330 GT Registry

29 DECEMBER 1979  Vol. 4 No. 26 

330 AMERICA

One of my personal all-time favorite Ferraris was the 250 GTE 2+2, which makes me a bit of a heretic in current Ferrari circles. Unfortunately the cult that has sprung up in the middle and late 70’s to worship the Ferrari has relegated the 250 GTE 2+2--or for that matter almost all 2+2’s--to a rather low place in the pantheon. But when I first became a Ferrari fanatic, in the early, 60’s, the 250 GTE 2+2 was still a new car, and its price put it within a few hundred dollars of its contemporaries--most of which are now worth perhaps twice what a nice 2+2 of the same vintage would bring.

At that time I was also an avid reader of Road & Track and a fan of John R. Bond (as well as Henry Manney III), so when Mr. Bond reported that he had acquired a new Ferrari, a 4-liter engine in a 250 GTE 2+2 body, I had a new, ultimate, dream Ferrari. I assumed that someone as prestigious as Mr. Bond had been able to talk Ferrari Into producing this unusual car especially for him. Only much later did I learn the true story about how he came to buy the car, and by then I also knew that it was only one example of a small series that Ferrari built between the demise of the 250 GTE 2+2 and the birth of the 330 GT 2+2.

As a type the 330 America has been pretty well ignored in the published references on Ferrari, and much of what has been published has been wrong. Taken as a whole these brief mentionings would lead one to believe that the external differentiation between the two was the presence of faired-in fog lamps on the 330; that the engine that powered the 330 was in actuality a derivation of the Type 163 400 Superamerica engine; and that only a handful were made--maybe 15 or 20.

In actuality there was no external difference between the bodywork of the 250 GTE 2+2 and that of the 330 America except for an identification script on the trunk of some of the larger-engined cars. Late 250 GTE 2+2’s also had the faired-in fog lamps, and as a result many of these have been incorrectly identified as 330 Americas. The engine used in the 330 America was the new Type 209 that would also be used in the 330 GT 2+2. It differed from the 250 GT/400 SA engines by having increased--from 90 mm to 94 mm--spacing between the bore centers, and hence had a longer block, while retaining the 400 SA bore and stroke dimensions of 77 x 71 mm. Finally, it appears that there were exactly 50 examples of the type manufactured, all within a span of only a few weeks late in 1963. Below are the 50 serial numbers as I have them recorded in my files.

The 330 America was a true “interim” model, with the body and chassis of the older type, but the mechanical components of the soon to be announced 330 GT. Why the type was even built is a bit of a mystery, with its own legends (see Vol. 2 No. 2) and the type has been the victim of misinformation, a bad reputation, and even neglect ever since. But it deserves better, for it was in many ways a better car than either the 250 or 330 GT 2+2.

330 AMERICAS:

Published & Edited by Gerald Roush   850 Maxey Hill Ct.   Stone Mountain GA 30083

© 1979 G. ROUSH