Ferrari 400

An interesting find in Tokyo MidTown’s parking : a Ferrari 400 ! The Ferrari 400 and Ferrari 412 are front-engined 2+2 coupé cars from Italian manufacturer Ferrari. They were available with 5-speed all synchromesh or an optional 3-speed automatic transmission unit from General Motors. Their design was derived from the almost identical looking 365 GT4 2+2 (which itself was based on the famous Daytona). Production began in 1976, when Ferrari revealed its first car fitted with an automatic transmission – the 400 – at the Paris Motorshow of 1976. The improved 412 was introduced in 1985 and phased out in 1989, bringing to an end Ferrari’s longest ever production series. Today, its sleek, Pininfarina-designed lines and relatively limited production numbers may give it potential as a future classic. It has not been universally admired however, and is listed at #18 in the BBC’s book of “Crap Cars” and Jeremy Clarkson on Top Gear described it as “awful in every way”. However, there have been many other favorable articles about the 400 series in the motoring press, including one by the highly respected UK motoring journalist L.J.K. Setright in CAR magazine in August 1984, in which the author described it as “one of the few most beautiful, and one of the two most elegant, bodies ever to lead the lead of Pininfarina’s pencilling vision” [ref].