Shame he doesn't really do cars that aren't either obviously sponsored in some way by a manufacturer or are for sale on cars and bids. The videos are still good, but the channel has lost lots of its appeal and charm. Feel like he sold out after launching cars and bids
@@richardschwarzbauer201well yeah he did sell out, he sold a portion of his channel and his business cars and bids. If we were in the same position we would do the same as he did, I definitely would, I mean for the most part it’s the same but yeah I know what you mean
I bought a Manual blue Ferrari Mondial T from 1989 and 64000km so about 40k miles just 3 Weeks ago here in Germany! So great Timing reviewing this! My Mondial T has blue exterieur and baby-blue interieur, now before you tell me that's ugly, it looks surprisingly good on that Car and apparently there are several Mondial Ts with that Combination. Also Doug, great to see that this Mondial also comes with the Leather Toolkit Bag, mine did too which surprised me. But one Mystery about my Mondial: Mine also came with an Agip/Ferrari branded black Bag but sadly whatever was in there is missing, i'd love to find out what that was for Prost & Cheers from Berchtesgaden in the Bavarian Alps
As for the key, per Cornes Motors (San Diego's original Ferrari, Rolls-Royce and Bentley Dealer, now gone) the key folded that was to reduce the amount of stress on the ignition IF you had additional keys and key rings attached. Having the hinge reduced the pressure that a Straight Headed key would have from gravity, by brining the attachments closer to the dashboard.
Very cool, I never knew that. I wish manufacturers would still do that. I remember watching an episode of Motorweek on Goss' garage (Pat has now passed) where he showed how the weight of the extra keys damages the lock cylinder and internal mechanism.
I find the "entry level" Ferrari's (California, Portofino, Mondial), more interesting than the supercars because those are something you can actually use and so I find it more interesting what it's like to live with. Edit: I wish that faux manual thing you described at 10:20 stuck around. Seems like a good compromise to me. I'm sure it was a servicing nightmare but what Ferrari isn't.
Automated clutches are hard to drive at slow speeds so they never did well. Saab tried it in the 90s and you can find a video of Top Gear crucifying the system (called Sensonic).
This is a supercar that will get its butt kicked by any modern sports car. No thanks, I'll take modern reliability and creature comforts over this "not so bad" Ferrari.
I’ve always loved the Mondial and had no idea it wasn’t the “cool” Ferrari until someone told me that. The funny thing is that I’d rather have that Mondial over the new California all day long. Great video and thanks for paying homage to a real cool car from a great era! 👍
I actually really like the Ferrari Mondial. Especially in the convertible body style, I think it's pretty attractive. The side view isn't great, yes it looks like a yellow tabletop from the side, but otherwise it pulls through on most of the design ques from Ferrari in the 80s. I could seriously love this thing if I had it sitting in my garage as my sports car.
Great video Doug, but I wish I hadn’t of watched it. The reason is, back in about 1999, when I was 15, I went to my local Ford dealership in the UK, which my dad was extending the workshop on. There was a crashed damaged Ferrari Mondail, in a light blue colour. It was a coupe with white leather. And yes , it wasn’t in the best shape, but I was offered the car for £500! They just wanted it gone, as it was taking up room. I tried to talk my dad into letting me buy it, but he said no. 😢 😂
And also to lock the transmission mechanically in reverse (or Park). But yeah, good for driver safety and more logical in terms of ignition-gearshift-handbrake sequencing.
I always wanted to make my own customized Mondial cabrio after seeing one listed once. Add 355 front bumper, 355 rear tail lights, a painted lower rocker panel, and a larger more sculptural side scoop (addressing the worst styling cue of the car). MAYBE even adding a widebody rear fender flare as an ode to the 288. Just need to find buried treasure somewhere to make it happen.
Been warming up to Mondials in the last decade or so. The convertible especially really looks good to my eyes, and nowadays I don't much mind the coupe's C pillar and buttress design anymore. Consider this: the Mondial convertible is the ONLY mid-engined four seater convertible ever made. Pretty unique! The coupe is in illustrious company with other 2+2s, like its 308GT4 predecessor, that car's Urraco sister car, the Merak SS and more recently the Evora and BMW i8, all trying to beat the 911 in its own game.
@@hansmuller7161 Yes, but not a four-seater. They say the Boxster is a roadster, because it has two seats, but I think that's a misnomer as roadsters are front engined. The Boxster is a spyder. The open top Mondial is a Cabriolet.
These 80s Ferraris are majestic. It does not matter if the Ferrari Mondial is the entry level Ferrari. It's still a really cool and in my opinion, beautiful car
In real life this transmission was quite bad... and as already mentioned, a few different brands experimented with it, even Fiat Seicento had one here in Europe (Citymatic).
Doug, The Mondial t coupe is super rare. Only sold in US in 1989 and only about 85 units imported. Very rare. Personally I think the coupe looks better.
Styling wise the Mondial mainly needs the right wheels. Something larger, and maybe with more negative offset (ie; deeper dish / more concave). If you Google image Mondial wheels you can see some good ones. Several people have used 348 wheels which look decent.
Finally Doug reviews a Mondial! A couple of points: yes, the Mondial 8 was slow, but so were injected 2-valve 308's. The QV's, 3.2's, and the t's were considerably faster. And look at other makes in early '80's. A C3 Corvette of the day had less than 200 hp.... I wouldn't say that the T is "by far the most desirable"; the 348 isn't necessarily more desirable than the 328. The earlier Mondials don't need an engine out service to change the cam belts, which is big plus for alot of people.... That blank switch on the center console I think would have been for the glove box. Doug would love the earlier Mondials with the array of warning lights and switches in the center console -- far 'quirkier' than the T's. ... I think there would have been a spare wheel in the front trunk (at least in the earlier models). Finally, Mondials cost (marginally) more than the corresponding 3x8's. So not really an entry level Ferrari, esp. in the early 80's in the US, where the Mondial and the 308 were basically the only Ferrari's available.
I went for the 1988 Mondial 3.2 convertible back in 2001 since I already had a 348TB so we could put a push chair and our baby daughter in it. Now my daughter is starting to drive it and loves it for it's 80's feeling, finding it even cooler than our 458 spider. The Mondial may not be the fastest or best loved but it's the one we would never part with!
The weird automatic (actually what’s called an automatic stickshift, or Autostick) was quite common in Europe in the ‘60s and ’70s, available from Volkswagen, Opel, Porsche and I’m quite sure other makes.
Volkswagen also had an automatic clutch set up. This was years before this car though I think in 1969 and some other year bugs. Anyway you would shift it like a normal bug but no clutch pedal. My wife had one when we were in high school and it worked great. No issues at all.
Just wanted to chime in and say the Alfa 164 had adjustable suspension on several models, and was around the time of this car as well. The early Italian adjustable suspensions actually work really well, my 164S goes from modern Lexus gliding over bumps to an NA Miata when you flip the switch.
Leave it to Doug to really get to the bottom of the Mondial. Most Ferrari collectors of this era go straight to the 308/328/348 and bypass the Mondial because of looks or image. But underneath it's got much of the same running gear and the same driving experience. If you can get past the looks, it's a bargain compared to the others. A similar fate befell the 308 GT-4 but those are now gaining some appreciation in both image and value. The Mondial will probably follow that trend.
Mondial is an entry level Ferrari. Good place to start to get to know all the quirks of owning a Ferrari and the costs. I bought mine back in 1995 before moving into a Modena and then to 458. Loved the car. Very capable car, albeit underpowered. Handling world class for the time. Drove it in rain and snow. Even put chains on it for the Pennsylvania winter back then. Made it from NM to Calif. in 110 degree heat with AC on hitting 150mph plus and not even a hiccup. As long as you use it everyday, drives like any other normal reliable car.
My dad is an original owner of one of these with a 1989 Mondial T Coupe MT. He used to daily it until very recently finally getting a newer sports car but it's a good car. Just terrible to maintain and find parts for. There's several things that are broken on it but we've worked around those. The Seatbelt tensioners, Electronic dampener controller, sun roof switch, fuel door switch, and turn signals stalk are all broken. It's currently in need of a new coolant reservoir so we're waiting on parts before we can drive it again. He's thinking of selling it, let's see how this one does.
Wow that horn sound!! Very rarely do you hear a two toned horn pitched a minor second apart! (Like adjacent black and white key on the piano!!) Most two toned horns used a major third or minor third
Couple of things, the Mondial was never the entry level Ferrari, they were always more expensive than the 308/328 to buy new. All Mondials have gated shifters, not just the T. And the T should have power steering, it was the only Mondial that came with it, along with ABS. The original 8 made 205bhp not 215. And yes, I do have one, a 1983 QV in red, and it is wonderful (and a bargain!).
I remember seeing one of these as background in an ad in R&T or C&D in the 80s, and being instantly in love with the design. But it was just an ad for something else, so I had no idea what it was. It looked like a Ferrari, but that's all I knew about it.
I'd LOVE to see you review a 456. Another car that was criticized in it's time but has aged quite well IMHO. I think its a beautiful car. Not quite like a 550 but still an interesting, beautiful, under appreciated Ferarri.
Loved the Mondial since I first saw it in Weird Science. Watch a beautiful woman being built? Nope. Watch a gorgeous red Mondial drift around a corner? Absolutely!
I think I knew about it before that movie but yeah seeing it in Weird Science was awesome. I always thought it was a good looking car and never really understood the hate. Again, just like today, most of the haters are people who never get anywhere near the car, let alone drive it.
Those center buttons are OUTRAGEOUS. So slapdash that Ferrari would put those random two-way window switches (IE, whatever was lying around) to open all these things and put them right in the middle of the console spaced out so far with minimal effort to the graphics. So Italian and hilarious. Part of the charm of the car now, but what the heck honestly.
I knew virtually nothing about the Ferrari Mondial, as they never looked interesting to me compared to cars like the Ferrari Testarossa, 512tr, F40, F50, and so.on... the cars people think about when they usually think of Ferrari. But now I am educated on this car, so thank you Doug. I love watching the videos on the more enigmatic and less well known car models on this channel to grow my car knowledge.
The Semi automatic transmission You describe is actually something that has been in the automotive industry since the 1930s when cord came out with the 810 Sedan. This car was the first vehicle to be sold with a presselector automated manual transmission Which operates the exact same way as the Ferrari mondial
People also don't realize that's the same V8 that Ferrari put in everything, up through the 360, including the F40. The Dino V8 was reworked, retuned, and turbocharged in various iterations. But the Mondial engine is way more similar to the F40 than a lot of people realize.
It looks a little bit long in the middle, but otherwise a handsome car, especially in yellow. But I've always had a soft spot for these cars, probably because a doctor in town had a red coupe when I was in high school in the early 80's, seeing any Ferrari around town back then was special.
Outside of the 90's and 2000 era Ferraris I have driven (348, 360, Testarossa, California), although I've never driven a Mondial glad you did this review, and pleased to hear your opinion the car is a good riving car doesn't deserve necessarily all the negativity. Its pretty much reason I've never bought one. I can remember the couple times mentioning to people I was considering one and it ALREADY started with the negativity. Sure we shouldn't care what others think, but we kinda really do to a small degree. To me I think it seemed like a good way to get into a classic ferrari, one with gated shifter, and not break the bank mechanically say compared to a Testarossa. I dunno though, these aren't that "cheap" now $75k-$110k for a Mondial is getting into all kinds of other car territory there's lot of options at $100k. When it was $35k-$50k sure, not so sure I'd drop $100k for a Mondial though when I can get a slightly used Bentley convert for example, or 911 covert. Enjoyed the review, thanks!
Doug, do house reviews again. I loved it! I understand if nobody else enjoyed it and you don’t want to waste your time but I thought you were great at it.
Had one of these as my daily driver for two years in the 90s and loved it. Much better ride and handling compared to a 348 or 355, more space for luggage and buying it two years old with 4k miles it was cheaper than the two seaters. Doug is right about the wheels, l had to replace them with something more stylish. I sold it with 23k miles and almost broke even. I totally agree with Doug but l still own one of the last imported 412 manuals that l really enjoy so......
Living in southern California. I still see a few Ferrari mondials around. Older guys bringing them out on the weekend. And although I've always known that the mondial is not the appreciated Ferrari I think they still look really nice and you can take more than one person for a ride. Obviously the convertible is sweet for California and I would have no problem owning and driving this car. Watching the video, I never realized the mondial had such a ridiculously high and awkward front wheel arch
In Italy there’s a comic called Martin Mystere, where the main character drives a Mondial (not the cabrio). Since I was teen I’ve always tought it’s a good car.
The automatic system reminded me of the fifties Beetle system the Saxomat and the later two speed that was used until 1975 in production.. Or The French electromagnetic systems from Renault in the sixties used in the Dauphine, Renault 8 and Renault 10 Major…from Jaeger..
My uncle has an international dump truck with an “automated clutch” . I borrowed it one day and it was the worse thing I ever drove. At low speeds it bucked and jumped horribly. We still aren’t there with auto clutches
Doug is the type of guy knows he is big, and he always manage to force in to sports car back seat, TELLING YOU HE ACTUALY DO TAKE HIS PANTS ALL THE WAY DOWN TO MAKE URINATION.
one problem with the Mondial was it was overshadowed by the 308/328 GTB/GTS. The GT had the same engine but with a lighter weight was much faster, plus the GTB/GTS was the iconic Ferrari of the 80s- Magnum PI's ride, even ALF bought one. In 1982, Ferrari gave the Mondial and GT 4 valve per cylinder heads, which I believe was the first time in the modern era a production car was offered with 4 valves per cylinder. Also, per my recollection the original Mondial had a transverse mounted engine, and with the T in 89 they switched to a longitudinally mounted 3.4 V8. Y'all please correct me if I got this wrong or missed something.
A manual transmission with automatic clutch can be found on foot shifted machines much more commonly than cars. The Honda Cub is prob the most ubiquitous example
5:45 The California also got a lot of criticism but it’s my favorite modern Ferrari. It’s a front engine car with the engine out of the 430 so it’s genuinely fast and sounds fantastic.
I would have been populair if Instagram existed in the 70’s and 80’s, we had so much of this cool stuff when I was young and daddy in car business, great years.
