Scarabeo is the Italian word for ‘beetle’ but for a few Alfa Romeo connoisseurs, it is also the name of one of the most tantalising ‘might have been’ chapters in the marque’s history. The story of Project 105.56 began in February 1966, less than a month after Giuseppe Busso and Alfa's experimental department had begrudgingly surrendered development of the Tipo 33 sports prototype to Autodelta, Alfa’s racing division headed by Carlo Chiti.
The Bora was Maserati’s first ever midengined road car; the MC20 is its latest; but in between there have been several others. Maserati’s answer to the Ferrari Dino was a ‘baby’ version of the Bora whose mid-mounted engine was downgraded to a 2965cc V6 borrowed from the Citroën SM. In its top-spec ‘SS’ guise, the Merak boasted 220hp, a top speed of 153mph and 0-60mph in 7.0 seconds.
Our Italian correspondent, Matteo Licata, recalls how aluminium-bodied Fiat X1/9 prototypes were tested to destruction in… Nuneaton Blind ‘Ally’ This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Fiat X1/9, which was presented in Sicily in November 1972.
Democratic motoring is something that Fiat has always done well. Low prices, easy maintenance, practical packaging, logical design – Fiat consistently delivers. But a company in Germany has found a way to make the current-model Fiat 500 even more democratic, by exploiting a local legal loophole that allows it to be driven by 16-year olds and older people who don’t have a modern driving licence.
It’s 10 years since Ferrari last made a car with a manual gearbox. We chart the inexorable rise of Ferrari’s automated Transmission THE AUTOMATIC STORY Considering it wasn’t until 1976 that Ferrari first offered an automatic gearbox option (on the 400 GT), it’s quite remarkable that today all Ferraris have automated gear-shifting. How did we reach this point? It all started with Formula 1.