The Lamborghini Countach (help·info) is a rear mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive sports car produced by the Italian automobile manufacturer Lamborghini from 1974 to 1990. It is one of the then-exotic designs conceptualized by Italian Design house Bertone, which pioneered and popularized the sharply angled "Italian Wedge" design language.
This design language was originally embodied and introduced to the public in 1970 as the Lancia Stratos Zero concept car. The first showing of the Countach prototype was at the 1971 Geneva Motor Show, as the Lamborghini LP500 concept car. The Countach also popularized the "cab forward" design concept, which pushes the passenger compartment forward to accommodate a larger rear-mounted engine.
The development of the Lamborghini Countach was initiated by Ferruccio Lamborghini with the goal of creating a successor to the Lamborghini Miura. The Miura was widely acclaimed after its introduction in 1966, but by 1970 new competitors including the Ferrari Daytona had been released, and the Miura was showing its age. Chief engineer Paolo Stanzani and his staff began work on the Miura successor in 1970 under the project name "LP112." From the beginning of the project, Stanzani's collaborators included test driver Bob Wallace, assistant engineer Massimo Parenti and designer Marcello Gandini of Bertone.
Stanzani and Mr. Lamborghini agreed that the Miura's successor required a mechanical design that enabled the greatest possible performance as well as a body that was both aerodynamically efficient and aesthetically daring. These principles had informed the Miura's development and enabled the commercial success of that model. Despite Mr. Lamborghini's preference for comfortable grand tourers, he recognized the commercial value of a more uncompromising sports car like the Miura and gave Stanzani's team permission to further push boundaries with the LP112 project. The resulting Countach incorporated successful aspects of the Miura, such as the rear mid-engine, rear wheel drive layout along with many new engineering and styling innovations. Lamborghini's engineering team addressed several flaws in the Miura design, improving high-speed stability and reducing lift-off oversteer as well as addressing the limited maintenance access, uneven weight distribution and cooling issues endemic to the Miura's transverse engine layout.
After a year of intensive development work, the first Countach prototype, designated LP500, was shown to the public at the 1971 Geneva Motor Show. Subsequently, the Lamborghini engineering team spent three years refining this radical prototype into the production-ready LP400 Countach, which debuted in 1974. The Countach would be an enduring success for Lamborghini and was produced in various versions from 1974 to 1990.
The Countach name originated in late 1970 or 1971, near the beginning of the LP112 project. Most previous and subsequent Lamborghini car names are associated with famous bulls and bullfighting, but the Countach broke with this tradition. The name originated from the word contacc (pronounced [kʊŋˈtɑtʃ]), an exclamation of astonishment in the Piedmontese language.
Marcello Gandini, the designer of the Countach, explained the origin of the name:.mw-parser-output .templatequoteoverflow:hidden;margin:1em 0;padding:0 40px.mw-parser-output .templatequote .templatequoteciteline-height:1.5em;text-align:left;padding-left:1.6em;margin-top:0
Lamborghini used a system of alphanumeric designations in order to further delineate Countach models.This designation begins with "LP", an abbreviation of the Italian "longitudinale posteriore," meaning "longitudinal rear." This refers to the engine orientation and placement shared by all Countach models. For the prototype and early production models, "LP" was followed by a three digit number designating nominal engine displacement, "400" for 3.9-litre engines and "500" for 4.8 and 5-litre engines. Therefore, the full name of the first production Countach was the Lamborghini Countach LP400. As in the Miura, "S" was added for later high performance variants. This naming scheme was disrupted by the 1985 LP5000 Quattrovalvole equipped with a 5.2-litre engine, also called the 5000QV. The LP- designation was dropped entirely for the 1988 25th Anniversary Edition, also called the Anniversary.
The Countach was styled by Marcello Gandini of the Bertone design studio. His design for the Countach's predecessor, the Lamborghini Miura, achieved commercial success and critical acclaim from the automotive press when it was introduced in March 1966. Following the Miura's debut, Gandini began experimenting with a new, more angular and geometric design language in a series of concept cars for Lamborghini, Alfa Romeo and Lancia. In particular, the 1968 Alfa Romeo Carabo and 1970 Lancia Stratos Zero were direct styling precursors to the Countach. Like the Countach, they were both entirely wedge-shaped, mid-engine designs with a low, flat front, truncated tail and angular details. Both of these concept cars featured unconventional methods of entry into the passenger compartment—a hinged windshield for the Stratos Zero and scissor doors for the Carabo—foreshadowing the scissor doors used on the Countach.
At the start of the LP112 project in 1970, Lamborghini commissioned Gandini and his team at Bertone to develop a body for the then-unnamed prototype. Chief engineer Paolo Stanzani supplied the design team with chassis information so that body design could proceed while the mechanical details of the prototype were finalized. Shortly before the 1971 Geneva Auto Show, the finished chassis was shipped to Bertone where the prototype bodywork and interior was installed. The resulting Countach LP500 prototype was unveiled at the 1971 Geneva Auto show, where its unconventional design drew great public interest and extensive press coverage. The LP500 prototype had a crisp, wedge-shaped design that, compared to the Miura, was wide and very low but shorter in overall length. Overall dimensions of the prototype were 185 cm (73 in) wide, 103 cm (41 in) tall, and 401 cm (158 in) long. The nose of the prototype tapered sharply to a thin grille, an uninterrupted slope enabled by headlights in retractable housings that flipped down inside the body when not in use. The prototype's body lacked bumpers, aerodynamic spoilers, side mirrors and any other addition that would have interrupted the lines of Gandini's design. Trapezoidal shapes appeared throughout the body, including in the windshield, side windows, door openings, hood and engine covers and taillights. Air was supplied to the engine and side-mounted radiators through louvered vents immediately behind the side windows, although road testing quickly demonstrated these vents alone were inadequate to control engine temperatures.
The interior of the prototype was equally notable to contemporary audiences as the exterior, as it incorporated new technologies and bold styling decisions. Gandini initially sketched a dashboard with all-digital readouts for the Countach. This dashboard design was not fully realized in time for the 1971 Geneva Auto Show debut, the LP500 prototype instead using a conventional analog speedometer and tachometer. However, the LP500 dashboard incorporated other innovations from Gandini's original sketches, including aircraft or spaceship-inspired warning lights placed centrally on the steering column, within the arc of the steering wheel. One of these warning lights functioned similar to a modern cruise control system, illuminating when a set speed was exceeded. Another innovation was the inclusion of an on-board diagnostic system (long before their standardization and widespread adoption) that displayed the status of the car's individual subsystems superimposed on a schematic view of the entire car, located on the dashboard to the driver's left. Due to the poor rearward visibility inherent in the Countach design, a periscope was integrated into the passenger compartment roof, instead of a conventional rear-view mirror. This periscope system was obtained from Donnelly Mirrors, who had first developed it for an ESV project. Gandini also used a single-spoke steering wheel and deeply recessed bucket seats, which shared a stylized motif of segmented blocks. The low seating position, prominent transmission tunnel and wide door sills all contributed to the sensation of being inside a race car cockpit.
The scissor doors of the Countach prototype were a prominent design feature carried over to the production Countach as well as many subsequent Lamborghini models. First appearing on Gandini's 1968 Alfa Romeo Carabo concept car, they attached to the vehicle structure at the front of the door using horizontal hinges, so that they lifted up and tilted forward when opened. The mechanism was assisted by gas struts, which supported the weight of the doors and smoothed the opening and closing motion. Gandini incorporated this door design as both a styling gesture and to facilitate entry. The car's wide chassis and high and wide doorsills made entry using conventional doors difficult in narrow spaces. Conversely, care needed to be taken in opening the scissor doors under low ceilings. Due to poor rearward visibility and the wide sills, many Countach drivers park by opening the door, sitting on the sill, and reversing into the parking spot while looking over the back of the car from outside. The scissor doors made it difficult to exit the car following a rollover accident. Lamborghini engineers studied solutions to this problem including an easily removable "kick-out" windscreen or using explosive bolts to remove the doors following an accident, although neither were incorporated into the production Countach.
Following the LP500 prototype's public debut in 1971, the body design was progressively altered during pre-production testing to improve aerodynamic performance, high speed stability, engine cooling and ability to meet mandated safety requirements. This resulted in many differences between the LP500 prototype and the production LP400. The most visible change was the addition of several vents to improve engine cooling and air intake. These included NACA ducts spanning the doors and rear fenders on each side and protruding air intake boxes, which replaced the louvered vents behind the side windows. The slope of the nose was made shallower to reduce excessive front-end downforce that destabilized the prototype during braking. The side windows inset with small trapezoidal glass sections were changed to horizontally-split two piece windows with a retractable lower half. Additional small windows were added behind the side windows, slightly improving rearward visibility. The futuristic dashboard and diagnostic displays seen on the prototype were replaced with a conventionally-styled dashboard using Stewart-Warner analog gauges, while the single-spoke steering wheel was replaced with a three spoke wheel similar to those used on other production Lamborghinis. The periscope rear-view mirror was retained for the LP400, but for subsequent Countach models it was replaced with a conventional rear view mirror. The overall dimensions of the LP400 were slightly larger than the prototype, at 189 cm (74 in) wide, 107 cm (42 in) tall, and 414 cm (163 in) long.
The styling of the Countach was continually altered as new production models were introduced. Later additions—including fender flares, spoilers, carburetor covers and bumpers—progressively changed the Countach body in order to improve the model's performance, safety and appearance. Despite these updates, the basic shape of the first Countach prototype revealed in 1971 remained virtually unchanged over its 19-year production lifespan.
The Countach was designed around the existing Lamborghini V12 engine in a rear mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive layout. In contrast to the Miura's transversely-mounted engine, the engine in the Countach was longitudinally-mounted. This was not an unprecedented layout for a V12, as it was already being used in the successful Ferrari P-series racing cars. However, chief engineer Paolo Stanzani wanted to improve the weight distribution of the car even further and devised a new type of longitudinal layout that would avoid placing the mass of the transmission at the rear of the car. The resulting configuration had the output shaft at the front of the engine, immediately connecting through the clutch assembly to the transmission. The transmission itself was a 5-speed manual with Porsche-type synchromesh and was mounted in the middle of the car between the two seats. The driveshaft ran from the transmission through the engine's oil sump to a differential at the rear. This arrangement effectively sandwiched the length of the engine between the mid-mounted transmission and the rear-mounted differential. This configuration had numerous advantages over the Miura's transverse engine, including an increase in stability from placing more mass near the car's center, a shorter overall wheelbase, a more direct gear-shift linkage for easier and faster shifting, better cooling and easier maintenance access to engine components.
The Lamborghini V12 used in the Countach originated in 1963 and was designed by Giotto Bizzarrini. Versions of this engine were used in preceding and then currently produced Lamborghini models including the 350 GT, 400 GT, Islero, Espada and Miura. As used in the Miura, this engine had a 3,929 cc (3.9 L) displacement, a 60º cylinder bank angle, double overhead camshafts per bank, two valves per cylinder, lubrication and distributor ignition. Paolo Stanzani's engineering team wished to increase the Countach engine's power over the maximum of 279 kW (379 PS; 374 hp) as seen on the Miura SV. The 3.9-litre version had been tuned to produce approximately 307–324 kW (417–441 PS; 412–434 hp) in the experimental P400 Jota, but an engine of this specification was expensive to manufacture and was difficult to handle in normal city driving due to lack of low-RPM power. Therefore, the engineers decided to increase the engine's displacement to 5-litre, in order to extract more power while avoiding the usability problems of a race-tuned engine. This increase in displacement would require a major redesign of the existing V12. Lamborghini's plan was to produce the 5-litre engine in time for series production and published specification sheets for the proposed production 5-litre engine at the 1971 debut of the prototype. Lamborghini reported this engine would generate 328 kW (446 PS; 440 hp) at 7,400 rpm. One experimental engine was constructed by boring out a conventional 3.9-litre engine block and was fitted to the Countach LP500 prototype for testing purposes. It incorporated many lightweight castings made from Elektron, an expensive magnesium alloy. This engine self-destructed during a 1971 road test by Bob Wallace. This made it clear that further revisions to the basic engine design were required to improve durability. The LP500 prototype was subsequently fitted with a 3.9-litre engine for the remainder of pre-production testing.
The first production cars used a 3.9-litre engine as durability issues with the new 5-litre engine could not be resolved in time. As equipped to the 1974 Countach LP400, the engine generated a stated 276 kW (375 PS; 370 hp) at 8,000 rpm. The stated power output was less than that of the Miura SV, which was blamed on the use of side-draft Weber 45 DCOE carburetors instead of the down-draft carburetors used on the Miura. Later engine development eventually increased the engine displacement to 4,754 cc (4.8 L) in the 1982 LP500S, and then to 5,167 cc (5.2 L) with four valves per cylinder in the 1985 LP5000 Quattrovalvole. All variants of the Countach were equipped with six Weber carburetors until the arrival of the LP5000 QV model, some of which used Bosch K-Jetronic fuel injection to meet US emissions regulations. European-specification cars continued to use carburetors until the arrival of the succeeding Diablo.
Paolo Stanzani and the Lamborghini engineering team developed an all-steel partial space frame chassis for the LP500 Countach prototype. This prototype chassis was constructed of both a steel sheet and square-section steel tubing, with wall thicknesses between 0.8–1.0 mm (0.031–0.039 in). The front section primarily used stamped and spot-welded sheet steel, with certain areas stiffened by stamped ribs and welded reinforcement panels. Stiffening frames constructed of sheet steel and tubing extended through the center of the car, along both door sills and around the central transmission tunnel. The rear section of the chassis consisted of almost entirely square-section tubing and included diagonal bracing and multiple cross-members for strength. This prototype chassis was constructed by Marchesi of Modena, which had produced chassis for earlier Lamborghini models.
The prototype chassis was stiffer and heavier than the Miura chassis. It weighed 107 kg (236 lb), while the Miura's chassis weighed 75 kg (165 lb). The additional weight was partially due to the lack of the lightening holes used in the Miura and partially due to the need to construct an extra-durable chassis for pre-production testing. In addition to the strength and stiffness improvements over the Miura design, engineers believed that greater use of steel tubing would result in a chassis that was easier for the factory to fabricate and easier to protect from corrosion.
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