The Lamborghini Museum in Sant’Agata Bolognese is the focus of the sixth part of this documentary exploring this maker’s history and production from an insider’s point of view.

Born in 2001, this very impressive museum covers the entire history of the exclusive car maker in all its aspects. The photo gallery highlights Lamborghini’s milestones and it includes black and white stills of old production lines as well as advertising shots and pictures of all the different vehicles.

Within the historical models on display on the ground floor you can find some gems such as the first 350 GT built by Ferruccio Lamborghini in 1963, the Miura S, the Espada, the Urraco and the Silhouette as well as some prototypes such as the Countach 001 and the Lamborghini LM 002. On the other hand the first floor is dedicated to more contemporary vehicles such as design, concept, exotic and racing cars. It also includes an area displaying everything you need to know about Lamborghini’s marine motors such as the Toro.

The pictured car is the BMW Spicup Convertible Coupe styled by Bertone that was presented at the Geneva Motor Show in 1969. After being exhibited at the BMW museum, it has been auctioned at the “POWER by BMW” event, organized by Bonhams, for 460.000€ . Unlike most concept-cars, this car was actually designed to be driven on the road as it was based on the famous BMW 2000 CS and powered by a 2.5litres in-line 6 engine.

Right after the 1969 fair, this car was bought by a Ducthman who was not happy with the original green livery and had it repainted orange. Using it for many years on a daily basis, the lucky owner managed to travel for 100.000 km, a result that makes this fantastic machine the one-off car with the highest mileage in history. The Spicup went missing 20 years ago, but recently it’s been retrieved and fully restored for the joy of some wealthy collector.

View the full Bertone BMW Spicup Convertible Coupè photo gallery

1980 Ferrari Pinin Concept, the one and only sedan with a Ferrari badge ever made, will soon be up for auction. This outstanding one-off was built to celebrate designer Pininfarina 50th anniversary and originally it didn’t even have an engine, although it was eventually given one in the form of a 5.0 litres 12 cylinder boxer engine delivering 365 hp. Elegant and luxurious, this car was equipped with such accessories as a second radio with headphones for the passengers on back seat.

Even though Enzo Ferrari himself liked the car, it never went into production because of the ‘cold’ response from Ferrari’s customer base. However, the Pinin Concept still maintains its original glamourous appeal and can be considered as the forerunner of models like Porsche Panamera and Aston Martin Rapide. It will be up for grabs next October, 26th in an event organized by RM Auctions, and is expected to fetch at least half a million Euros.

View the full Ferrari Pinin Concept photo gallery

GWA Tuning has announced it is developing this Ferrari 340 Mexico Tribute Berlinetta model. The one-off Ferrari will be a tribute to the original 340 Berlinetta, designed by Vignale for the 1952 Carrera Panamericana. Only three of those models were built and currently have a value somewhere in the millions.

The one-off 350 Mexico Tribute uses a Ferrari 456 as a base with completely new bodywork including a new diffuser, rear spoiler, side vents, and front splitters from other Ferrari models. The model uses a modern 5.4-litre V12 with 476 hp. The interior is in a retro style, although materials used include carbonfibre seats a new chronometers.

Source | TopSpeed

Zagato has been getting itself some remarkable publicity this year with the Aston Martin V12 Zagato, the Fiat Zagato Coupé and now this lovely 1956 Ferrari GT by the coachbuilder which has won the best of show at the 2011 Uniques Special Ones. The vintage and special edition car event in Florence actually featured the largest collection of Zagato-built models in one place, including the V12 Vantage Zagato mentioned above and the Alfa Romeo ZT3 Stradale.

The Ferrari 250 GT Berlineta by Zagato is owned by American collector David Sydorick and it won for both its looks and its technical features. Only five of these models were built, of which only three have the classic double hump on the roof, and it beat a Bugatti Type 57S Cabriolet and a Maserati A6 GCS/53 for the prize.

At the 2011 Uniques Special Ones event 26 Zagato models were present in total. See after the jump for all the winning models in their classes including everything from an Austin Healey to a Jaguar SS 100.

Classe 1: Best of Class for Style Bugatti Type 57S Cabriolet
Classe 2: Best of Class for Style & Originality Jaguar SS 100
Classe 3: Best of Class for Style & Originality Ferrari 268 SP
Classe 4: Best of Class for Originality Rolls Royce Silver Wrath Sedanca Coupè
Classe 5: Overall Best of Class Mercedes 300 SL
Classe 6: Best of Class for Style & Originality Ferrari 212 Export Coupè
Classe 7: Best of Class for Originality Austin Healey 100S
Classe 8: Best of Class for Style Ferrari 250 Europa GT
Classe 9: Best of Class for Style & Originality Ferrari 250 GT Zagato
Classe 10: Best of Class for Originality De Tomaso Pantera

Source | Autoblog.it

This year’s Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance will open on the 21st of August and it will be particularly special due to the fact that in 2011 we celebrate the 125th Anniversary of the Automobile, which is 125 years since the Benz Patent Motorwagen by Karl Benz got its patent in 1826. To honour the date, Mercedes-Benz will provide the exhibition with a remarkable range of historic vehicles to celebrate the brand’s development through time.

The rarities on display will include the 120 PS, a racing car designed in 1906 by Wilhelm Maybach and still remembered as one of the most innovative of the time. This six-cylinder will strike you for its unusual features such as overhead camshafts and valves, dual high-voltage spark plug ignition and a quite low centre of gravity.

Another noteworthy vehicle that will be on display is the replica of the famous Blitzen Benz, a 1909 car best known for being the first petrol vehicle to pass the 200 km/h mark. And let’s not forget the 1928 SSK by Ferdinand Porsche, a vehicle that not only dominated the international racing scene of the 1920s and 1930s, but is also still highly regarded today for its performance and design.

View the full Mercedes 2011 Pebble Beach Photo Gallery

The Ferrari museum is the last part of our series on our days at Maranello, and we’re happy to share this gallery with you after having toured the Fiorano garage, the Ferrari production line and the Ferrari personalisation atelier. The museum is the height of any tour of Maranello because it houses the Ferraris of bygone days, and shows us the important evolution of this renowned brand to becoming one of the top luxury and race car manufacturers in the world today.

The Ferrari museum is full of impressive pieces - from F1 racing helmet memorabilia, to the open cockpit cars that have made history. The Ferrari Enzo, placed on its own in perfect light and looking fantastically modern, is quite a head turner, and is only part of every corner of a museum which proudly speaks of a prestigious tradition.

The walk down memory lane in the Ferrari Museum is likely to give you plenty of emotions at the least, and complete goosebumps at the most. The museum isn’t big, but what it contains and even just the mere suggestion of some of the pieces on display are its strengths - in fact some exhibits are enough to be a museum on their own for the stories they tell. We’ll leave you this gallery of images and the words of Enzo himself: “The best Ferrari ever to be produced is the next one.”

A day at Maranello: Ferrari museum gallery

It’s quite hard to describe what a full immersion in the world of Ferrari might mean. For our Italian colleagues at Autoblog.it, the description is about their home company’s capacity to surprise - to really break the mould of what the world expects from supercars. Others might disagree although this year’s Ferrari FF definitely was along the lines of Ferrari playing a field all its own.

In any case in our day at Maranello, for us visiting the Ferrari production lines, after the Corse Clienti department, with its assembly operations seen in these pics, is a privileged moment to see the inside of one of the world’s legendary car manufacturers. So much history has rolled off these lines that if you try to think about it, it’s overwhelming.

Seeing Ferrari production facilities we should probably tell the story in institutional terms - talking of numbers, prizes, excellence, technology, work-life balance and production operations. But with all respect to Ferrari, it seems frankly inadequate. How can you use those kinds of parameters to relate what you see when you turn around and suddenly something jumps out at you, like a kind of exotic mirage?

A day at Maranello: Ferrari production and nuova meccanica pics

Here, there are examples of the kinds of Ferrari models that have come out of these production facilities, which are still in full operation when we walk through. The queen of this little group has got to be one of only three Ferrari 288 GTO Evoluzione models that exists in the world. It’s followed by models like the 1986 Formula Cart, 550 Barchetta, 599 GTB Panamerican 20.000, the 612 Scaglietti 15.000 Red Miles Tour, the F355 World Tour, 250 GT lusso, Ferrari F50 and more. Enjoy the spectacle in the gallery.

Our colleagues at Autoblog.it describe the Ferrari F40 engine as the “sound of old glory”. They recently had the chance to meet a Ferrari F40 in mint condition and filmed this example of its engine revving. The camera angles are a little jerky, but we get the chance to hear the racy and rude engine.

The Ferrari F40 design looks a bit dated right now as the vehicle was produced between 1987 and 1992, but that takes nothing away from its historical significance as a piece of technical wizadry for Ferrari. The F40 was equipped with a turbocharge V8 which produced 470 hp. For two years from 1987 to 1989 it held the record of the world’s fastest street-legal production car - hear why in the video.

This gorgeous BMW 328 Hommage has been produced to celebrate the original BMW 328 model. Although eons apart in terms of the technological development that has occurred over the 75 years in between, the original and the new 328 share one crowning principle - lightweight materials to create a superbly fast racing car.

BMW says:

The BMW 328 is considered the most successful and best-looking sports car of the 1930s. The BMW 328’s success was the result of its design parameters – through the use of systematic lightweight construction, aerodynamic lines, optimum engine types and outstanding suspension technology, it laid the foundation stone for a new vehicle concept, by which performance only leads to success if combined with perfect harmonisation of all parameters and maximum efficiency.

While the BMW 328 Hommage goes on show over the weekend at the Villa d’Este Concorso d’Eleganza, it’s easier to see just what the original meant to cars and racing 75 years ago. And even though the new 328 Hommage exemplifies the use of new technologies and lightweight materials, it merely builds on an idea that was born a long time ago. Not to take away from just how beautiful this vehicle is, looked at in inverse ageism, it will never be as innovative as the original purely from a time point of view.

The BMW 328 Hommage is equipped with six-cylinder, 3.0-litre engine and has been built with extensive use of carbonfibre reinforced plastic. The original was built mostly from aluminium and magnesium, helping it to hold the fastest average Mille Miglia speed. That record, set in 1940, has never been broken and the model again won last year’s Mille Miglia.

In fact, the original 328 could be considered the first experiment in how winning isn’t just about power and speed, but is also about weight and aerodynamics. The original first debuted in 1936 - on the racetrack. And we’d love to see the 328 Hommage get out and about sometime soon.

To get closer to just what it means to pay tribute to this model, BMW says:

In this area of conflict be-tween tradition and modernity, the BMW Group is paying tribute to the BMW 328 on the occasion of its anniversary with a special model – the BMW 328 Hommage. “With the BMW 328 Hommage, we wish to pay homage to the passion and inventiveness of the fathers of the BMW 328”, explains Karl Bäumer, CEO of BMW Group Classic. “They created an icon, which is consid-ered a milestone in the history of the automobile.” The BMW 328 Hommage translates the principles and the character of the vehicle of that time into present times and offers a possible interpretation of how the designers of that time, Fritz Fiedler and Rudolf Schleicher, might have built the BMW 328 in the present day using current technology.

That’s a pretty big undertaking and one which, looking at these pics, BMW has achieved - at least regarding style. No performance details of the BMW 328 Hommage are available, but that it is a beautiful vehicle is in no doubt whatsoever.

An unusual find on the used-car scene is this Briatore-owned Jaguar XJ220 on sale. According to reports from Autoblog.nl, a German dealership specialising in used luxury cars is selling this 1994 Jag, one of the last XJ220 models to have been made as production stopped that same year.

According to the report, the model was once part of Flavio Briatore’s car collection. For now its has 22,000 km on the clock from its 3.5-litre V6 twinturbo engine with 550 hp. That made it one of the fastest cars around at the time, reaching 100 km/hr in 3.9 seconds and having the highest top speed of a production car at 354 km/hr (before the McLaren F1 appeared).

The Ralph Lauren car collection has some of the most gorgeous vintage cars we’ve seen in one place for a while, and if you’re in Europe you can admire the collection at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. The collection includes mostly vintage cars but is based on sports cars from the 1930’s to today.

The Ralph Lauren car collection is on show from today until August 28th. Seventeen models representative of European automobile history have been chosen by curator Rodolphe Rapetti and vehicles that can be viewed include some of the greatest names in European cars: Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, Bugatti, Porsche, Jaguar, Alfa Romeo and others. See the L’Art de l’automobile exhibition information on the museum website for more details.