Ferrari
Ferrari S.p.A. is an Italian sports car manufacturer based in Maranello, Italy. Founded by Enzo Ferrari in 1929, as Scuderia Ferrari, the company sponsored drivers and manufactured race cars before moving into production of street-legal vehicles as Ferrari S.p.A. in 1947. In 1969, Fiat S.p.A. became a shareholder of Ferrari and now its majority owner. Throughout its history, the company has been noted for its continued participation in racing, especially in Formula One, where it has had great[citation needed] success. Ferrari road cars are generally seen as a symbol of speed, luxury and wealth.
History[edit]
Main article: History of Ferrari
Enzo Ferrari was not initially interested in the idea of producing road cars when he formed Scuderia Ferrari (literally "Ferrari Stable", and usually used to mean "Team Ferrari", it is correctly pronounced [skudeˈriːa]) in 1928 as a sponsor for amateur drivers headquartered in Modena. Ferrari prepared, and successfully raced, various drivers in Alfa Romeo cars until 1938, when he was hired by Alfa Romeo to head their motor racing department.
In 1941, Alfa Romeo was confiscated by the fascist government of Benito Mussolini as part of the Axis Powers' war effort. Enzo Ferrari's division was small enough to be unaffected by this. Because he was prohibited by contract from racing for four years, the Scuderia briefly became Auto Avio Costruzioni Ferrari, which ostensibly produced machine tools and aircraft accessories. Also known as SEFAC (Scuderia Enzo Ferrari Auto Corse), Ferrari did in fact produce one race car, the Tipo 815, in the non-competition period. It was the first actual Ferrari car (it debuted at the 1940 Mille Miglia), but due to World War II it saw little competition. In 1943 the Ferrari factory moved to Maranello, where it has remained ever since. The factory was bombed by the Allies in 1944 and rebuilt in 1946, after the war ended, and included a works for road car production.
In 1988, Enzo Ferrari oversaw the launch of the Ferrari F40, the last new Ferrari to be launched before his death later that year, and arguably one of the most famous supercars ever made. From 2002 to 2004, Ferrari produced the Enzo. The Enzo was Ferrari's fastest model at the time, and was introduced and named in honor of the company's founder, Enzo Ferrari (Although it was to be called the F60, continuing on from the F40 and F50, but Ferrari was so pleased with it, they called it the Enzo instead). It was initially offered to loyal and reoccurring customers, each of the 399 made (minus the 400th which was donated to the Vatican for charity) had a price tag of $650,000 apiece.
In 2012, September 15, 964 Ferrari cars (worth over $162million) attended the Ferrari Driving Days event at Silverstone Circuit and paraded round the Silverstone Circuit and set the World Record.[3]
Road cars[edit]
- For a complete list, including future and concept car models, see List of Ferrari road cars.
The company has also produced front-engined 2+2 cars, culminating in the current 612 Scaglietti and California.For a time, Ferrari built 2+2 versions of its mid-engined V8 cars. Although they looked quite different from their 2-seat counterparts, both the GT4 and Mondial were closely related to the 308 GTB.
Ferrari entered the mid-engined 12-cylinder fray with the Berlinetta Boxer in 1973. The later Testarossa remains one of the most famous Ferraris.
Supercars[edit]
The company's loftiest efforts have been in the supercar market. The 1962 250 GTO may be considered the first in the line of Ferrari supercars, which extends to the recent Enzo and FXXmodels.
Concept cars and specials[edit]
Ferrari has produced a number of concept cars, such as the Ferrari Mythos. While some of these were quite radical (such as the Ferrari Modulo) and never intended for production, others such as the Ferrari Mythos have shown styling elements which were later incorporated into production models.
The most recent concept car to be produced by Ferrari themselves was the 2010 Ferrari Millechili.
A number of one-off special versions of Ferrari road cars have also been produced, some of which have been commissioned by wealthy owners. One of the examples is the Ferrari P4/5.
The Special Projects program is a collaboration by Ferrari with Italian automobile coachbuilders such as Fioravanti, Pininfarina, and Zagato to build custom cars using selected Ferrari models as a structural base. The first car under this program is the SP1, commissioned by a Japanese business executive. The second is the P540 Superfast Aperta, commissioned by an American enthusiast.
Naming conventions[edit]
Until the early 1980s, Ferrari followed a three-number naming scheme based on engine displacement:
- V6 and V8 models used the total displacement (in decilitres) for the first two digits and the number of cylinders as the third. Thus, the 206 was a 2.0 L V6 powered vehicle, while the 348 used a 3.4 L V8, although, for the F355, the last digit refers to 5 valves per cylinder. Upon introduction of the 360 Modena, the digits for V8 models (which now carried a name as well as a number) refer only to total engine displacement. The numerical indication aspect of this name carried on to the F430, however the F430's replacement, the 458 Italia uses the same naming as the 206 and 348.
- V12 models used the displacement (in cubic centimetres) of one cylinder. Therefore, the famed 365 Daytona had a 4390 cc V12. However, some newer V12-engined Ferraris, such as the 599, have three-number designations that refer only to total engine displacement.
- Flat 12 (boxer) models used the displacement in litres. Therefore, the BB 512 was five litre flat 12 (a Berlinetta Boxer, in this case). However, the original Berlinetta Boxer was the 365 GT4 BB, which was named in a similar manner to the V12 models.
- Halo Car F followed by the anniversary in years, such as the F40 and F50. The Enzo skipped this rule, although the F60 name was applied to a Ferrari Formula One car and is sometimes attached to the Enzo.
- Some models, such as the 1980 Mondial and the 1984 Testarossa did not follow a three-number naming scheme.
Most Ferraris were also given designations referring to their body style. In general, the following conventions were used:
- M ("Modificata"), placed at the end of a model's number, denotes a modified version of its predecessor and not a complete evolution (see F512 M and 575 M Maranello).
- GTB ("Gran Turismo Berlinetta") models are closed Berlinettas, or coupes.
- GTS ("Gran Turismo Spyder") in older models, are open Spyders (spelt "y"), or convertibles (see 365 GTS/4); however, in more recent models, this suffix is used for targa top models (seeDino 246 GTS, and F355 GTS; the exception being the 348 TS, which is the only targa named differently). The convertible models now use the suffix "Spider" (spelt "i") (see F355 Spider, and 360 Spider).
- GTO ("Gran Turismo Omologata"), placed at the end of a model's number, denotes a modified version of its predecessor. Indeed, those three letters designate a model which has been designed and improved for racetrack use while still being a street-legal model. Only three models bear those three letters; the 250 GTO of 1962, the 288 GTO of 1984 and the 599 GTO of 2010.
This naming system can be confusing, as some entirely different vehicles used the same engine type and body style. Many Ferraris also had other names affixed (like Daytona) to identify them further. Many such names are actually not official factory names. The Daytona name commemorates Ferrari's triple success in the February 1967 24 Hours of Daytona with the 330 P4.[7] Only in the 1973 Daytona 24 Hours, a 365 GTB/4 model run by NART (who raced Ferrari's in America) ran second, behind a Porsche 911.[8]
The various Dino models were named for Enzo's son, Dino Ferrari, and were marketed as Dinos by Ferrari and sold at Ferrari dealers—for all intents and purposes they are Ferraris.
In the mid-1990s, Ferrari added the letter "F" to the beginning of all models (a practice abandoned after the F512 M and F355, but adopted again with the F430).
Identity[edit]
The famous symbol of the Ferrari race team is the Cavallino Rampante ("prancing horse") black prancing stallion on a yellow shield, usually with the letters S F (for Scuderia Ferrari), with three stripes of green, white and red (the Italian national colors) at the top. The road cars have a rectangular badge on the hood (see picture at top of page), and, optionally, the shield-shaped race logo on the sides of both front wings, close to the door.
On 17 June 1923, Enzo Ferrari won a race at the Savio track in Ravenna where he met the Countess Paolina, mother of Count Francesco Baracca, an ace of the Italian air force and national hero of World War I, who used to paint a horse on the side of his planes. The Countess asked Enzo to use this horse on his cars, suggesting that it would bring him good luck. The original "prancing horse" on Baracca's airplane was painted in red on a white cloud-like shape, but Ferrari chose to have the horse in black (as it had been painted as a sign of grief on Baracca's squadron planes after the pilot was killed in action) and he added a canary yellow background as this is the color of the city of Modena, his birthplace. The Ferrari horse was, from the very beginning, markedly different from the Baracca horse in most details, the most noticeable being the tail that in the original Baracca version was pointing downward.
Ferrari has used the cavallino rampante on official company stationery since 1929. Since the Spa 24 Hours of 9 July 1932, the cavallino rampante has been used on Alfa Romeos raced by Scuderia Ferrari.
The motif of a prancing horse is old, it can be found on ancient coins. A similar black horse on a yellow shield is the Coat of Arms of the German city of Stuttgart, home of Mercedes-Benz and the design bureau of Porsche, both being main competitors of Alfa and Ferrari in the 1930s. The city's name derives from Stutengarten, an ancient form of the German word Gestüt, which translates into English as stud farm and into Italian as scuderia. Porsche also includes the Stuttgart sign in its corporate logo, centred in the emblem of the state of Württemberg. Stuttgart'sRössle has both rear legs firmly planted on the soil, like Baracca's horse, but unlike Ferrari's cavallino.
Fabio Taglioni used the cavallino rampante on his Ducati motorbikes, as Taglioni was born at Lugo di Romagna like Baracca, and his father too was a military pilot during WWI (although not part of Baracca's squadron, as is sometimes mistakenly reported). As Ferrari's fame grew, Ducati abandoned the horse- perhaps the result of a private agreement between the two companies.
The cavallino rampante is the visual symbol of Ferrari. Cavallino Magazine uses the name, but not the logo. However, other companies use similar logos: Avanti, an Austrian company operating over 100 filling stations, uses a prancing horse logo which is nearly identical to Ferrari's, as does Iron Horse Bicycles and Norfolk Southern Railway.
Colour[edit]
Main article: Rosso corsa
Since the 1920s, Italian race cars of Alfa Romeo, Maserati and later Ferrari and Abarth were (and often still are) painted in "race red" (Rosso Corsa). This was the customary national racing color of Italy, as recommended between the World Wars by the organizations that later would become the FIA. It refers to the nationality of the competing team, not that of the car manufacturer or driver. In that scheme, French-entered cars such as Bugatti were blue, German such as Benz and Mercedes white (since 1934 also bare sheet metal silver), and British green such as the mid-1960s Lotusand BRM, for instance.
Curiously, Ferrari won the 1964 World championship with John Surtees by competing the last two races in North America with cars painted in the US-American race colors white and blue, as these were not entered by the Italian factory themselves, but by the U.S.-based North American Racing Team (NART) team. This was done as a protest concerning arguments between Ferrari and the Italian Racing Authorities regarding the homologation of a new mid-engined Ferrari race car.
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