Enrico Ghinato is a talented painter who manages to magically capture the gleaming beauty of Ferraris on canvas. He has created a series of astonishingly realistic portraits of the California to celebrate its launch
The Paris Motor show has seen the unveiling of some of the world’s greatest automobiles. it has showcased the models that have marked the ascent of Ferrari into legend. Most recently, the 1984 Testarossa, dramatic and full of the promise of extreme performance; the 1992 456 GT, emblematic of the shift, as requested by the new president Luca di Montezemolo, towards a Ferrari that combines performance and quality of life on board; and the 2004 F430, symbolising the new Ferrari generation, made entirely of aluminium, a strategic choice by a company creating cars fit for the new century. This year at Paris, Ferrari will present the California, a car of firsts. It emerges from the Maranello stable as a perfect fusion of advanced technology, exclusivity, practicality and ease-of-use. It’s the first Ferrari ever to feature a folding hard-top roof. It’s the first Ferrari to combine supreme performance with the experience of the open air, and space to carry sports equipment and luggage. It’s also a Ferrari capable of delivering a softer, more fluid touring drive when the occasion requires it. That was the goal – a car that would have it all and appeal to all tastes, all needs. That is what the technicians wanted, and that is what Donato Coco, Ferrari’s Chief designer, requested of Pininfarina when issuing the design brief. The pleasures of owning and driving a real Ferrari – well understood by enthusiasts around the world – are encapsulated in the California. This twoplus- two model – a two-seater adaptable for every eventuality – is a versatile motor car for a new age and a new customer. But above all, it is a Ferrari.
SUBLIME INNOVATIONS – BECAUSE EVERY FERRARI MUST AMAZE – Roberto Fedeli, Technical director
‘A car is made from the best integration of the subsystems it comprises. This is something we have learnt from Formula one, where it is not enough to have the most powerful engine or most effective aerodynamics to win. Only excellence in every subsystem can lead to success,’ declares Roberto Fedeli. The fortysomething Tuscan engineer and Ferrari’s Technical director is looking fondly at the model due to be unveiled at the paris Motor show. The California is designed to appeal not only to the traditional Ferraristi looking above all for performance, but to those people who have been waiting a long time for a Ferrari that is suitable for less extreme uses. ‘We have developed three innovations to characterise the car technically,’ says Fedeli. These three ‘features’ set the California apart from the rest, but while direct petrol injection, multi-link suspension and a double clutch between the engine and the gearbox are firsts for a car emblazoned with the prancing horse, it is in every other respect a Ferrari. Following tradition, the engineers at Maranello have given every feature the originality and specificity that are the hallmarks of a car boasting the highest performance levels. ‘Injecting into the cylinder, at the right moment, just petrol and not an air/petrol mix, is a great advantage,’ explains Fedeli, opening the bonnet to reveal the generous 460bhp V8 engine. ‘We get better yields such as power output and torque values, lower consumption and a 20 per cent carbon dioxide reduction.’ Though it might seem strange that fuel economy and the environment are considerations at Ferrari, at Maranello they are doing much work in this field, such as the methane-propelled 430 that was unveiled at this year’s detroit Motor show. The second main feature of the California is the F1 gearbox – instant and precise, just like the one räikkönen uses – that can also function as an automatic. ‘With a traditional automatic gearbox there are times, such as pulling away or during certain gearchanges, when there is a sort of detachment between what the foot is doing on the accelerator and the behaviour of the car,’ explains Fedeli. ‘With the Ferrari dual-clutch system this disappears.’
The advantage of the double clutch is that while the clutch of the current gear opens, the clutch of the new gear closes in an instant. it’s a bit like two athletes running a relay; instead of the baton being passed, they have one each and it is enough to pass the white line to make the other one start. in practice, there’s a gearchange without engine torque being interrupted. Combining this system with an F1-derived gearbox is the ultimate perfection. The third characteristic of the new model is the multi-link suspension. ‘In the overlapping triangular suspension systems, the stresses from the road and from the style of driving are absorbed by arms that operate on just three axles,’ reveals Fedeli. ‘However, with the multi-link system, levers are used to target every specific stress.’ The system guarantees a greater level of comfort while increasing the capacity of the drive wheels to transmit power output to the ground. The castings of the aluminium chassis of the California have been made especially for this multi-link system. As Fedeli says, it is the integration of individual elements into a working whole that really counts. But technology is better appreciated on the road than on paper. It’s just a pity that we will have to wait until the end of the year to have first-hand experience of the Ferrari California. But then…
IT’S ALL IN THE DETAIL – Donato Coco, Chief designer
The traditional gear-stick, complete with the evocative open gate designed to make gear engagement easier, was the symbol of Ferrari for more than 50 years. With its passing, the central tunnel of the Ferrari cabin lost an aesthetic and symbolic feature, but what it gained – with the arrival of the revolutionary high-performance, ultra-precise F1 gearbox – more than made up for it. ‘The three buttons dominating the central bridge are reminiscent of the old paddle-and-switch,’ says Donato Coco, Chief designer at Ferrari, showing off the elegant centre feature of the California. ‘This bridge has enabled us to arrange the functions hierarchically. Instead of lining up the buttons, oddment or telephone compartments, ashtray and so on in a row, we have put the functions on top of each other. In this way, on the top and clearly visible to the person at the wheel, are three gearbox keys. Below them is the service area. This innovatively shaped feature provides functions such as the reverse gear, launch control and automatic gear transition.’ Consider what it means to drive with an F1 gearbox. The gears are engaged and shift up and down via compensators on the steering wheel – which means the driver can forget that there was once a pedal called ‘the clutch’. These three easily identifiable functions take the original concept of the gear stick in the middle of the passenger compartment and develop it for the driver of today using the very latest technology. ‘Even the instrument panel is new: a huge, centrally placed rev counter, in the Ferrari tradition; analogical and 170 millimetres, no less,’ says Coco adamantly. ‘It offers perfect legibility within a clean and unfussy design.’ Then, resplendent in the middle, the large sat-nav screen. Surrounding the screen is an aluminium border upon which is whispered the name ‘Ferrari’ in chromium: refined, just like the carbon and the Frau full-grain leather. ‘Looking at this passenger compartment from the emotive position that a drop-top car allows, everything appears harmonious without losing any of Ferrari’s signature features,’ Coco declares. ‘The steering wheel is also new, with the start button and the dials [for the electronic suspension, traction control and speed-shifting adjustment] as in F1, and the prancing horse, featuring prominently on the yellow-and-black background, as it used to be on the 250 California.’ The new California is a car of possibility. ‘Behind the lightweight, sculpted wraparound seats there are various options. The car can be used as a twoplus- one or two-plus-two, with extra seats,’ says Coco. ‘It’s also possible to have a bench with two functioning drawers, or to load skis or golf bags, using the opening that connects the passenger and luggage compartments.’ This is the California. A true Ferrari in its performance and style, fitted with the latest technology – but also a different Ferrari, for people who like a more ‘grand touring’ style. A Ferrari for people who might once have preferred to sit alongside an enthusiastic companion. But above all a Ferrari.
REDEFINING BEAUTY FOR THE 21ST CENTURY – Andrea Pininfarina, Ceo Pininfarina
The leading company in Italian automobile styling and design, Pininfarina’s creations are things of beauty. Pininfarina has been ‘dressing’ Ferraris since 1951, when a legendary meeting, fundamental to the companies’ history, took place. Some people still remember the encounter at Voghera, halfway between Turin and Maranello, when old Pinin and Enzo Ferrari first met, on neutral territory, to see whether they could work together. Despite being what might be described as far-from-easy characters, these two great visionaries immediately saw eye-to-eye. Their agreement – that from that day Pininfarina would be responsible for the styling of Ferraris – created an indisputable bond between the two companies that still exists today. With the California, however, Pininfarina has had to make a mighty effort: the challenge was to make a real Ferrari and a new Ferrari at one and the same time. according to Ferrari’s Chief designer, Donato Coco, the car had to be a Gran Turismo model in Ferrari’s finest tradition: both sporty and luxurious. ‘The task he gave us – to create an eight-cylinder front engine, with hard retractable top – was not an easy one,’ recalls Andrea Pininfarina, who has taken over the company from his father, Sergio. ‘a traditional concept was chosen, with a sculptural approach, made of highly expressive surfaces.’ The challenge for Pininfarina, as Coco recalls, was ‘to come up with an authentic Ferrari that was capable of attracting that section of the public that loves the brand, but are not looking for a spartan racing car’. The result is truly seductive: the compactness expressed when one approaches it stands in contrast to the message of strength and power the car displays in motion. The lightness of the rear, something that is unheard of in models with a hideaway hardtop, is a real surprise; when it is open one does not suspect that the rigid, fully automatic roof is tucked away discreetly at the back. Pininfarina’s brilliance has been to alternate the muscular and convex surfaces with concave areas that are able to ‘empty’ and thus lighten the masses between the passenger compartment and the rear wing, and at the front, between the headlights, where muscularity and lightness merge. A number of traditional Ferrari features accompany these striking new characteristics, as Pininfarina explains: ‘the air intake on the bonnet, the front grille of the purest Ferrari style and the side air exhausts are classic features of the marque. What is completely new is the rear, which is sculpted to house two large, red, classically round Led lights, as well as the new exhausts, positioned vertically, and the large roof, which when folded leaves considerable stowage space in the luggage compartment.’ If the California comes as a surprise at the Paris Motor show, its distinctive shape on the road will be more surprising still. Imposing from a distance, yet compact and muscular close up; it will speak a completely new language while being a Ferrari through and through. It belongs in the grand tradition of classic Ferrari cabriolets, but boasts a character that is thoroughly 21st century. As never before, the words frequently uttered by Enzo Ferrari – ‘My favourite Ferrari is the next one’ – will come into their own in the form of the California.
PUBLISHED IN Home, Styles BY Antonio Ghini ON 06.14.2008
Credit: Ferrari S.p.A. (www.ferrari.com)
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