Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - LaFerrari Review - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666



 Ferrari LaFerrari


Maranello, Italy -- A man named Roberto drives me in a Lancia Voyager minivanhttp://images.intellitxt.com/ast/adTypes/icon1.png to a deserted parking lot at the bottom of a hill-climb that leads to the village of Samsone. After waiting a few minutes, we hear the shriek of a high-revving V-12 engine before we see the car it’s powering: a red-and-black LaFerrari pulls up, the winged driver’s door rises, and an Italian journalist climbs out. It’s now my turn to drive the most anticipated Ferrari since the 2002 Enzo. No explanations, no admonitions. Just get in and go, Joe.
On the road: The ultimate sensory experience

Twist the red key, push the red start button, and the 6.3-liter V-12 instantly ignites. Foot on brake, pull the right-side carbon-fiber shift paddle, foot on gas, and we’re off. It’s raining, so I dial in wet mode, the most forgiving of the manettino switch’s driver settings. This road is a tight, bumpy, badly paved series of switchbacks, sluiced with gravel runoff. There’s no sound insulation, so I hear, always, the intoxicating rrrrappp of the V-12, the road debris hitting the underside of the car, the clicking of the shift paddles, the brake calipers on ceramic composite rotors, the rubber on the road. LaFerrari is the ultimate sensory experience.

The steering wheel, flat on both top and bottom, is small and transmits lots of information about the road. The familiar red start button is on the bottom left of the wheel, and the manettino switch used to select driving modes is on the bottom right. The steering is light in effort but precise. The front Pirellis are still cold and are crabbing in corners. When I dial in sport mode, the upshifts are a little quicker and the rear end of the car is a little more lively. The rears warm up, and it’s easy to oversteer. I’m hesitant to select race mode in these wet conditions. I last drove on this road in November 2009 in the then-new Ferrari 458 Italia, and I remember marveling at that car’s ability to pivot effortlessly into corners, but it’s pretty clear that LaFerrari takes that ability to a new level. If only the road were dry.

The sideview mirrors on carbon-fiber struts, a foot long, are equally cool-looking and practical. Speaking of practical, these Brembo brakes. On the short straights, I downshift, mash the accelerator, and hold on tight as the 345/30R-20 P Zeroes try to transmit a level of power and torque to the ground that is almost comical in these adverse conditions. The rear end of the car is having little of it. Damn this weather.
If you must go slow, take some time to appreciate your surroundings

Resigned to the conditions, I take a longer look at the cabin. It’s pretty austere, but the four round vents are nice to look at, and everything is obviously high-quality. Virtually everything you see and touch is polished carbon fiber accented with black Alcantara. Thin rubber floor mats provide a bit of traction for your feet, there’s a slim map pocket near the passenger’s kneecaps, and there’s a little rectangular tray for your phone, because if there’s one thing Italians will make room for, it’s a phone. The door panels are widely scooped out, making for plenty of outboard elbow room, and you’re also unlikely to rub elbows much with your passenger. In the center console, a carbon-fiber protrusion that looks like a grab handle has buttons to choose reverse gear, auto mode for the transmission, and launch control.

I abandon the hill-climb and head back to Maranello on meandering two-lane roads, following Roberto in the minivan. I have to say, he really knows how to drive that Voyager. Now there’s more spray from the rain, and the big single wiper sweeps efficiently over the huge windshield. The car isn’t quiet by any means, but I can carry on a conversation with my passenger. I glance up at the rear-view mirror and see the top of the engine cover, framed by the very sharply angled window, and just a little bit of the road behind. The rear-view camera image in the driver’s instrument cluster is crisp and clear. The A-pillars are close and not particularly tall, so the forward visibility is quite good. I can’t see the front corners of the car, but I have a very good sense of it.

Time to try automatic mode for the seven-speed dual-clutch gearbox. It’s flat-out wonderful and utterly benign; your mother could drive this car in automatic mode while sipping an espresso. Lovely throttle blipping on the automatic downshifts when you brake. It’s so easy to thread this car through roundabouts and villages.

We arrive at Pista di Fiorano. You think we had any problem getting the gates to open for us in our LaFerrari? Back in Roberto’s minivan for a ride to lunch at Il Cavallino, the famous restaurant adjacent to the Ferrari campus. The engineering team, who gave us a technical briefing last night, is there to finish telling the story of the development of LaFerrari, Ferrari’s first-ever hybrid automobile.

Efficiency of performance
LaFerrari is no tree-hugging exercise with a prancing horse badge. This is a real Ferrari, the most powerful roadgoing Ferrari ever built and, surely, one of the most desirable. While the word “efficiency” is in every other sentence that comes out of the mouths of Ferrari engineers, they’re talking about efficiency of performance far more than they’re talking about fuel efficiency or emissions.

Ferrari began working on hybrid KERS (kinetic energy recovery system) powertrains in 2008 for its Formula 1 Scuderia’s racing efforts. A Ferrari 599-based concept car slathered with fluorescent green paint and fitted with a HY-KERS powertrain debuted at the 2010 Geneva motor show, and development of the LaFerrari began shortly thereafter. In addition to its tightly packaged mechanical layout, which encompasses a V-12 hybrid powertrain in the same wheelbase and overall length as the 2002 Ferrari Enzo, LaFerrari’s claim to technical fame is its highly advanced use of carbon fiber for the car’s chassis-tub structure and body panels, made possible by hand-applied, time-intensive, proprietary techniques that are also a direct trickle-down from Ferrari’s racing development.

All carbon fiber is not created equal
Ferrari strongly feels that all carbon fiber is not created equal. Many of the latest carbon-fiber cars, including highly respected machines from the likes of McLaren, Porsche, BMW, and Lamborghini, use RTM (resin-transfer molding) carbon fiber, but Ferrari isn’t impressed.

“With RTM, you don’t get any better weight reduction than we already achieve with our advanced aluminum technologies,” says Franco Cimatti, the Italian-born, American-educated Ferrari veteran engineer who’s in charge of vehicle concepts and pre-development.

For LaFerrari’s chassis tub and body panels, Ferrari prefers pre-preg carbon fiber, which is pre-impregnated with resin before it’s sent into the same huge autoclaves that bake up all the pieces for the F1 race cars. “With pre-preg, we are taking a lot less resin for the ride,” quips Cimatti, “because our autoclave techniques allow us to squeeze out excess resin during the baking.” A particular type of extra-high-strength carbon fiber referred to as T1000 is used both in the F1 race cars’ nose cones and in the structure of the LaFerrari’s doors for crash protection. T800 UD refers to a type of unidirectional carbon fiber that Ferrari carefully places in the same direction as principal loads in key sections of the car’s structure.
In the end, the LaFerrari’s chassis tub and roof, which are bonded together with resins and mechanical fasteners, weigh all of 176 pounds and provide 27 percent more torsional rigidity and 22 percent more bending stiffness than the carbon-fiber structure of the Ferrari Enzo.

A user-friendly supercar
Ah, yes, the Enzo. It’s a constant reference point for LaFerrari engineers, so I ask Matteo Lanzavecchia, who’s in charge of vehicle performance and who once spent a year working for Newman/Haas Racing’s IndyCar program, what an Enzo owner might experience if he or she gets behind the wheel of a LaFerrari.
“If you drive an Enzo and you drive this car, if you are in the same gear, you will have double the level of acceleration,” he says without hesitation. “And you will reach it in one-third the time when you go on the throttle. You will also feel how easy and how safe it is to push the car to the limit. LaFerrari also requires 45 percent less steering activity [input] than the Enzo did, which makes it much easier to control coming out of corners.”

On a more elemental but perhaps more important level, LaFerrari is easier to climb into and out of than the Enzo was, or than most other supercars are. You see, many of the multimillionaires who can and do buy cars like these are not as petite as, say, Ferrari test driver Raffaele De Simone, a typically compacthttp://images.intellitxt.com/ast/adTypes/icon1.png, trim Italian racer. The path to making the LaFerrari more user-friendly started, like everything else on this car, with its carbon-fiber construction, specifically that of the X-shaped roof, which provides enough rigidity to allow for huge door cutouts.

“The sills swell as they go rearward,” Cimatti points out, “our doors are hinged from above, and we have no conventional door posts to get in the way.” The result is a surprisingly large aperture into which you can thread your body quite easily. Indeed, I climbed into and out of our LaFerrari test car at least twenty times during our test-drive day, and it was by far the easiest ingress/egress I’ve ever experienced in a supercar. The doors are easy to open and close from both inside and outside of the car.
Packaging efficiency and a lower center of gravity

Although LaFerrari does not require its occupants to have the size and flexibility of F1 racing drivers, their perches inside the cabin, Cimatti explains, are “inspired by the reclined posture of F1 drivers, which allows for space efficiency.” He elaborates: “We wanted to have cabin space that’s similar to the Enzo’s, but with room for helmets. We experimented with how far we could recline the seating position and eventually arrived at an additional seven degrees of seatback tilt. Anything more than that would create undue pressure on the necks of occupants.” Nevertheless, the change in seat position and the lack of a separate seat structure gained Ferrari engineers 2.4 inches of vertical cabin space (for helmets), even while the vehicle’s overall height has been reduced by 1.2 inches.

Crucially, the highly efficient use of cabin space also allowed Ferrari to lower the LaFerrari’s center of gravity by 1.4 inches as compared with, you guessed it, the Enzo. “This is a massive number,” Cimatti boasts. “In F1, we will completely redesign a car just to lower the center of gravity by a few millimeters.” LaFerrari’s center of gravity, at 14.8 inches above the ground, is also some 2.6 inches lower than the 458 Italia’s. Given the lack of a separate seat structure and the thinness of the seat bottom, this means your butt is perched about as low to the ground as it can go. Small, medium, large, and custom-size seats are offered, so a range of girths, if not extreme heights, of buyers can be accommodated. Our test car is equipped with size large perches, but they don’t feel overly large.

Lunch is over and we’re back at Fiorano, in the pit garage. My LaFerrari has been cleaned and shined, and its doors are soaring toward the ceiling. Noticing the big bulge of carbon fiber between the seatbacks, I ask Cimatti if he couldn’t have wedged in a little storage compartment. “That’s the fuel tank,” he replies with a grin. “It curves behind and between the seats. This is what I meant when I said [the previous evening] that there is a difference between ‘interior space’ and ‘the space needed for driving.’ ” By the same token, passenger footroom is reduced due to the fact that the air-conditioning unit is mounted just in front of the footwell, which helps keep the dashboard low.

Indeed, every square millimeter has been accounted for, says project manager Michele Giaramita, leaving room for only the tiniest of cargo compartments, some 40 liters in capacity, in front of the firewall and behind the front radiators, whose fans are visible through slots in the hood. This is not a car for road trips, but you could wedge a handbag and a jacket in there.


“Let’s go for a ride.”
Ferrari test driver Raffaele De Simone climbs into the driver’s seat and, pointing to the passenger’s seat, says, “Let’s go for a ride.” The seats are fixed in place, but the steering wheel and pedals are adjustable. Racing harnesses secured, we burst out onto the circuit, De Simone providing a running commentary, which I find impressive not only because English is not his first language, but also because he’s driving the balls off this car in a steady rain. Even with his skilled hands and feet, though, the rear tires are sometimes clawing for traction.

“All this technology has a physical output that speaks to the driver in a very natural way. Even in these difficult conditions you feel that you are driving the car, you are managing the power, and the behavior of the car is always giving feedback.” Reflecting on the extremely wet track, he continues: “When the mechanical grip is low, the aerodynamics makes a lot of work. So you have to trust a little bit. So even on a day like this, you can drive your LaFerrari.” Indeed.

The feedback I’m hearing is the mechanical sound of the big rear wing deploying under hard braking, at the same time as two rear flaps that are integrated into the rear diffuser. There are also three automatically deploying aerodynamic flaps under the front of the car, but they’re not visible or audible. There are, of course, all manner of sophisticated aerodynamic manipulations happening with LaFerrari, starting with a frontal area that’s ten percent less than the 458 Italia’s. The thing is, it’s all achieved subtly, without garish wings, in a rather svelte body profile.

Behind the wheel at Fiorano: Always, the V-12.
De Simone pulls back into the garage. “I would say sport and wet today are the best for you,” he gently advises, then steps out of the car. I’m on my own. I cautiously enter the circuit and head toward Turn 1, a tight right-hander. The V-12 sounds awesome. It’s pouring rain now, so, yeah, wet mode for sure.
With a big burst of speed coming out of third gear, Enzo’s house is visible out of the corner of my right eye. I brake hard, downshift to second for the uphill of Turn 4 and the bumpy, tricky approach to the bridge. I often screw this up, because you want to get some speed up to get over it, but then you have the immediate hard right of Turn 5. I’m still contemplating that challenge when another one arises: a big pool of water. I hydroplane into a runoff area on the left but gather it back up (with the able assistance of the electronics) and swivel gently through the tight lefthander that is Turn 6. More standing water, and I can feel the rear tires clawing for traction as the V-12 angrily tries to tell them who’s boss. Hard braking for some acceleration toward the gentle swell of Turn 7. This is the moment when you feel like you’re aiming right toward the big ceramics factory, smoke billowing from its chimneys, which borders this side of the track. But you’re not. At least, I’m not.

At the end of the straight is a tight left toward the last corner, Turn 8, a fairly broad but slow loop, and the apartment building is hard on the right. Every time I’m at Fiorano, I wonder, who in the world lives there, with a bird’s-eye view of Fiorano? A blessing for some, a curse for others, I imagine.
Now onto the straight, the paddock on the right, and the V-12 sounds so, so amazing, brapp brapp, brapp. The sound of a Ferrari V-12: nothing like it, and nothing is muffling it here, trust me. Electric motor? I have no clue. I don’t hear it.

Now, just the slightest movement of the steering wheel to the left to enter Turn 1 from the correct angle. Braking blipping blipping blipping click clack click of the paddle shifters. Always, the V-12. And the single wiper blade, furiously sweeping.



The HY-KERS Powertrain
The hybrid components add a total of 322 pounds to LaFerrari but also provide an additional 161 hp and 199 lb-ft of torque to the 6.3-liter V-12’s 789 hp and 517 lb-ft, for a grand powertrain system total of 950 hp and 716 lb-ft. We’d say that’s a fair trade-off. The two battery packs, each consisting of four 15-cell modules, for a total of 160 cells, reside just below and behind the seats, under the fuel tank and ahead of the V-12. The lithium-ion cells are provided by Samsung, but the battery packs, which are protected from road debris by a layer of underbody Kevlar, were designed by Ferrari in-house. A layer of glass electrically insulates the battery pack from the rest of the cabin.

The V-12 resides behind the batteries and fuel tank and is of course followed by the seven-speed dual-clutch transmission. A Magneti Marelli electric motor is attached to the back of the gearbox via a gear set, and two electric inverters are mounted on top of the transmission housing. That electric motor is at the very rear of the car, which helps explain why cabin space -- and space in general -- is at such a premium in this car. Nevertheless, it’s all crammed into the same size package as the Enzo.

Lest we give you the impression that Ferrari is unconcerned with emissions, powertrain chief Vittorio Dini points out “our goal was to reduce CO2 but also increase performance, with more power, more torque, and a higher maximum engine speed. You always work to manage maximum power versus maximum torque, and the electric motor allows you to make different compromises and choices.”

Vehicle performance chief Lanzavecchia elaborates: “Since we added weight to the car by adding the hybrid system, we always want it to either be boosting or recharging. Otherwise, you are carrying around weight for no reason.” LaFerrari takes advantage of the electric boost in a straight line, where the tires can handle the extra power output, but when the car is exiting a corner and the tires, limited by grip and lateral acceleration, can only transmit a limited amount of torque to the ground, the KERS system uses the V-12’s excess torque to recharge the battery pack. “Normally, with braking, you are turning energy into heat. Instead, we are turning it into chemical energy for the battery,” Lanzavecchia says.

source: http://www.automobilemag.com/reviews/driven/1404-ferrari-laferrari-review/#ixzz30KTNUluc
by Joe DeMatio

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Thursday, April 24, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - LaFerrari XX Prototype Laps Nurburgring In 6:35 - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666


LaFerrari Nurburgring




Earlier this week, Antonella Coletta, head of Ferrari's Sporting Activity Department, announced that the Italian company is working on a track focused version of the LaFerrari, called the LaFerrari XX. Now, spy shots have emerged from the Nurburgring reportedly showing an early LaFerrari XX prototype in action.
According to WorldCarFans, the spectacular LaFerrari XX was able to circle the Nurburgring in an impressive unofficial time off 6 minutes and 35 seconds. To put this in perspective, the current production car lap record is 6:48s held by Radical SR8LM. What's more, Ferrari's time also obliterates the 6:57s lap time set by the Porsche 918 Spyder hybrid supercar. However, unlike the Porsche, the extreme LaFerrari XX supercar is not street legal and will be limited to circuit use only. 

The LaFerrari XX test mule spotted conducted testing at the Ring in unpainted carbon fiber. Windows were replaced with lexan units. Although not visible on this car, the production LaFerrari XX will most definitely come with a few aerodynamic bits and pieces which should make it even faster around the corners. It is not clear whether the LaFerrari XX will produce even more than 950 horsepower from its 6.3 liter V12 hybrid power unit.
"It's very difficult to make a car faster than LaFerrari, but this is where the challenge!" Coletta had commented. The production-ready LaFerrari XX could be revealed as early as next year. Be sure to watch the video below to see the LaFerrari XX prototype in action:



source: http://www.imotortimes.com/laferrari-xx-prototype-laps-nurburgring-635-watch-it-tear-ring-here-video-29440
by Adnan Bhat

http://fzrestoration.com

Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Texan Driver Crashes Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 Into Swimming Pool! - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666


Texan Driver Crashes Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 Into Swimming Pool!




A young Texan driver has crashed his black Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 into a local community swimming pool after losing control of the potent muscle car.
According to those who witnessed the crash, the man behind the wheel was driving too fast. A friend of the driver, Ashton Brantley said, “I was driving right behind him the whole time. He lost control, and I think he took his traction control off. And then he just hit the curb, and then went into the fence, and then he hit the pool.”



The awesome blacked out near $60,000 was understandably destroyed by its little swim and will inevitably be deemed a write off by his insurer.
The driver may be ticketed for speeding and could face fines for the damage caused to the pool and its fence

source: http://www.gtspirit.com/2014/04/08/texan-driver-crashes-chevrolet-camaro-zl1-into-swimming-pool/

by Brad Anderson

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Ferrari 458 Spider gets crashed in Australia - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666


Ferrari 458 Spider gets crashed in Australia



Australia has seen the crash of a Ferrari 458 Spider these days after its driver has probably lost control of the wheel and hit a tree.

When compared to a lot of European or Asian countries, Australia is not that “rich” in supercars, mostly because of the massive 33 percent luxury car tax, so an incident involving such a ride can’t go away unseen. As you can see from the image posted above, the crashed vehicle is a Ferrari 458 Spider. The guys atAdelaide Exotic Car Spotting (FB) are saying that the reasons of the crash remain unknown but happily no one was injured in the incident.

The Ferrari 458 Spider is the convertible version of the 458 Italia. The model was officially unveiled during the 2011 Frankfurt Motor Show and it has an aluminum retractable hardtop which is weight 25 kg less than the one of its predecessor, the F430 Spider. The roof can be retracted in 14 seconds. The 0 to 100 km/h sprint takes the same as in the 458 Italia but the top speed has been lowered to “just” 320 km/h (199 mph).

source: http://www.inautonews.com/ferrari-458-spider-gets-crashed-in-australia#.U1gEhPldWSo
by Cristian Gnaticov

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Saturday, April 19, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Formula One Planning To Launch Masters Racing Series Says Ecclestone - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666





Bernie Ecclestone has revealed that he is planning to launch a masters series for former Formula One drivers following the concept which has been made popular by sports such as golf and tennis.

It would see superstar drivers such as Nigel Mansell and Nelson Piquet return to racing and has already been endorsed by several of the leading lights from yesteryear. They include Ferrari race-winner Gerhard Berger who says “I am sure that it will be successful and that all former drivers would like to participate.”
http://speed.pointroll.com/PointRoll/Media/banners/trans.gif?PRAd=1883434&PRCID=1883434&PRplcmt=2269623&PRPID=2269623The series could see a return of the deafening V10 engines from the 1990s compared to the V6s which have been introduced to F1 this year and have been criticised for being too quiet. One of the fiercest critics has been Mr Ecclestone and he revealed the plans for the masters series to the Wall Street Journal.
“A series with former drivers is a good idea,” says Mr Ecclestone. “We have talked about it and it is something we ought to do. Many of these old drivers are still absolutely good enough. You would put them in the cars they used to drive.”

Former driver Martin Brundle, who is now a television pundit, says “whatever the format I’d want to be part of it especially if it was supporting the F1 calendar.” Eddie Irvine, who almost won the F1 title in 1999, admits that “it’s not for me personally” but adds “I think the fans would love it and some drivers too.”
Mr Ecclestone’s interest was revealed by a European trademark application which was filed in February by Formula One Licensing to protect the name ‘Historic Formula One’. The application is specifically in the category covering sporting events which is an important step in the preparation of a race series as it gives ownership to the name.

It is often possible to find out about the launch of a new racing series by checking the trademark register because an application for its name usually has to be made in advance of it being officially announced. In September 2008 the London Evening Standard newspaper revealed that F1 would launch a grass roots racing series called GP3. The following month GP3 was officiallyannounced and it took its place underneath F1’s junior series GP2.

A masters series would complete the ladder as it would give a home to drivers who want to continue racing but are no longer up to F1 standards. It would also boost F1’s revenue which would please CVC, the private equity firm which controls the race series through its parent company Delta Topco.
Although there is no equivalent in F1, there is a series called Masters Historic Racing which allows the owners of classic F1 cars to compete against each other. They visit ten historic tracks including Britain’s Silverstone circuit, Spa in Belgium and Germany’s historic Nürburgring. Its championship is known as the ‘Historic Formula One Championship’ and F1 licenses the name to it.

“Historic Formula One is us,” says Mr Ecclestone. “We license them to use the name.” As the license is under Mr Ecclestone’s control he could use it for his series once the agreement with Masters Historic Racing comes to an end.

It would be a different championship as Mr Ecclestone says “they have got different drivers, they have got people who bought these old cars. They have not got people like Mansell and Piquet driving but my idea would be to use them.”

A similar racing series, known as Grand Prix Masters, was launched in 2005 and featured ex-F1 drivers over the age of 40, competing against each other in modern 3.5-liter single-seater cars. It held three races – in South Africa, Qatar and at Silverstone, which was won by American driver Eddie Cheever. The series was shut down in 2007 after failing to pay its bills. As F1 is the world’s wealthiest form of motor racing it is unlikely that its masters series would share the same fate.

Brundle adds that “a well structured F1 masters series would be very popular with drivers and fans, and therefore TV and new media channels and sponsors too. In any event I’d want to drive cars that some others enjoyed back then. To attract the household names of decades past I suspect the cars would need to be safer and less physical to drive.”

Britain’s 1996 world champion Damon Hill added that it “sounds interesting. However, the problem is risk. I think most old drivers want to get home to bed early with a good book.” The spectacle on track promises to be a lot more interesting than that.

source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/csylt/2014/04/16/formula-one-planning-to-launch-masters-racing-series-says-ecclestone/

by Christian Sylt

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Friday, April 18, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Ferrari exec confirms a track-focused LaFerrari XX - report - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666

 Ferrari exec confirms a track-focused LaFerrari XX - report


Could arrive as early as next year
Ferrari's head of the Sporting Activity Department has confirmed the company is developing a track-focused LaFerrari.

Speaking to Drive, Antonello Coletta said “Now we are working on the new hypercar for the circuit, the LaFerrari XX." He went on to say "I hope that the new car will arrive on the circuit in January or February of next year."
Little is known about the model but Coletta hinted we shouldn't expect huge performance gains. As he explained, "It will be more or less the same [power] but it will be completely different ... because it’s normal that the handling is different for the circuit and the road." Coletta went on to say the changes will most likely include improved aerodynamics, upgraded electronics, a sportier suspension and racing tires.
Source: Drive via Motor Authority
http://www.worldcarfans.com/114041573402/ferrari-exec-confirms-a-track-focused-laferrari-xx---report
by Michael Gauthier

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Thursday, April 17, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Ferrari 458 Italia Crashed - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666







A stunning red Ferrari 458 Italia has been crashed in Beckton, United Kingdom, after the driver of the vehicle lost control of the car. The supercar veered off the road which was elevated and would have come crashing down onto the track if it wasn't for the concrete barricade protecting the train track. The front of the car was severely damaged and is most likely going to be a write-off. Luckily though, there were no casualties, it was reported that the driver of the Ferrari was seen coming out of the car and running up the road most likely to call for help/assistance but the passenger was said to be injured. The exact cause of the crash is still unknown.




source: http://www.zero2turbo.com/2014/04/ferrari-458-italia-crashed-in-beckton.html

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Saturday, April 12, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 Spyder crashed in Switzerland - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666

Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 Spyder crashed in Switzerland



The driver of a Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 Spyder has managed to crash his ride after he had lost control of the wheel and ended up over a ditch.

Exotic and powerful supercars combined with not enough driving experience will most of the times lead to some spectacular crashes. The newest example of such an unfortunate incident is coming from Zofingen, Switzerland, where a Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 Spyder has definitely seen better days. According to the guys at Wrecked Exotics, the Italian supercar was being driven by a 33-year old man, who lost control of the wheel. Happily no one was injured in this incident, which is more than we can say about the supercar.
The Lamborghini Gallardo has recently left the production line after 11 years, being replaced by the Huracan. The Gallardo was offered in two body styles, two-door coupe and two-door roadster, with a mid-engine and all-wheel drive or a mid-engine and rear-wheel drive layout. The LP560-4 Spyder was officially presented to the public during the 2008 Los Angeles Auto Show. This came with improvements such as the 5.2 liter V10 engine, with improved E-gear transmission and with a 20 kg weight reduction. The 0 to 100 km/h sprint took 5.0 seconds in this model and top speed stood at 324 km/h (201 mph).

source: http://www.inautonews.com/lamborghini-gallardo-lp560-4-spyder-crashed-in-switzerland#.U0YsVPldWSo

by Christian Gnaticov

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Friday, April 11, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Ferrari 458 Italia crashed and split in half in the UK - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666


Ferrari 458 Italia crashed and split in half in the UK


A Ferrari 458 Italia has been recently crashed and it split in half after the incident in Birmingham, UK.
Exotic supercars combined with not enough driving experience will always keep our Car Crashes section full, this is what we’ve always said, and the latest example of such an unfortunate incident is involving a Ferrari 458 Italia, which met its end in Birmingham, United Kingdom. The model in question was crashed by an employee of a transport company, who decided to take it for a spin before loading it in the car carrier trailer.
He apparently lost control of the wheel at 225 km/h (140 mph) and hit a post, which split the Italian supercar in two. The incident left the driver in a coma and the passenger has suffered some serious injuries. The Ferrari 458 Italia has been crashed beyond repair and this will be taken to the scrap yard where it will probably be transformed into beer cans.

The Ferrari 458 Italia has replaced the old F430 and it has been officially unveiled back in 2009, during the Frankfurt Motor Show. The model in question is taking its power from a 4.5 liter V8 unit, producing 562 HP at 9,000 rpm and 540 Nm of torque, at 6,000 rpm. The engine is mated to a 7-speed dual clutch transmission, sending power to the rear-wheel drive.

source: http://www.inautonews.com/ferrari-458-italia-crashed-and-split-in-half-in-the-uk#.U0YrtvldWSo

by Christian Gnaticov

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Thursday, April 10, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Last Corvette pulled from museum sinkhole will need some extra TLC - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666


Corvettes damaged by sinkhole



Since the Kentucky earth opened up beneath the display dome of the National Corvette Museum in February, workers have been carefully retrieving the eight classic Vettes that fell into the chasm. As they've gone from the top down, each car retrieved has seen a bit more damage. Today, the museum pulled out the car at the bottom of the pile. That is not going to buff right out.

This car was known as a 2001 Mallett Hammer Z06, which had been donated to the museum just a few months before the collapse. Its owners, Kevin and Linda Helmintoller, spent more than a decade customizing the Vette before offering it to the museum. According to the museum, when word came that workers had found his car, Kevin Helmintoller drove from Florida to see it recovered.

"I expected bad, but it's 100 times worse," he told the museum's staff. "It looks like a piece of tin foil... and it had a roll cage in it! It makes all the other cars look like they're brand new.



General Motors executives have vowed to restore all eight of the damaged Corvettes, although there may not be enough of the Mallett left to make anything but a new 2001 model. The museum will have the eight cars that fell into the hole on display through August.
Photo: National Corvette Museum
source: Motoramic
by Justin Hyde

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Friday, April 4, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - The invisible blood of Formula 1 - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666




PAUL CROCK/AFP/Getty Images


“If I’m honest, these are the things that keep me up at night,” says Guy Lovett. Like most of today’s F1 paddock, Guy wasn’t following the Imola drama in 1985. “I was smashing models of those cars together on my mother’s floor, not considering the implications of their fuel design,” he laughs. Now Shell’s Technology Manager for Ferrari, Lovett has time to consider little else. Some 30 years after the dawn of F1’s first Turbo era, fuel engineers are scrambling to adjust contemporary gas to a very familiar formula.

“We’re going back to basics with fuel components. Fuel rules haven’t changed, but the appetite of the engine is quite different.”

Lovett’s enthusiasm is apparent, even over the phone. He talks about early testing on a single-cylinder slice of V6 F1 engine in Maranello. He talks about additives, how Shell and Ferrari have run an F1 car on retail gas. How his team reached its tentacles into Shell’s diesel development staff to better assess new technology. He talks about the places where Shell can sharpen their edge. “FIA dictates that we use 5.75% biofuel by mass. That’s an area that can be exploited. There’s so much happening in biofuels right now.”

Then he clams up. “I’d love to tell you exactly what we’re doing, but I just can’t.”



Fuel development wasn’t so different in the mid-1980s, though it was a little less practiced. It was in 1985 that the 1.5-liter twin-turbo V6s made the leap into insanity. Intriguing, then, that the specifications of today’s V6 racing engine are remarkably similar to the hairiest racing cars the world has ever seen.

In the 1980s, just like today, fuel was the answer to a host of problems. The blood running through the veins of volatile and consumptive things, creating an appropriate fuel became a project that could make or break a team. Just bring up the ‘80s to anyone with a passing interest in F1 fuels, and they’ll blurt out, “Rocket fuel.” Guy did.

“Rocket fuel,” for all intents and purposes, means toluene. It reeks like paint thinner and works well as such. More importantly, it has a superior energy density to gasoline, and it won’t cook a cancer in you like benzene. When F1 teams started adding rocket fuel to already-potent racing engines, turbo pressures started to increase and cars started to break dynos. And engines.

That fragile balance means that today, a running Turbo-era car is a rare find. Ask an owner. Michael Taggart has been trying to coax his Lotus into life for years. Best known for being the unruly predecessor of the 97T that would propel Senna to greatness, the Renault-powered Lotus 95T was so rudely unsuccessful that it famously prompted team boss Peter Warr to say driver Nigel Mansell would “... never win a Grand Prix as long as I have a hole in my arse."

Of course, he was wrong.

F1 cars of the mid-eighties were living, growing prototypes. Wings sprouted mid season and didn’t stop growing until the car was left to gather dust. New composite technology allowed for a light and stiff monocoque chassis and bodywork. Even the paint was designed for lightness, it’s thin, the gold has faded to a pale yellow now, and the ripple of Kevlar beneath is no less visible or tantalizing as it was in the 1980s. Mansell’s Lotus 95T pushed technology into an undrivable, unreliable future. Refined into the Lotus 97T and placed in the hands of Senna, that technology made a legend.

Chris Cantle

I went to Willow Springs to hear the Lotus run. It’s a hell of a thing when it does. Taggart’s mechanic, an enormously capable guy named Dean Sellars, has had to tinker the car into submission. After an hour of fiddling and getting oil pressure up and checking computers, the ignition is thrown and the engine lights. It barks loudly and never wants to settle into an idle. There’s a hollowness, too, on top of the snarl. The car laps the track maybe twice before the driver throws his hands up in frustration. A wastegate is stuck open and the car is useless without forced induction. We only get to hear the siren song of the little V6 for a minute, but at full boil, the Renault engine is a dangerous thing, and it sounds like it.


Chris Cantle
 

More time passes. The Lotus is fueled by commercial race gas, now. It’s been detuned from it’s wicked 1000+ dyno-melting horsepower to something manageable. It might have been tempered, but it’s still ill-tempered. When the sun sets we’re hot and frustrated, and we wind up drinking cognac out of mugs, and then the bottle, at the top of Turn 3.

The first test of the F1 season made our session at Willow Springs look like a picnic.

We’ve been blessed by years of shockingly reliable engines in F1. All that might change this weekend. Despite the incredible investment in science and technology, the computer modeling, and the single-cylinder test engines, racing is still a risky thing.

If all goes according to plan, we’ll never see the result of Lovett’s hard work. An F1 fueling rig will invisibly and almost instantly pump 100 kg of gas, chilled 10 degrees centigrade under ambient air temperature, and we won’t see a drop. This weekend, Ferrari’s 2015 F1 car will be exploding a cocktail that began development more than a year ago and has been designed, engineered, studied, tested, and tweaked by a team of more than 100 people at facilities across the globe.
Things have changed so dramatically in F1. Teams are restricted to a fuel that is, fundamentally, a superbly tuned gasoline. No more tricky lead and manganese additives. Toluene is long gone. Lovett tells me that the gasoline going into an F1 car shares about 99% of the same chemical components as retail fuel. The FIA samples and tests fuel constantly to be sure, and that means Lovett’s trackside team of six has to do the same, running their creation through their own gas chromatography lab.
Research, refine, research, refine, and then finally… race. That cocktail would smell familiar to any of those drivers at Imola 29 years ago.
source: http://www.roadandtrack.com/features/web-originals/the-invisible-blood-of-f1?src=soc_fcbks
By Chris Cantle March 15, 2014 / Photos by Getty Images

http://www.fzrestoration.com

Thursday, April 3, 2014

Vintage and Exotic Car Restoration Livermore - Ferrari 458 Crash - FZ Restoration Livermore- (925) 294-5666


Ferrari 458 Italia gets ruined in Madrid


The driver of a Ferrari 458 Italia has managed to crash his ride after trying to overtake another car in Madrid.

The Ferrari 458 Italia seems to be one of the most crashed Italian supercars these past few months, and not only, as the newest example of such an unfortunate incident, involving this model, is coming all the way from Madrid, Spain. According to the guys at Wrecked Exotics, the Italian supercar in question has been crashed while its driver tried to overtake another car but ended up losing control of the wheel. The driver left the scene of the accident, possibly under the influence.

Ferrari has introduce the 458 Italia as a successor of the F430 back in 2009 and the model in question is currently being offered in two body styles, a two-door coupe Italia and a two-door convertible Spider. Both have a rear mid-engine and a rear-wheel drive layout, along with a seven-speed dual clutch transmission. Power is being provided by a 4.5 liter V8 engine, rated at 562 HP (419 kW) at 9,000 rpm and 540 Nm (398 lb-ft) of torque, available at 6,000 rpm. The 0 to 100 km/h acceleration is made in 3.3 seconds and top speed stands at 325 km/h (202 mph)
source: http://www.inautonews.com/ferrari-458-italia-gets-ruined-in-madrid#.UzwhU_ldWSo



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