Race Engine Forum UK

In general knowledge section about Abarth I plan several articles concentrating on key aspects.
It will include:

1/ A piece on life and achievements of Carl Abarth (featuring also special relationship of Carl Abarth and the Porsche family)
2/ A Story on Abarth under Fiat ownership.
3/ A supplement on Ferdinand Porsche and relatively unknown facts of his life.

The article below will be put on the page under "Mr. Abarth" section

I would appreciate any comments and corrections ( from style to language/grammar/spelling and substance).

Your help will be greatly appreciated.

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"ABARTH WITHOUT MR. ABARTH" section

When Fiat took over Abarth the Abarth & Co faced major change from Carlo Abarth management style. Abarth was subjected to strict corporate planning and had to fit into the Fiat sales strategy. Aurelio Lampredi – has enough experience to combine the Abarth corporate culture with the requirements of being just a sports division of a major auto company.

Instead of multiple projects every year, as before Abarth concentrated on Fiat objective to boost its sales through building a successful rally Gr.4 car.

(picture of x-1/9 Prototipo)
Between 1971 and 1983 Abarth produced Abarth rally versions of stock models including Abarth versions of Fiats 124, 125, 126, 126p, 128, 131, X-1/9 as well as Abarth versions Pinifarina Coupe (known as Lancia SE 037) and Lancia Delta known as (SE 038).

(picture of Fiat 124 Abarth Rally)
Lampredi concentrated on two car models: the 124 and 131. He trusted that the Fiat DOHC engine he designed had the technical and performance potential for major professional tuning. The 124 Abarth rally (based on 1800cc DOHC) and 131 Abarth Rally ( based on the 2000cc DOHC ) were to become flagship rally cars of the Fiat auto conglomerate.

(picture of Fiat 131Abarth Rally)
(picture of Lancia SE 037)
(picture of Lancia Delta SE 038)

It was not until Fiat heavily invested its motor sports that Fiat Abarths became mega- stars of international motor sports. Fiat investment in motor sports at that time was as big as Ferrari spending on F-1.

Between 1973 and 1981 Fiat Abarths won a total of 21 World Rally Championship. While famous Fiat 124 Abarth Rally and Lancia Stratos made a contribution to this success, the 131 Abarth rally was clearly the most successful performance Fiat ever built. Despite being up to 30 hp less powerful than its major opponent Ford Escort RS 2000 the 131 had its other advantages. 131 Abarth was equally durable as the competition, but far more stable and predictable in handling. This allowed Fiat drivers to drive it on verge of losing control without actually losing control of the car. It was unbeatable on corners just flying through them as if it needed no traction.

The 131 Abarth won for Fiat three Manufacturers' titles in 1977,1978 and 1980.
(picture of Fiat 131 Abarth Rally)
This was the most successful Abarth period since Carlo Abarth set up his "Squadra Carlo Abarth" in 1951.

By 1981 the 131 Abarth competitors were too strong to continue its world success. With introduction of 4x4 technology into rallying and introduction of Audi Quatro, the 131 Abarth became technologically obsolete and needed a successor. It was replaced by Abarth designed Lancia 037 and Lancia Delta 038. These cars despite their very good design and solid construction were not able to compete with the same success as the 131 Abarth. They also suffered from Fiat's major sport budget cuts. Fiat never again invested as much in sports as it did during the 131 Abarth reign.

In the mid 90's Fiat abandoned sports as its strategic marketing tool. Abarth sports division aware of financial cuts offered a prototype of a new, “civilian” 131 Abarth Rally street version with a standard 2000cc and 8 valve engine. Fiat decided against the project.

In the 80s Abarth name was seen by Fiat only as a tool to stress performance of some models: (like Ritmo Abarth 130 TC). During the 1990's Fiat practically abandoned technical development by Abarth and dropped Abarth as Fiat’s top brand name. In early 2000's Abarth was just a trim (like on Stilo).

Between 1952 and 1998 ABARTH & Co produced total of Abarth 172 models. Most of the Abarth cars were Fiat engine and or Fiat chassis based. All Fiat models had its role in Abarth -Fiat relationship. Fiats 500, 600, 750, 850, 1100, 1300, 1500,1600, 1800, 2000, 2300, 2800 and 3200 had its Abarth versions or their engines were modified and used in Abarth cars.

In 1998 Abarth prepared a beautiful prototype of Stola Abarth Monotipo. Fiat did not offer financial support for this project.
(2 pictures of Stola Abarth Monotipo)

In 2007 Fiat Automobiles Sp.A. re-launched the Abarth brand with the Grande Punto Abarth ,Grande Punto Abarth S2000 and Fiat 500 Abarth.
( pictures of Grande Punto Abarth S2000 and Fiat 500 Abarth)

The Abarth 1500 coupe, which was rumored to be launched in 2010 did not make it to the production (yet?) but shows that that Abarth spirit is back.
(picture of Abarth 1500 coupe)

Fiat lovers around the world missed the Abarth flair for a decade when Abarth was not a part of Fiat strategy. For many years Fiat without Abarth was just another unimaginative automaker producing "transport vehicles" designed by accountants and second rate fashion designers. Now, that Abarth regained its proper position in Fiat marketing, Fiat has regained major edge over its competitors. Abarth brings back to Fiat the flair, imagination, temperament, sporty feeling and love of life many grew to associate with Fiat ever since Carl Abarth started modifying Fiats in mid 1950's.
.

Thank you Fiat (Abarth) !

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Miro

This is an article on Carl Abarth,

I would appreciate any comments and corrections ( from style to language/grammar/spelling and substance).

Miro

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KARL (CARLO) ABARTH
Born at Vienna on November 15 1908, died October 24 1979.

On November 15th 1908 on Karl Abarth jr. was born in Vienna. His parents were loyal subjects of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Mother - Dora Taussig was an Austrian national from Viennese “pettit bourgeoisie”. Father, an Italian from Merano was a lieutenant in the Imperial Austro-Hungarian army.

Initial childhood interest of Karl was bicycles and - as he grew - motorcycles. He always exhibited a passion for motor sports and ingenuity to modify whatever bike motorbike or car he had. Over a lifetime these childhood passions filled his entire adult life.

His initial mechanical education took place at Italian chassis factory Carozzeria & C, and its partner - Dagan garage in Vienna, where he worked in his teens and where he learned basics of precision engineering. His interest and abilities caught the eye of Joseph Opawsky, a motorcycle champion. Opawsky introduced him to the racing division of Motor Thun factory in Traischkirchen, which built "MT" motorcycles. Karl joined Tun as a mechanic and mechanic became a MT team race driver by chance. One of the MT factory drivers got ill and Karl was offered race in his place. On a practice training session Karl set the best lap time beating the rest of the factory drivers. Some racers thought Karl cheated and watched him closely on the second run. Karl set a lap time top time again. This was a source of great annoyance among the rest of the team, who raced the MT bikes for years and were beaten by this "kid" racing the bike for the first time. For actual race Karl was given back-up service bike which broke down during the race. Karl accused other drivers of sabotage. Having not received support from the management on his complaint Karl got furious and quit the TUN factory in protest.

After the affair Karl was subject to ostracism by all major factory teams. Ambitious Karl was very upset but decided to get even and show the world how good he really is. He bought a used British Grindlay-Peerless 250cc. He striped it to pieces, modified it to make it lighter and better fit to track racing and started winning. In 1929 Karl beat all factory teams winning the Austrian Grand Prix on a 250cc motorbike he build. This bike was a 250 cc two stroke water-cooled by two radiators Abarth – the first the motorcycle with Abarth brand. Sweet taste of revenge.

Not only his professional life was all around the motor industry. In 1934 Karl married secretary of Alfred Piëch - husband of a Ferdinand Porsche daughter. By this Karl became close to the Porsche. "Ferry" Porsche - son of the famous professor Ferdinand Porsche was one of his close lifetime friends. He also made lot of friends among top Porsche engineers and designers.

After a serious crash in 1930 in Lintz Karl vowed not to race again. But nothing could keep him away from racing for more then a short time.

Despite long rehabilitation after Lintz and pulling all the tricks in the book to get his racing license back Karl was permanently disqualified from motorcycle racing. Karl's injured knee was too weak. This technicality could not keep him away from motorcycle racing. Karl figured out that his weak knee was a problem only when the motorcycle had two wheels Neither the doctors nor sports officials expected Karl to file for a three wheel motorcycle racing license: the sidecar motorcycle racing. Knowing they will never get rid of Karl otherwise they gave him the license. Karl's persistence paid off again.

Soon after Karl became the most popular sidecar motorcycle racer of his time. Working for Dougan garage again Karl he came up with an idea of the Orient Express Challenge. The event was to prove that Karl can drive a Dougan garage prepared motorcycle with a sidecar from Vienna to Ostend (a distance of 1370 km) quicker than the famous Orient Express. Karl convinced Dougan garage management to fund this as a promotional event for the garage and the Orient Express officials to accept a challenge as promotion of the Orient express itself. It fact this was indeed a show of Abarth' a self-promotion skills.

Karl drove a motorbike with a sidecar of his own construction. Press journalists accompanied Karl in cars all the way from start to finish. On the first run Karl’s motorcycle suffered an electrical malfunction and he arrived at Ostend railway station 15 minutes after the Orient Express. On a back run Karl beat the train by 20 minutes becoming an instant international celebrity. The European press had Karl's face, the bike and the race with Orient Express on the front of all European newspapers.

Sidecar racing gave Karl another opportunity to show of his technical ingenuity again. He designed a flexible car. Under his design the third wheel – mounted on the sidecar - could be tilted. The swing axle of the wheel he called "Schwingachs". It tilted by lever changing the wheel angle to the track on a curve. This produced better grip and allowed for much higher speed on curves without loosing traction and stability of the bike. This system allowed him to win most side car races he participated in between 1937 and 1939.

Karl raced under Austrian colors but after Nazi Anschluss of Austria in 1938 he was presented with an alternative to racing under Swastika. An Italian delegation offered him a handsome budget in return for support of Italian motor sport in Nazi Germany. Being half Italian Karl accepted the offer and decided to race under Italian colors. To do so he had to obtain an Italian driver's license and use his Italian name. Karl moved to Merano and became (informally) Carlo Abarth.

One last races of the 1939 season was Ljubljana - the capital of Slovenia region of Yugoslavia. Despite Nazi attack on Poland in September 1939 effectively starting WWII the event was not called off. During the race Carlo had another serious accident. Recovery took a long time. When he could travel he went back to Merano. By that time the war changed Italy completely. 31 year old Carlo was faced with a prospect of being forced to serve in the Fascist Italy or the Nazi German armed forces. Carlo was not about to accept that and thus was in no rush to recover too early. Carlo obtained a medical certificate of permanent physical disability, disqualifying him from military service. His father – himself a retired military man - knew that when defeat looks in the eyes of the leaders they turn to people with "paper" disabilities to fill in the trenches and advised Carlo to move back to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Carlo became a manager of Ignaz Vok mechanical factory in Lubjljana.


He worked on converting gasoline combustion engines to gasogene engines. The technology was based on gasification of carbonaceous material (as kerosene or charcoal) into carbon monoxide and hydrogen by treating the raw material with high temperature steam. Resulting was syngas, which is a fuel itself. The technology was originally developed in Germany in 1881. It was used in both WWI and WWII to overcome chronic scarcity of petrol for civilian use.

In 1941 Slovenia was conquered by the Italians only to be occupied by Nazi Germany in 1943. Karl – still Austrian and thus German Third Reich citizen had to maneuver to avoid being forced into the army or being executed for avoiding military service. In 1945 when the Nazis withdrew and the communist dominated partisans took control of Yugoslavia territory. As a "German" Karl had to flee leaving all his possessions. With some adventures and difficulty he managed to reach his Italian home in Merano. His father arranged issue of an Italian identity card in the name of Carlo Abarth and in few years his Italian citizenship was formally confirmed.

With no cash in his name Carlo had to support himself by taking whatever work he could. He took up selling carpets and bicycles but longed to return to racing. Carlo was re-establishing all of his racing contacts he could. In 1945 Europe no auto or motor sports existed but this was about to change.

In 1945 he teamed up with Rudolf Hruschka (1) a former Porsche engineer, who came to Italy on his way to Stuttgart. He could not get there because of restrictions imposed by US Occupation Forces in Germany. Hruschka decided to wait in Merano for opportunity to travel. Carlo and Rudolf sharing the same automotive passions became friends. After long hours of conversations they decided that the Italian automotive industry, far less damaged by the war will recover much quicker than the automotive industry in Germany. This was an opportunity both for them as well as for Porsche.

In 1945 Porsche had no cars to sell. Porsche family was broke and desperate for cash to pay for his processor Porsche father Dr. Piëch to be released from French prison .

Rudolf Hruschka and Carl Abarth presented Ferry with an idea. Porsche design studio in Stuttgart could design a high performance racing car and the Italians could build it.

Ferry Porsche liked the idea of working with old friends and prospect to start generating cash he needed.

Ferry Porsche recruited Professor Robert Eberan Von Eberhost (2) to supervise the project in Turin, because after the war, Porsche did not have in Gmund the production facilities of the Italians. Von Eberhost was already known by Ferry because his father had worked with him in the Auto Union company, where both had worked to develop the Auto Union D type.

Key person in this undertaking was Piero Dusio. Carl was introduced to him by the famous Italian race driver Tazio Nuvolari

Piero Dusio an Italian industrialist owner of the Juventus football club and race cars fan. Dusio made his money in making textiles, banking , hotel owner and bicycle producer. During WWII he made fortune boots to the Italian army. He was an owner of "Compagna Industriale Sportive Italia (Cisitalia). The company already produced sports cars: successful D46 single seater as well as 202 and 204 models. These cars were designed by Dante Giacosa and Giovanni Savonuzzi and powered by Fiat 1100 engine.

Ferry, Rudolph and Carlo convinced Dusio to provide financial support to build the Porsche designed sports racer at Cisitalia. The result was the Cisitalia Type 360 – a 1.5-liter supercharged 300-hp four-wheel drive mid mounted engine race car. The car was truly revolutionary but also extremely complex mechanically.

The huge advance Ferry Porsche received from Cisitalia for the design of Type 360 as well as technical difficulties of building this very technically complicated car drained the finances of Piero Dusio and Cisitalia went bankrupt in 1949.

Dusio escaped to Argentina taking the only Cisitalia Type 360 prototype with him.(3)

The project fell through and the only pay Carlo was able to recover form his work were few Cisitalia 204 Sports cars and a few boxes of parts. Incidentally among the parts Carlo recovered from Cisitalia was an exhaust pipe developed by Giovanni Savonuzzi under inspiration of silencers designed for guns. The 204's later became the first Abarth racing cars and the muffler became a star product of Abarth &Co.

Carlo Abarth post war engagement in auto industry under his own name consisted of two separate but connected operations - the Abarth manufacturing Company ("Abarth & C.") and Abarth racing team. "Squadra Carlo Abarth". The company quickly hires the best sports car engineers from Cisitalia.

"Abarth & C. S.r.l " was founded by Carlo Abarth on the 31st March 1949 his new business partner , famous Italian race driver Guido Scagliarini. The company was based at via Don Minzoni # 9 in Bologna. Scorpion – Carlo's zodiac sign became Abarth & C." emblem. It was to design and produce sport cars.
Immediately after inception Abarth started designing sports cars. In 1949 Abarth built its very first car – Abarth version of Cisitalia 204.

Carlo's business philosophy was that to boost sales you need to win races was winning races thus on 15th April 1949, Carlo established "Squadra Carlo Abarth" - Carlo's own racing.

The Abarth racing team quickly hired the best Cisitalia race drivers: Tazio Nuvolari, Felice Bonetto, Franco Corteseand, Manlio Duberti. The team's racing stable consisted of all the Cisitalia 204's Carlo owned. Soon after Squadra started racing and winning. The Cisitalia Abarth 204 A Spyder Sport was the first ever car in "Squadra Carlo Abarth" colors to win a sports race. Abarth team won the Mille Miglia 1950 in 1100 class. On April 10, 1950 Tazio Nuvolari behind the wheel of a Cisitalia Abarth 204 A Spyder Sport secured a spectacular victory in1100 class of the "10th Palermo-Montepellegrino" hillclimb.

Supporting low volume manufacturing of sports and racecars and running the Squadra was to be an expensive undertaking. Abarth had to develop a side business to support his auto making operations and racing. In fact the original
company stature provided not only for "the production of cars but also production of auto parts and accessories, tooling for mass production of cars, tuning and servicing of sports and racing cars as well as, selling fuels for race cars. The auto accessories and tuning parts soon turned into very much a key part of the business.

Abarth was selling performance car parts to make the small Italian cars go faster, accelerate better and sound louder. The first Abarth product was a gearbox conversion kit for Topolino - the original Fiat 500.

Other key product was Abarth exhaust system. Inspired by the exhaust pipe developed by Giovanni Savonuzzi acquired form Cisitalia at bankruptcy Carlo has developed his own sport exhaust systems for street cars. The Abarth exhaust gave beautifully laud, sporty sound and increased cars performance. It was painted flat black, had the colorful Abarth logo and chrome tailpipes.

The Italian young drivers loved the Abarth exhaust and it quickly became most fashionable element to have on your car. Despite price tag double the factory standard the Abarth exhaust sold like hot cakes. In 1950 Abarth sold 4500 silencers. In 1952 Ferrari started to install Abarth exhaust giving its name brad name a stamp of quality approval. The sales sky rocketed.

At the end of 1956 Abarth muffler sales exceeded one hundred thousand. In 1962 Abarth sold 260 000 silencer units worldwide.

Later the core Abarth products which made him really as famous as the Abarth racing records were the so called "Abarth conversion boxes" (cassetta di trasformazione). The kits were expensive (often as much as 30 % of a brand new car) but included everything necessary to turn a small street car into a true sporty beast (packed in a wooden cerate): redesigned crankcase, stronger crankshaft, lighter and stronger pistons, rings rods, different profile camshaft, racing valves, performance carburetors, rugged water pumps and large flow manifold, Abarth exhaust system plus all the gaskets, filters, pipework, belts, tools, oil, chrome badges and instructions. to complete the kit's installation. Abarth also produced stiffer suspension springs, front disc brakes and Abarth accessories such as the famous Abarth steering wheels.

Despite initial attempts tuning and sport modification of Porsches, Porsche never became a strong Abarth business partner. One example of Porsche-Abarth cooperation was Abarth Porsche 356 B Carrera GTL. This car successfully raced in 1966 on Nurburgring and Le Mans 24h races.

The real Abarth opportunity was with Fiat. Carlo saw it very early on and to facilitate this he moved Abarth & C to the Fiat City in 1951. Abarth & C headquarters were moved to 10 via Trecate in Torino. Natural proximity to Fiat manufacturing as well as its engineers and managers gave Carlo the access he sought. From this point on the Abarth relationship with Fiat grew ever stronger.
In 1957 Abarth & C moved to a new location bigger location at Corso Marche 38, in Turin.

The 600

The unpretentious small city car of the 50's – the Fiat 600 was used by Abarth as launch pad for a series of projects geared to producing real rear engine sports beasts. Abarth quickly turned the 600 into a 750. These cars secured great sport victories in 50-s and 60's.

At the 24th Mille Miglia in 1957, there were 20 cars representing Abarth in the 750 class - 16 of them finished the race, with Abarth models covering first, second and third places. Franklin Delano Roosevelt Jr. – son the legendary US president - was so impressed he soon secured exclusive distribution of Abarth products in the US.

Abarth produced a 750 GT designed by Zagato:

Ultimately in 1958 Abarth created the 850 Record Monza Zagato

In 1961 also the Fiat 600 D in its own chassis was also modified by Abarth and became 850 TC, and later 1000 TC Berlina

Fiat Abarth 850 TC visually differed very little from civilian Fiat 600D. It became a real sales hit.

On the track, the 850 TC enjoyed countless victories - it came first-in-class in its inaugural 24 Hour race at Le Mans in June 1961, collected titles for the European Touring Car Challenge in '65, '66, and '67, and six successive Manufacturer's Championship titles. When the 55 bhp 850 TC won the grueling 500 km Nurburgring race in 1963 - with a multitude of Abarths in all the top places - the victories made such an impression that the German track's name was added to the engine cover in recognition of the car's achievement.

This car made the Abarth name synonymous with "sporty". Abarth became a fashion statement and a brand name everybody wanted to have on their cars.

The little 600D with a 1000cc engine looked pretty innocent but was a real vicious sporting machine.

However it should be remembered that Abarth made both street cars ("stradale") and their race track versions ("corsa").

The "corsa" 1000 TC looked quite different than his "stradale" brother.
Same differentiation applied to all models that Scudedia Carlo Abarth raced.

The 500

1957 brought the famous masterpiece of Abarth 500 (new version of pre war Topolino). By 1958 Carlo increased the standard Fiat 479 cc engine compression from 6,55 :1 to 10,5 :1, installed a Weber 26 IMB carburetor, modified exhaust and fuel system thus doubling its standard power from 13 hp to 26 hp.
Abarth 500 won many events and established many international records. It also gave the post war Italy youth the taste of real sports and real fun for little money. The Abarth 500 is one of the most recognized and loved Abarths around the world.

Tested at Monza for seven days and seven nights, the Fiat 500 Abarth performed a marathon that went down in history: covering a distance of 18,186 km at an average speed of 108 km/h, the 500 Abarth broke six international records, nearly one every day.

In 1963, launched the Abarth 595. With a larger, 595 cc capacity engine, a new Solex C28 PBJ carburetor and a tuned fuel system, power increased to 27 bhp and the car's top speed passed the 120 km/h mark. The Abarth 595 SS, released the following year, increased power still further to 32 bhp and a 130 km/h top speed.

Abarth 500 Coupé Zagato version is still one of the most sought cars by the car collectors.

Impressed by this success and publicity this brought to the "500: Fiat managing Director Vittorio Valletta offered to pay Abarth for all of race victories and records set by Abarth-modified Fiats. Given the low cost of the cars, Abarth entered his Squadra Fiat Abarths in any race he could and achieved an incredible string of victories.

At the 1962 World Championship race at Circuito del Garda, the only rival manufacturer withdrew before the start, leaving the Abarth-only field to fight amongst themselves for victory.

Abarth also took advantage of his former associate Rudolf Hruschka work for Simca on development of Simca 1000 and designed its Abarth version SIMCA ABARTH 1000 and SIMCA ABARTH 1150.

The top of the line of Simca Abarths was the ABARTH SIMCA 1300 featuring Abarth's potent 1,300-cc twin-cam four-
cylinder engine, pumping out 140 bhp.

In fact, all Abarth models were under continuous development. In 1964, the Abarth 1600 OT (Omologata Turismo) arrived, a derivative of the mightily successful 850 TC, with a colossal 155 bhp from its fire-spitting 1,592 cc four-cylinder engine. It had a 131 mph top speed and could hit 62 mph in 7.2 seconds, but earned a reputation as something of a 'monster' given its aggressive character.

Success of Squadra Carlo Abarth was so overwhelming that racing officials tried to stop that, without much success though. By mid 1960's Squadra Abarth were decimating the competition. In that year alone, Abarth racers recorder some 900 victories. Success continued unabated during the late 1960s, despite the best efforts of race officials and associations to curb the company's triumphant run. New cars continued to arrive on the racing scene, such as the Fiat Abarth 1300 OT, the Fiat Abarth 1000 SP, and the Fiat Abarth 2000 Sport Spider.

However, there was a price to pay. The costs sky rocketed. As the company moved towards the 1970s, the cost of maintaining the brand's reputation was beginning to take its toll. The company's management style was more focused on achieving victory than returning a profit. This had to have an unhappy ending.

Until the late 1960's Abarth & C was growing and "Squadra Carlo Abarth" was turning up more and more victories. Nothing signified an upcoming crisis. With almost 200 employees, great sales of the Abarth boxed conversion kits and sales of Abarth mufflers close to 300,000, With string partnership with Fiat the future of Abarth looked bright indeed. However, the world economy went into a nosedive. The automotive industry was harshly effected. Smaller companies as well as some big ones developed financial troubles.

Fiat with very strong revenue and lots of cash on hand it bought 50% of Ferrari, 100% of Autobianchi and 100% of Lancia. Abarth tried to resist. In 1971 a legendary Autobianchi A112 Abarth was designed. Abarth also designed a "Formula Italia" single seater. Hopes this would help Abarth to survive the World economic crisis as an independent manufacturer proved too optimistic. On October 15th, 1971 Fiat bought Abarth & C.

Abarth became the racing department of Fiat, managed by famous Aurelio Lampredi the designer of the best Fiat engine - the Fiat DOHC.

Loss of control over his beloved company was a traumatic experience for Carlo Abarth. Fiat management tried to make it easier for him by appointing Abarth a high level adviser to Fiat. Carlo served in this capacity for few years but soon retired, moved to Vienna where he died on October 24, 1979 at the age of 71.

Under Carlo Abarth the Abarth & C designed and made 141 models sports cars, modifying standard version cars into sports cars. Some modifications was just tuning and some meant building totally new cars mostly based on available Fiat engines and variety of available Fiat and non Fiat chassis. Many cars were just Abarthized and produced in some volume. Most of the cars however were built in short series from single car to few dozens to few hundreds. Abarth built not only road cars but also Formula type single seaters, experimental or concept cars as well as cars built specially to brake records. Many of the cars Abarth build ware actually raced by his own racing team. Squadra Carlo Abarth participated in thousands of races over the years winning hundreds of them. The racing was the proving ground for their designs. Most of the cars that Abarth team raced were equipped with small engines up to 1000 cc. In mid and late sixties the engines became larger.

In 1967 Abarth build its only 6-liter V12 car - the T140 6000. Many 60's models had variety of engine options from 1300cc to 2000cc. In total there were just ten Abarth models with more than 2000 cc engines.

Carlo Abarth was clearly more interested in designing cars and racing them than making money. Large number of models Abarth & C designed and produced required continuous high level of investment. Most of Abarth & C corporate profit was immediately reinvested into new models and new projects as well as to spent on the Abarth racing team. Under business rules this was risky, verging on irrational. This could only be driven by racing passion first and by then profit second. Money Carl Abarth made was just a byproduct of his passion of making his childhood dream come true. In this sense he was more of an ingenious dreamer than a candidate financial tycoon. This is what made Abarth so appealing to car fans around the world, but it also contributed to eventual submission of a small innovative auto-tuning company to an international auto conglomerate.

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Footnotes :

(1) Rudolf Hrouschka was one of the top Porsche design team engineers. He joined Porsche 1938 and worked on KdF, Kubelwagen and Schwimmwagen conversions as well as Porsches tank projects including Tiger and Ferdinand. In 1945 was arrested by the allies but soon gained release. This is when he changed his name to Hruska. In 1945 was sent by Porsche to order parts in Italy, but the war ended, Europe was occupied by Allied forces and he could not get back to Germany. He set up residence in Merano, where he became close to Carlo Abarth. Hruska signed as a consulting engineer for Alfa Romeo's first mass-production car, the Millenove (1900) in 1951 at Finmeccanica. The Finmeccanica was a part of the state-owned IRI group (to which Alfa Romeo belonged since 1933) whose task was to reconstruct the destroyed Italy after the war. Finmeccanica was in charge of transportation and vehicles. With the launch of the Alfa Romeo 1900, Portello had to be transformed to mass-production plant. Hruska's job was to improve the productivity of Alfa Romeo's Portello plant, which included the reorganization of the working processes in a factory, which mainly used manual labor to produce a small number of high-class cars per year before. In 1954 Alfa Romeo appointed Hruska technical manager. He assisted the in developing Alfa Romeo's Giulietta. In 1959 left Alfa Romeo and joined Simca in France where he to the development of the Simca 1000. His friendship with Carlo Abarth resulted in Abarth-Simca project. Later he worked for Fiat - Alfa’s "arch-enemy" contributing to development of Fiat 124 and 128. In 1967 he got an offer to design am entirely new small Alfa Romeo. He could not resist the chance challenge and opportunity. The result was Alfasud.

(2) Later Von Eberhost worked in the UK developing the Jorwet Jupiter and the mythical Aston Martin

(3) What remained of the car was recovered by Ferry Porsche by the end of the 50 from Argentina. Currently, fully restored is on display in the Porsche museum.
[END]

Sorry Miro - some parts of the Porsche/Abarth and Porsche articles are too (potentially) controversial to publish here as they stand and I have deleted it. I have saved a full HTML copy in case you do not have your own.

Please call to discuss.

G

timinator wrote:Hi Miro,

All racing groups try to impose rules they hope will lead to safe racing. In my area we would not be allowed to mount both release handles as close to each other as are shown in Rich's photo without a partition of some sort. We also would not be allowed to mount them where body panels dislodged by collision could cover the handles such as deck lids(boots) or hoods(bonnets). The best way to find if your warning labels are easy to understand is ask someone who does not race. It might be easier to go to the track where you plan to race and ask the tech official(scrutineer) for his or her suggestions.

Tim

Sorry to back track you're thread Miro, I'd just like to say I agree with what Tim says here it make sense to me.

Guy,

Let me quote in this context words of Ignacy Krasicki an XVII century Polish poet and clergyman "true virtue fears no critics".

I appreciate and share your view that some portions on WWII of the Porsche/Abarth and Porsche articles are (potentially) too controversial.

As you know half of my family were imprisoned and killed during WWII by the Nazis and the remaining half were killed by the Commies during and immediately after WWII. This entitles me to have some very strong feelings on the subject.

However, this forum is not the place to test the degree to which historical facts irritate some automotive industry big wigs.

Your decision to delete the articles is fully understood and appreciated.

On a separate , though not totally unrelated note.

The history of automotive industry is just a part of our universal history. The fact that some ugly historical figures - from extreme left to extreme right - were great auto sports fans and supporters bears no reflection on the automotive industry or any particular brand.

When a country goes to war all its industries (including automotive industry) go to war with it. Natural, understandable and necessary. During WWII all industries of both the Axis and the Allies had a role in the war effort. The difference is that now some are proud of it and some would want to hide it.

Miro

PS: I do not have my copies so if you could sent them to me I would appreciate it.

Rich Ellingham wrote:

timinator wrote:Hi Miro,

All racing groups try to impose rules they hope will lead to safe racing. In my area we would not be allowed to mount both release handles as close to each other as are shown in Rich's photo without a partition of some sort. We also would not be allowed to mount them where body panels dislodged by collision could cover the handles such as deck lids(boots) or hoods(bonnets). The best way to find if your warning labels are easy to understand is ask someone who does not race. It might be easier to go to the track where you plan to race and ask the tech official(scrutineer) for his or her suggestions.

Tim

Sorry to back track you're thread Miro, I'd just like to say I agree with what Tim says here it make sense to me.

Rich and Tim.

I appreciate your comments as well as comments by Tim ( the terminator) and thank you both for them for them. I fully agree. As a safety nut I try to think of all including the most marginal chance scenarios trying to make sure the safety system will work also in such a case as well.

The placement of the external kill switch is the best and has already been approved by the Polish Automotive Association ( PZM as well as the sports judges of my club (Auto Club of Poland). The internal kill switch is historically correct, but it is not inaccessible to the co-pilot. So we have run a separate line ending on the right side of the dash, just in front of the co-pilot.

Your remarks on additional ( "plain English" marking for he switches ( Like "KILL" and "EXTINGUISHER". We will have to find proper Polish equivalents ( "PRĄD" and "POŻAR" lub "GAŚNICA").

Your comments timing was excellent as the fire system is just being installed and we will make the decisions on handles internal and external locations.

As a safety freak I am actually thinking of second set of external switches ( kill and extinguisher) in the back of the car.

Incidentally the car is equipped with a "flip switch" , which cuts of power to fuel pumps in case the car overturns and or hits a stationary object of major mass ( like a tree or another car).

Miro

Here is another article ...for your review and comments :

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Specs for building Fiat 131 Abarth Rally replica.

Many people interested in the history of 131 Abarth and those considering or attempting to build its replica face a number of challenges.

First, they look for specs and start getting conflicting results. One source says one thing and other sources give very different data. This is confusing and frustrating, but not really surprising.

The 50 factory “corsa” cars prepared for 1976 season were actually not all the same. The cars were prepared in three basis specs : Snow & Ice, Gravel and Tarmac. Each of these specs were different. Suffice to say that their curb weight varied from 973kg (for tarmac version) to 1028kg (for gravel version). This was mainly due to additional weight of heavy duty suspension and addition guards and equipment.

It should not come as major discovery that a factory prepared rally cars geared up to win world rally championship must come with different specs for different type of rally events and must be build in a variety of configurations to meet specific challenges of each event. Obviously, builders did not keep formal records for each configuration, especially since they changed over time. Whatever working records existed, vanished. Thus the specs of Fiat 131 Abarth are really a bit of a mystery even to true experts.

What remained is the FIA homologation file # 647. This is the only truly credible source of data. The file includes all modifications, but their technical description is very scarce. The Abarth 131 rally parts list does not really exist (bits and pieces that are known) do not give a full picture and do not include separate specs for each of the three basic versions (Snow & Ice, Gravel Tarmac). Not to mention the later Safari version, which is the least documented.

To make tings event harder the modifications entered into FIA homologation were not used by all teams in all events and by some teams not used at all. Each team had its own preferences and modified their car (cars) according to these preferences. Each team’s service personnel had their own specs notes to configure the car according to conditions of each rally, but these notes are also gone. They also had their private specs in areas not covered by FIA homologation requirements.

In practice the factory teams had 30 cars at their disposal for. All were Fiat 131 Abarth Rally but each car was really different (and each car differed over time). Attempting to recreate a specs for any of them, even for any single event is mission impossible.

So making sure that your version of Fiat 131 Abarth Rally is rebuild (replicated) in accordance with original specs is an art rather than an exact science.

Thus what is left to the enthusiasts trying to replicate Fiat 131 Rally in accordance with original specs is years of research and a lots of analytical guesswork.

The answer to "What specs" is really: Guess and make sure you can substantiate each element of your car configuration. Be ready to defend it.Variety of true and experts and lots of ignorants will criticize it challenging you that the car you built is just a poor fake of a real Abarth.

Advise: do not event talk to idiots but listen to true experts, treat them with respect and learn from them. Just make sure you can distinguish one form the other. This is an art, itself.

In further articles we will share our experiences with key sub assemblies of our replica (engine, gearbox, suspension, brakes, body, fuel system, interior, safety equipment, etc). Each article will contain a detailed description of what we did (how and why) as well as explain the reasoning for going with particular solution/design. Each assembly (subassembly) and system (subsystem) will be compared to known original specs.


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Guy : an oil question.

We were invited to take part in the prestigious St. Barbara Rally, The Rally takes place in Warsaw and is final rally of the season, and is nicknamed "Rally of the Champions" (as all champions of the season are invited). We will take in Legend Class , where rally legends ( both drivers and cars compete).

We are preparing the car for this event. It will be the first winter event as rally takes place on December 5. The temperatures may be low ( realistically from -4 to -15 max).

I am currently running on Motul 20W-60. It technicality is supposed to be good to -33 deg centigrade. ( when the oil becomes solid enough not top be pumped by the oil pump any more. This a a very good oil but mainly selected for the fact we rum practically all events in the summer.
When I spoke to you i mistakenly said this oil rating was 0W-60. No, it is 20W-60.

The rally consists of 4 street like events (each up to 5 minutes long). If I stay with this oil I will have to make sure the engine and oil temperature is at normal level ( and the engine fully warmed up). Do you think I should change to Motul 15W-50 ?

I also plan to make sure the Paraflu concentration is at least 50% if not higher.

Any other preparations to be made (except for winter tires) ?

Miro

You shouldn't use antifreeze mixures over 50% unless ambient temps are very cold. More antifreeze in the mixture weakens the liquid heat transfer ability.
Of course the best is water itself, but for obvious reasons it cannot be used by it self on system.

50% Paraflu or any good quality antifreeze mixed 50% with water holds up to -36-40 deg. C without going even to slush, which is the first stage of freezing point coming closer. After that is many many degrees until all froze to solid.

Here is a view of our car on St.Barbara rally list.

Miro

Poland Rally Historique

Finally !

Group of enthusiasts who dream about it finally succeeded and the Poland Rally will have its Historique edition in 2012.

It many this may be surprising but Poland rally is the SECOND OLDEST rally in the world !(second only to Rally Monte Carlo).
Its first edition took place in 1921 over a distance of 2000 km. It has been an annual event except for world crisis in 1926 and 1931-1936 as well as WWII. he first post war edition of Poland Rally took place in 1947. It was the first rally in Poland after WWII.

The I'st Poland Rally Historique web page is still under construction , but insiders say the rally will take place in Poland in September 2012, on less restrictive rules than RMC-H. This will be a two day regularity rally with 750 km driving.

The flag car of this rally is Fiat Abarth 131 Rally. Our Fiat Abarth 131 Rally !
It is nice that our car became the flagship of the rally . Actually no Polish team ever had such car ( the corsa version cost was was ca 50000 USD in 1980 for most Poles $100 was a three months pay. The price of a standard 131 was under 2400 USD.

But Fiat 131 Rally won Poland Rally in XXVIII Poland Rally in 1978. Spanish team (Antonio Zanini / Juan Petisco) won the rally and another Spanish team took third place Salvador Cañellas / Jordi Sabater).

Miro

As you seem to be able to get Motul readily I suggest you go to their 5W/50 for the winter months.


G

Guy,

Motul makes no 0WXX oil. The lowest winter rating with 50 rating is 15W50.

I looked it up and this oil is also recommended for ice races.

Other oils are rated 0W20, 5W30, 5W-40,10W40, 15W50, 20W60.

Looks to me like 15W50 with the expected temp at minus 5 deg. centigrade.

Miro

Motul 5W/50

I lifted that spec from this website:

http://www.motul-oil.co.uk/products-syn ... ne-oil.php

GC

Guy,

The 5W50 was specifically developed for the UK market and is not available outside UK.

I am currently running on Motul 20W60. This is perfect for summer , but the oil is very "thick" even in high temperatures , so the oil flow in low temperatures is very low. Great in summer but bad in winter.

During start the oil pump has pump the oil into all oil channels. At low temperature ( negative Centigrade range) the pump has to build up high pressure to push the tick oil into the engine oil channels. It takes time for the thick oil to flow freely through all oil channels and initially increases engine wear as well as forces high oil pressure ( providing the oil pump can create such pressure. My oil pump been modified to create higher pressure than standard so it is strong enough but still initial oil pressure is likely to be at ax level and oil flow somewhat impaired until the oil/engine heats up.

This is the reason to use a different oil in Winter.

So which oil ?

Guy recommends nothing less than Xw50. so the practical options are : 5W50, 10W50, 15W50.

I did my research and as a result created a comparison table for selected oils. It took me some time to build the table ( above ) and still I am at a mercy of what is published. During the research i realized that this data is not readily available and not all makers publish the same /similar/comparable data/
Nevertheless, it looks like the real options are :

Castrol Edge, Motul Sport , Mobil 1 Peak Life and Valvoline VR1 RACING.

All current top oil makers make oils of comparable quality and use of any one of them should be fine. I am not an engineer / expert in oil viscosity/quality to make a fully educated selection between them. However since I have to select and thus I must make a decision.

I am partial to Motul, so my first choice would be Motul Sport. This however is has been specifically developed for UK and is available only in UK. The second choice is Valvoline VR1 RACING. Reasons I studied the available oils data and , based on the differences between all Motul 300 V oils i selected Valvoline as its data is closest to Motul Sport. And Motul Sport was developed specifically for hard winter use.


Hope it also will help others in selecting winter sports oil

Miro