the bodywork by stripping the interior carpets, lighter weight bumpers, carbon mirrors and the optional Modena carbon seats becoming standard. The engine and transmission weight was slimmed down 11 kg (24 lb) through the use of a smaller, lighter weight sports (yet still stainless steel) exhaust back box and valved exit pipes.
There are a lot of subtle (and some not so subtle) styling differences between the Challenge Stradale and the standard Modena.
These include;
Visual differences
• 19" BBS Challenge Styled Alloys with Titanium wheel bolts
• Large Diameter Carbon Ceramic Brakes
• Carbon-fibre side mirrors
• Updated front and rear bumpers
• Pair of rear bumper diffusers
• Sharper side skirts
• Plexi-glass rear window
• Lower ride height on Titanium springs
• Lighter weight challenge grille (black metal mesh) made from Aluminium
• Challenge Stradale badging on rear grille
• Optional Tri-colour Racing Stripe
• Different exhaust tips to complement the lighter racing exhaust (the optional Modena racing exhaust became standard equipment on Challenge Stradale)
The car also had the optional carbon racing seats (available in 3 sizes, small, medium and large) which are noticeable from the outside to complement the interior detailing. These seats are a significant improvement in weight reduction over the standard seats.
Interior differences
• New instrument dials with a yellow rev counter and carbon fibre surround
• Carbon Fibre door panels
• Carbon Centre Console
• Fabric Dashboard with deleted stereo and glovebox
• New styled air ball vents (shared with 430)
• New Steering wheel with optional coloured racing ring
• Removal of carpets and lots of sound deading material (weight reduction)
• Rubber floor mats with optional fire extinguisher
Handling differences
• New stiffer rear anti-rollbar (hollow to make it lighter) and reduce body roll (same one fitted to 430 Scuderia)
• 360 Challenge cars uprated flanbloc's replace all original rubber suspension bushes including anti-roll bar bushes (uprated) improving alignment on the move
• 20% stiffer uprated (progressively coiled) springs made from Titanium (lighter, lowering unsprung weight) and reducing pitch and roll
• Different suspension alignment and ride heights (rear higher than front to aid downforce)
• Titanium wheel bolts and carbon ceramic brakes (along with overall weight reduction) also contributing significantly to handling improvements (along with aero downforce improvements)
• Re-programmed electronic suspension control software with new 'race' mode (stiffer than Modena)
• Specially devised Pirelli Rosso Corsa (soft compound) track biased road tires (wider than Modena)
• Factory corner weighted suspension, additional care taken to corner weight each vehicle before it left the factory to match its exact weight with options fitted.
• 0–100 km/h (62 mph): 4.1 s
• Top Speed : 300 km/h (190 mph)
• Downforce: about 270 kgf (2.6 kN) @ 300 km/h (without rear wing)
• lift/drag: about -1.1:1
Thursday at 8 am we started the first step (and admittedly the hardest) of moving the car onto the lift. This took awhile. I had 8 pieces of 2 x 12 lumber cut for “ramps� so we could lift the 360 high enough for the twin post lift to get underneath. I also had to run and grab 4 hockey pucks for the lifting points just to make sure no damage was done. Even with two very competent men working to make this happen it still took almost 2 hours to position the ramps just the right way to that the arms on the lift would hit the lift points and not the ramps before being in position.
After that headache was over I removed the wheels to expose what was quite possibly one of the sexiest part of this car; the rotors. Call me crazy but I couldn’t get over how beefy and capable these rotors appear while in the wheel well without a wheel covering them.
I also placed all of the titanium wheel bolts into my Wolfgang wash bucket for safe keeping. I believe these bolts are priced at $100 a piece (x20) which might seem expensive but when you feel how light they are in your hand you can seem to justify the expense.
I then generously sprayed P21S Total Auto Wash (TAW) all over the wheel wells, calipers, and suspension components. I also sprayed the entire underbody which was basically an assortment of composite/plastic molded sheets that cover the entire bottom of the car. This loosened up tons of road and track grime from underneath and ensured that this project was off to a good start from the ground up, literally. I also used my dry vapor steam machine to help on the underside.
Following the underbody I moved onto cleaning each wheel well. I came around and sprayed each wheel well again and agitated everything with a variety of brushed and let the TAW dwell. This really loosened up the road grime and it started dripping onto the ground below. I also used my steam cleaner to speed things up. This tool was invaluable in reaching into the various cracks and crevices that towels and brushes can’t reach to penetrate and loosen up the dirt. Calipers where sealed with Meguiar’s #20. You can see the results below.
Here you can see the driver’s side rear wheel well done while the passenger side is pre cleaning.
End of day one: 5:15 pm
Day 2 started at 8 am once again. I started with cleaning and sealing the wheels that were still off the car. The owner has taken the car to the track so there was plenty of track spaghetti on the fronts along with varying amounts of road tar and other goodies. I sprayed down the wheels with TAW and Meguiars All Purpose Cleaner Plus (MAPC.)
You can see the products getting to work. In conjunction with using a variety of brushes, I also used my steam cleaner to remove years of built up solvent based tire dressings on the tires and also the wheels themselves.
After drying I de-tarred the surfaces using Automagic’s Multi-Purpose Solvent. You can see the difference made in the following pictures on the edge of the backside of one of the wheels and also on the inside of the barrel.
One of the customers front wheels were apparently repainted or recoated and the inside/back lip were not done to Ferrari standards; or at least not mine. The inside barrel was a lot whiter than any of the others and also the back lip was heavily scratched and not even coated in some areas. In the end you can’t tell from the front so I guess not that big of a deal. I polished the wheels by hand and by pc for the barrel on a 4� white LC CCS pad with Menzerna Intensive polish. I then proceeded to seal them with Meguiar’s #20 Polymer sealant.
Despite my back still aching right now; having access to a lift definitely helped out and cut down on fatigue.
As you can see below, the 360 had a lot of built up dust in the crevices. The customer had purchased the car back in August and never given it more than a wipe down with a quick detail spray since ownership despite living on a ½ mile dirt road.
Following completing the wheels I moved onto steam cleaning the engine bay and washing the vehicle. Despite having only 9600 miles on the car the engine bay had built up a thin layer of grime and a little bit of built up dirt in some areas.
No after pics but trust me—it was clean. I’ll try and grab some when I go to the owners home later this week to apply a few more coats of Wolfgang Fuzion. After washing; the vehicle was clayed with Automagic’s mild bar and ONR as lube. The following are my (terrible) attempts at capturing the swirls/defects on this car.
.
A little history on the 360 Challenge Stradale:
The Ferrari 360 is a mid-engine midsize two-seater sports car produced from late 1999 until 2005. The 360 replaced the Ferrari F355 and was itself replaced by the fairly similar Ferrari F430. For the 360, Ferrari partnered with Alcoa to produce an entirely new all-aluminum space-frame chassis that was 40% stiffer than the 355, yet 28% lighter despite a 10% increase in overall dimensions. Along with the new frame was a new Pininfarina body styling that broke ranks with the last decade's sharp angles and flip-up headlights, replacing them with a rounded appearance that harkened to the 1960s. The new V8 engine, common to all versions, was only slightly larger and more powerful than the 355's at 3.6 litres and 400 bhp (300 kW) of power, but the lighter frame and added stiffness improved performance; the 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) acceleration performance improved from 4.6 to 4.4 seconds, and in the Challenge versions it was as low as 4.0 s. An engine replacement resulted in the V8 road model that followed, the F430 (internally referred to as the evoluzione or evo) which came out in 2004.
• Maximum power: 425 PS (317 kW; 420 bhp) @ 8500 rpm
• Maximum torque: 373 N•m (275 lbf•ft) @ 4750 rpm
The Challenge Stradale is a more track day focused car than the Modena, it was inspired by the challenge racing series and can be thought of as a Challenge car for the road. Ferrari engineers designed the car from the outset with 20% track day use in mind and 80% road use. With only a small 20 bhp (15 kW) improvement in engine power from the Modena but with substantially improved power to weight ratio, the Challenge Stradale accelerates from 0 to 100 km/h (62 mph) in just 4.1 seconds.
In total, the CS is up to 110 kg (243 lb) lighter than the standard Modena if all the lightweight options are specified such as deleted radio, lexan side windows and fabric cloth (instead of the leather option). As much as 94 kilograms (207 lb) was taken off on the bodywork by stripping the interior carpets, lighter weight bumpers, carbon mirrors and the optional Modena carbon seats becoming standard. The engine and transmission weight was slimmed down 11 kg (24 lb) through the use of a smaller, lighter weight sports (yet still stainless steel) exhaust back box and valved exit pipes.
There are a lot of subtle (and some not so subtle) styling differences between the Challenge Stradale and the standard Modena.
These include;
Visual differences
• 19" BBS Challenge Styled Alloys with Titanium wheel bolts
• Large Diameter Carbon Ceramic Brakes
• Carbon-fibre side mirrors
• Updated front and rear bumpers
• Pair of rear bumper diffusers
• Sharper side skirts
• Plexi-glass rear window
• Lower ride height on Titanium springs
• Lighter weight challenge grille (black metal mesh) made from Aluminium
• Challenge Stradale badging on rear grille
• Optional Tri-colour Racing Stripe
• Different exhaust tips to complement the lighter racing exhaust (the optional Modena racing exhaust became standard equipment on Challenge Stradale)
The car also had the optional carbon racing seats (available in 3 sizes, small, medium and large) which are noticeable from the outside to complement the interior detailing. These seats are a significant improvement in weight reduction over the standard seats.
Interior differences
• New instrument dials with a yellow rev counter and carbon fibre surround
• Carbon Fibre door panels
• Carbon Centre Console
• Fabric Dashboard with deleted stereo and glovebox
• New styled air ball vents (shared with 430)
• New Steering wheel with optional coloured racing ring
• Removal of carpets and lots of sound deading material (weight reduction)
• Rubber floor mats with optional fire extinguisher
Handling differences
• New stiffer rear anti-rollbar (hollow to make it lighter) and reduce body roll (same one fitted to 430 Scuderia)
• 360 Challenge cars uprated flanbloc's replace all original rubber suspension bushes including anti-roll bar bushes (uprated) improving alignment on the move
• 20% stiffer uprated (progressively coiled) springs made from Titanium (lighter, lowering unsprung weight) and reducing pitch and roll
• Different suspension alignment and ride heights (rear higher than front to aid downforce)
• Titanium wheel bolts and carbon ceramic brakes (along with overall weight reduction) also contributing significantly to handling improvements (along with aero downforce improvements)
• Re-programmed electronic suspension control software with new 'race' mode (stiffer than Modena)
• Specially devised Pirelli Rosso Corsa (soft compound) track biased road tires (wider than Modena)
• Factory corner weighted suspension, additional care taken to corner weight each vehicle before it left the factory to match its exact weight with options fitted.
• 0–100 km/h (62 mph): 4.1 s
• Top Speed : 300 km/h (190 mph)
• Downforce: about 270 kgf (2.6 kN) @ 300 km/h (without rear wing)
• lift/drag: about -1.1:1
Thursday at 8 am we started the first step (and admittedly the hardest) of moving the car onto the lift. This took awhile. I had 8 pieces of 2 x 12 lumber cut for “ramps� so we could lift the 360 high enough for the twin post lift to get underneath. I also had to run and grab 4 hockey pucks for the lifting points just to make sure no damage was done. Even with two very competent men working to make this happen it still took almost 2 hours to position the ramps just the right way to that the arms on the lift would hit the lift points and not the ramps before being in position.
After that headache was over I removed the wheels to expose what was quite possibly one of the sexiest part of this car; the rotors. Call me crazy but I couldn’t get over how beefy and capable these rotors appear while in the wheel well without a wheel covering them.
I also placed all of the titanium wheel bolts into my Wolfgang wash bucket for safe keeping. I believe these bolts are priced at $100 a piece (x20) which might seem expensive but when you feel how light they are in your hand you can seem to justify the expense.
I then generously sprayed P21S Total Auto Wash (TAW) all over the wheel wells, calipers, and suspension components. I also sprayed the entire underbody which was basically an assortment of composite/plastic molded sheets that cover the entire bottom of the car. This loosened up tons of road and track grime from underneath and ensured that this project was off to a good start from the ground up, literally. I also used my dry vapor steam machine to help on the underside.
Following the underbody I moved onto cleaning each wheel well. I came around and sprayed each wheel well again and agitated everything with a variety of brushed and let the TAW dwell. This really loosened up the road grime and it started dripping onto the ground below. I also used my steam cleaner to speed things up. This tool was invaluable in reaching into the various cracks and crevices that towels and brushes can’t reach to penetrate and loosen up the dirt. Calipers where sealed with Meguiar’s #20. You can see the results below.
Here you can see the driver’s side rear wheel well done while the passenger side is pre cleaning.
End of day one: 5:15 pm
Day 2 started at 8 am once again. I started with cleaning and sealing the wheels that were still off the car. The owner has taken the car to the track so there was plenty of track spaghetti on the fronts along with varying amounts of road tar and other goodies. I sprayed down the wheels with TAW and Meguiars All Purpose Cleaner Plus (MAPC.)
You can see the products getting to work. In conjunction with using a variety of brushes, I also used my steam cleaner to remove years of built up solvent based tire dressings on the tires and also the wheels themselves.
After drying I de-tarred the surfaces using Automagic’s Multi-Purpose Solvent. You can see the difference made in the following pictures on the edge of the backside of one of the wheels and also on the inside of the barrel.
One of the customers front wheels were apparently repainted or recoated and the inside/back lip were not done to Ferrari standards; or at least not mine. The inside barrel was a lot whiter than any of the others and also the back lip was heavily scratched and not even coated in some areas. In the end you can’t tell from the front so I guess not that big of a deal. I polished the wheels by hand and by pc for the barrel on a 4� white LC CCS pad with Menzerna Intensive polish. I then proceeded to seal them with Meguiar’s #20 Polymer sealant.
Despite my back still aching right now; having access to a lift definitely helped out and cut down on fatigue.
As you can see below, the 360 had a lot of built up dust in the crevices. The customer had purchased the car back in August and never given it more than a wipe down with a quick detail spray since ownership despite living on a ½ mile dirt road.
Following completing the wheels I moved onto steam cleaning the engine bay and washing the vehicle. Despite having only 9600 miles on the car the engine bay had built up a thin layer of grime and a little bit of built up dirt in some areas.
No after pics but trust me—it was clean. I’ll try and grab some when I go to the owners home later this week to apply a few more coats of Wolfgang Fuzion. After washing; the vehicle was clayed with Automagic’s mild bar and ONR as lube. The following are my (terrible) attempts at capturing the swirls/defects on this car.
