Scuderia's 1st issue...
Saturday the weather was beautiful so I took the car for a spirited drive on my favorite twisted mountain road. I drove the car really hard. After I used almost all the gas I returned to the gas station for a refill. As usual a gathering of people started to ask questions and take pictures of the car. One of them asked me to open the engine bay to take some pictures. I gladly obliged. And then, all hell braked loose 
After I paid, I returned to the gas pump and I tried to close the engine lid. Now, the proper way to close it is to shut it down very easy and after that to apply a gentle push right above the locking mechanism. You should hear a "click" and you are done. The problem was that this time no click was heard. The damn lid was not closing. Because of that the car will read the engine bay lid as being open and the gearbox will refuse to engage. So you are stuck at the pump with that entire crowd around you 
Not quite the proper way of closing down your fun day ) Now, I've been in tough spots before in my life but I swear this one was hard. I couldn't believe the thing was happening and I got stranded because of such a simple issue. Of course the first thing I did was the most sensible one: to call the service mechanic to ask for suggestions. I was in a town about 100 miles away from the garage but at least one and a half hours of driving away. As I suspected it was hard to try a "phone debug". I understood perfectly. I get sometime calls like that from friends about some computer problems and it's hard to get it right from distance, without seeing what goes wrong. I was offered two options, either they come and pick up the car or they send a mechanic to help me. Being the mule I am, all stubborn and so, I refused politely. Don't get me wrong, they acted great but I refused to surrender to such a simple issue. I asked permission to try to fix it by myself. To my surprise they agreed to let me try to fix it. So the quest begins with me in a truck park next to the gas station looking around to find the right tools: two screwdrivers, a couple of small wrenches and so on. With the help of one of the gas station workers I finally found what I need it. The rear locking mechanism is protected by a metal case. First step is to remove that. Having no blueprints, no manual, no nothing, it took me a while to decide with which screws to start first. And boy, my hand was shaking at the first one - lol. Good thing that the car's back has those fine grills you can see through Anyway, there are at least two things one must be careful about:
1. the exhaust it's so close you may get some serious burns no matter how careful you try to be - I know I got one
2. the position of the locking mechanism and especially the screws holding it in place it's so that if you drop any parts you will lost them somewhere in the engine bay) one of those things you really don't wanna do in a sport car )
So trust me on this one: there is no room for error!
Back to the story now: after unscrewing the two screws that are towards the exhaust and the two on the sides I took out the black metallic cover plate of the unlocking mechanism. Inside you have two metallic solid cables, one of which is coming from the driver's side, from the opening lever (the black plastic one you use to pull to open the engine bay, placed on the pillar of the driver's door). That lever you take out by unscrewing but be careful not to use force or you will break the plastic easily. That lever pulls one of the metallic cable (I still don't know what the second does ) and the cable moves one of two other metallic levers that are part of the locking mechanism (connected with a small spring); the moving lever also presses or not a small electric switch that signals the car's computer if the lid is open or not. The case also contain a small circular plate that makes contact, when the lid is closed, to another metallic switch placed on the lid, in order to close the electric circuit for the switch mentioned above (the one that signals to the car's computer that the lid is closed or not). You need to check if the screw placed on the engine bay's lid, the screw that keeps that round metallic switch is also in place because I found mine almost unscrewed from vibrations.
Anyway, after I learned all the above, the hard way - lol, I noticed that on the metallic cable there was a part, fixed at a certain point, that was supposed, when pulling the opening lever, to move a metallic lever and unlock the damn thing. The part felt loose so while praying I pulled the cable hard towards the engine bay, unwiring it from the belly of the beast. That's when I finally noticed the previous mounting point, which was hidden from my eyes until that moment. So the job became simpler. I fixed again that "blocker" placed on the metallic cable (sorry, English it's not my native language - I don't know the right name of it) put everything back and here we go: lock fixed, job done! I was again the proud owner of a fully functional Ferrari Scuderia despite my now all black and greased hands What can I say? It felt GREAT! Everybody likes winning, right? )
To my surprise, behind me, a crowd was cheering) One guy was even sad because apparently he lost the bet he made with his friend about me succeeding or not to fix the problem!!!! )
So lesson learned: if you drive really hard, from all the vibrations and heat generated by the engine, something simpler like a small screw inside of your engine's bay locking mechanism may get loose and you may get stranded so you better try to avoid opening the engine bay in such conditions.
How's the saying? No good deed goes unpunished?) lol
After I paid, I returned to the gas pump and I tried to close the engine lid. Now, the proper way to close it is to shut it down very easy and after that to apply a gentle push right above the locking mechanism. You should hear a "click" and you are done. The problem was that this time no click was heard. The damn lid was not closing. Because of that the car will read the engine bay lid as being open and the gearbox will refuse to engage. So you are stuck at the pump with that entire crowd around you Not quite the proper way of closing down your fun day ) Now, I've been in tough spots before in my life but I swear this one was hard. I couldn't believe the thing was happening and I got stranded because of such a simple issue. Of course the first thing I did was the most sensible one: to call the service mechanic to ask for suggestions. I was in a town about 100 miles away from the garage but at least one and a half hours of driving away. As I suspected it was hard to try a "phone debug". I understood perfectly. I get sometime calls like that from friends about some computer problems and it's hard to get it right from distance, without seeing what goes wrong. I was offered two options, either they come and pick up the car or they send a mechanic to help me. Being the mule I am, all stubborn and so, I refused politely. Don't get me wrong, they acted great but I refused to surrender to such a simple issue. I asked permission to try to fix it by myself. To my surprise they agreed to let me try to fix it. So the quest begins with me in a truck park next to the gas station looking around to find the right tools: two screwdrivers, a couple of small wrenches and so on. With the help of one of the gas station workers I finally found what I need it. The rear locking mechanism is protected by a metal case. First step is to remove that. Having no blueprints, no manual, no nothing, it took me a while to decide with which screws to start first. And boy, my hand was shaking at the first one - lol. Good thing that the car's back has those fine grills you can see through Anyway, there are at least two things one must be careful about: 1. the exhaust it's so close you may get some serious burns no matter how careful you try to be - I know I got one
2. the position of the locking mechanism and especially the screws holding it in place it's so that if you drop any parts you will lost them somewhere in the engine bay
) one of those things you really don't wanna do in a sport car ) So trust me on this one: there is no room for error!
Back to the story now: after unscrewing the two screws that are towards the exhaust and the two on the sides I took out the black metallic cover plate of the unlocking mechanism. Inside you have two metallic solid cables, one of which is coming from the driver's side, from the opening lever (the black plastic one you use to pull to open the engine bay, placed on the pillar of the driver's door). That lever you take out by unscrewing but be careful not to use force or you will break the plastic easily. That lever pulls one of the metallic cable (I still don't know what the second does
) and the cable moves one of two other metallic levers that are part of the locking mechanism (connected with a small spring); the moving lever also presses or not a small electric switch that signals the car's computer if the lid is open or not. The case also contain a small circular plate that makes contact, when the lid is closed, to another metallic switch placed on the lid, in order to close the electric circuit for the switch mentioned above (the one that signals to the car's computer that the lid is closed or not). You need to check if the screw placed on the engine bay's lid, the screw that keeps that round metallic switch is also in place because I found mine almost unscrewed from vibrations. Anyway, after I learned all the above, the hard way - lol, I noticed that on the metallic cable there was a part, fixed at a certain point, that was supposed, when pulling the opening lever, to move a metallic lever and unlock the damn thing. The part felt loose so while praying I pulled the cable hard towards the engine bay, unwiring it from the belly of the beast. That's when I finally noticed the previous mounting point, which was hidden from my eyes until that moment. So the job became simpler. I fixed again that "blocker" placed on the metallic cable (sorry, English it's not my native language - I don't know the right name of it) put everything back and here we go: lock fixed, job done! I was again the proud owner of a fully functional Ferrari Scuderia despite my now all black and greased hands
What can I say? It felt GREAT! Everybody likes winning, right? ) To my surprise, behind me, a crowd was cheering
) One guy was even sad because apparently he lost the bet he made with his friend about me succeeding or not to fix the problem!!!! ) So lesson learned: if you drive really hard, from all the vibrations and heat generated by the engine, something simpler like a small screw inside of your engine's bay locking mechanism may get loose and you may get stranded so you better try to avoid opening the engine bay in such conditions.
How's the saying? No good deed goes unpunished?
) lol
