Newbie questions.

I'm relatively new to Ferraris also. I'm a long time Jaguar guy. I went through the same thing with those cars. Each marque has its own nomenclature and shorthand. I'm starting to figure some of these out.

"QV" means Qauttrovalvole (4-valve per cylinder engine)

Name origins, haven't figured out yet, other than is seems like Ferrari did what most other manufacturers do -- they pick names or numbers for their cars that say something about the car, the engine, or just an interesting sounding designation. Mine is a Mondial Quattrovalvole. Mondial means "world" I think. Some of the other models are named for Italian towns (Modena?). Just guessing here. I'm sure if you pick up one or more of the many books out there about the history of Ferrari, you'll learn something about the way the numbered and named the models.

In the meantime, just enjoy the cars.

Regards,

barchetta=boat
gto=grand tourismo omologato(sp?)

FasterIsBetter: Where abouts in northern NJ are you?

Modena = Enzo's birthplace

Maranello = Hometown of Ferrari factory

Testarossa = 'Red-head', refering to the color of the cylinder heads

Barchetta= little boat : referred to for the shape of the 166 spider, thus becoming 166 Barchetta
Berlinetta= little wagon

....as for the numbers, in case you were wondering, they are based on the various engine metrics over the years.

e.g.
815 (1940) = 8 cylinder 1500cc
166 (1947) = The cubic capacitry of one of the 12 cyliders
456 (1996) = The cubic capacitry of one of the 12 cyliders
308 = 3 ltr V8
328 = 3.2 ltr V8
355 = 3.5 ltr, 5 valves per cylinder

etc...