Cizeta is back ???

http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/52838/ci..._v16_lives.html

In case the above link is not working....

 

 

 

Tuesday 4th January 2005

 

 

 

 

Cizeta V16 Lives!

 

 

Cizeta supercar creator Claudio Zampolli has finished work on the first roadster version of his unique 6-litre V16 supercar, previously presumed dead. The £500,000 two-seater, which has a claimed top speed of 205mph, has been prepared to order for a Japanese customer, and is shortly to be followed by a second bespoke convertible.

 

evo tracked down Zampolli in his Southern California workshop, where he relocated after quitting Modena in 1994, having completed just nine cars.

 

Although his core business is preparing engines for Ferrari Challenge cars, he still has the passion that first drove him to create the car that wowed the Geneva show crowds back in 1988. More importantly, he's still got enough chassis and engines to build another four cars.

 

The original Cizeta Moroder V16 (partly named after electro-pop maestro Giorgio Moroder who helped bankroll the project) was a monster in every sense. It was 14ft long and seven feet wide, and the 16-cylinder engine - complete with 64 valves and eight camshafts - produced 560bhp and 469lb ft of torque.

 

Zampolli is an ex-Lamborghini engineer and test driver, whose decision to go it alone in Modena ruffled feathers among the resident supercar elite, causing him some supply problems as ranks were closed around him. Since he had pinched a number of Lambo staff and was using some Ferrari contractors, a little hostility was perhaps unsurprising....

 

His creation was originally styled by Marcello Gandini, creator of the contemporary Diablo (among others) though it had to be heavily modified at the rear to accommodate the transverse layout of the huge engine.

 

Orders were taken for the car, and nine were delivered from 1991 onwards, including one to the Sultan of Brunei. But a combination of pressure being put on his suppliers and the onset of a recession forced Zampolli to quit for America just three years later.

 

It's taken Zampolli five years to complete his first roadster, which will cost around £200,000 more than the 'standard' car. The second roadster has just been ordered

 

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by a customer who already owns a Cizeta coupe.

 

When evo visited Zampolli's small workshop in Orange County, we were able to drive one of the original nine cars, which a customer had asked Zampolli to sell. Finished in Italian racing red, the Cizeta is immediately impressive, albeit in a very '80s fashion, primarily down to the Testarossa-esque side strakes over the air intakes. Zampolli explains that he much preferred his original design, with three vertical boomerang-shaped intake guards, but Federal regulations of the time forbade any aperture that could potentially scoop and trap an unlucky cyclist's foot. Only three of the Cizetas produced have horizontal strakes - the vertical ones look a lot better, especially in unpainted carbonfibre as featured on the Roadster.

 

After a prolonged whirr of the starter motor, all 16 cylinders catch with an incredible eruption of sound - a synchronised cacophony of cam-chains and exhaust noise.

 

The steering wheel is slightly more canted than the norm, and there is a rather quaint dogleg first on the longitudinally mounted five-speed gearbox that is reminiscent of past Ferraris. The clutch is user-friendly, despite the carbon plates.

 

Although massive, the Cizeta does not feel unwieldy, at least not on American roads. In fact, the car feels incredibly well balanced; with all of its mass ahead of the rear wheels, the engine helps give phenomenal traction, and all 560bhp can be deployed in first gear without inducing wheelspin.

 

Despite some visual similarities, the Cizeta feels more wieldy than Diablos of the same era. The ride is surprisingly soft but well damped, although for more spirited road driving or track use the set-up can be stiffened. The Brembo four-pot brakes are superb, with no judder or fade.

 

Unsurprisingly, the Cizeta's USP is the engine, which offers masses of smooth torque from tickover, plus a willingness to rev to nearly 8000rpm. And all the time it growls and screams like a cross between a Ducati Desmo and a Merlin aero-engine. In every sense it feels like a supercar.

David Yu

 

 

Comments: 0 Article from: evo

Its still a nice car for being built in the 1980's.

It has not aged well

the cizeta is a nice car :finga:

Whose parts bin did the taillights come from?

Looks like a Diablo to me, especially at the front.

It was part of the Diablo development in the early stages. I don't think it aged well either. Having seen one in person, it just doesn't have the presence like a Diablo for example.

Whose parts bin did the taillights come from?

 

I have been pondering on that myself. Them taillights sure look familiar.

mid 80's Renault ? One of the biggest problems I find with the car is that the taillights look like they are tacked on, they don't flow with the rest of the car.

I got it! The taillights are from a Alpine-Renault GTA turbo, they sucked ass on the renault and don't look much better on the cizeta! Do I win anything?

I like it as an alternative to Diablo roadster.It looks oldschoolish but i still like it :mrgreen:

 

 

 

'xept for the taillights

Those ''customers'' are realy livin' in the past...

Ugly and dated. And frankly it was always a Diablo rip off anyway, Gandini clearly mailed it in.

for some reason it reminds me of a diablo and 355 in one...

seriously! "can i get the white on bright ass red?" whats that "u only offered it in 1986?"

If they would clean up those ugly air intakes and change the nasty taillights that look like they came out of a junkyard (maybe they did?) as well as getting rid of that ugly four headlight front end, it might be do-able. But who the f-ck wants a hodge podge v-16? Where does the engine come from? Is it true that its 2 lambo v-8's bolted together?

DiabloRossa

I was looking at the picture of the engine that was posted above..it appears the intake runner/manifolds are from a Ferrari 328, modified to accept and electric injector. As far as I can remember the original V16 had a CIS injection system like a CT or anyother 80's Ferrari for that matter.

i've heard that its actually 2 ferrari v-8's bolted together :oops: