One of Australia’s wealthiest car collectors has spent more than $8m on Lamborghini’s fastest roadster yet.
While the brand has not revealed the identity of this passionate Lambo dude (or dudette), there aren’t many people with the cash and connections to get hold of a one-of-15 supercar destined to be one of the most expensive and exclusive cars in the world.
MORE: Lamborghini’s Temerario hybrid tested
We met the team behind the car and found one, Marco, might be great at developing Lamborghinis but he’d make a terrible poker player.
When asked if the new roadster was simply the work of a gas-axe wielding engineer attacking last year’s Fenomeno coupe his fixed smile slips unmistakably into a grimace of such epic proportions the occupants of the orbiting Artemis space probe would have been able to spot it.
Regaining his composure, the Lambo product man shakes his head as his smile returns but the glazed thousand-yard stare says it all.
MORE: Hyundai Ioniq 6 N tested
The gestation of the Lamborghini’s most powerful and fastest-ever roadster has been something approaching a true passion project that pushed designers and engineers to their limits.
The latest in a long run of the Italian carmaker’s ‘Few Off’ creations that it rolls out for its most loyal (read wealthiest) customers the Fenomeno Roadster, like the coupe, is based on the current Revuelto – and there lies the problem.
MORE: The push for Aussies to abandon luxe brands
Originally, the hybrid V12-powered supercar was never ever intended to go topless, so despite looking simply like a roofless Fenomeno engineers had to almost start from scratch to create it.
The biggest hurdle was adapting, and toughening up, the supercar’s carbon-fibre ‘monofuselage’ structure for open-air motoring, which ended up being a bit of a nightmare.
The solution lay in the creation of new composites, that included inventing a fresh bonding agent and using both long and short fibres in a secret patented arrangement.
Modified crash structures were also required, plus a large X-brace over the big engine.
Finally, a fresh cradle behind the driver and passenger seats had to be introduced to survive nasty side impacts, but said bracing robs the space needed for the most extreme carbon-fibre buckets used in the coupe.
The headaches continued. While the monstrous uprated electrified V12 carries over largely unchanged from the Fenomeno, by simply removing the roof and deleting the coupe’s roof scoop destroyed the hardtop’s aero performance, which saw the big 6.5-litre boil in its own juices.
Engineers hastily improvised a new roof scoop, but said intake ended up directing jets of cold air towards the passenger’s knee, while the in-car turbulence was deafening.
MORE: Lamborghini scraps electric supercar plan
To fix those problems designers were forced to start from scratch with the entire upper section of the supercar.
Up close you might spot the thicker windscreen rail, new rollover hoops that act as spoilers and the entirely new rear engine cover.
Happy with the 30 per cent boost in downforce, a massive improvement in cooling and drop-dead gorgeous looks, Lambo then had to offset all the weight added to stiffen up the tub.
Kilo cutting comes in the shape of experimental tech that includes a Countach-inspired wheel design that manages to save an astonishing 3kg per corner.
There’s also Lamborghini’s next-generation CCM-R carbon-ceramic brakes made, again, of varying lengths of carbon fibres embedded in a carbon matrix that’s then embalmed in a special coating and combined with ‘organic’ brake pads. The resulting stoppers are eye-wateringly expensive but combine huge weight savings with unbeatable fade-free performance.
Keeping mass down to a reasonable 1780kg, Lamborghini has retained the coupe’s bigger 7kWh battery (up from the Revuelto’s 3.8kWh power pack) and blends its planet-saving 20km EV range with a devastating 794kW of power and a dizzying 1075Nm of torque.
Lamborghini says its roofless Fenomeno can launch from 0-100km/h in 2.4 seconds, 0-200km/h in 6.8 seconds, before topping out at more than 340km/h.
Weatherproofing isn’t an option, with little or no space for a roof, but few will care when you get front row seats to that magnificent V12 spinning manically all the way to 9250rpm.
Until it rains, that is, and then you’ll simply soak the standard Revuelto cabin.
Since it will make just 15 cars Lamborghini says owners will be able to customise or personalise their Fenomeno with unlimited colour combinations in and out.
With the entire run sold out overnight, many Roadsters have been snapped by the same people who already own the Fenomeno coupe, you might wonder why Lamborghini wasn’t tempted to make more.
The reason was the US. The Fenomeno Roadster’s new crash structure upfront means it will fail new American pedestrian impact regs. A fix is possible, Marco stresses but engineers and designers simply ran out of time.
With full race-spec suspension, plus all the trick chassis tech from the Revuelto, the Roadster can be tweaked to the owner’s driving style, or simply be set-up for maximum comfort.
With just one Fenomeno Roadster destined to make it Down Under to join two coupes already hidden away in collections Lamborghini, perhaps understandably, didn’t bother with the expense of making it right-hand drive.
When asked if he thought all the long hours, hard work and effort were worth it for just 15 cars that few will ever see on public roads Marco says that projects like the Fenomeno were crucial for a small carmaker to fuel innovation and fancy tech, like the ultralight might just filter down faster versions of the Revuelto and Temerario in the very near future.
editions
Lamborghini Fenomeno Roadster
PRICE: From about $8,200,000 plus on-road costs
ENGINE: 6.5-litre V12 plug-in hybrid, 749kW/1075Nm
WARRANTY/SERVICING: Five years/unlimited km, 12 months/20,000km, free servicing for five years
SAFETY: Six airbags, adaptive cruise control, Automatic Emergency Braking, Blind Spot Detection, Lane Departure Warning, Adaptive Cruise, Lane Keep Assist, Automatic High Beam, Traffic Sign Recognition, 360-degree camera and Rear Cross Traffic Alert.
THIRST: TBC /100km
CARGO: TBC litres
SPARE: Repair kit
