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Mangusta vs Corvette C8: The Drive

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The Mangusta has a wonderful Italian driving spirit and the C8 Corvette is built with the force of American enthusiasm for performance.

By Dick Ruzzin

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THE MID-ENGINE CONCEPT AS ADDRESSED BY DE TOMASO AND CHEVROLET

The Mangusta platform potential was never realized, it came out before it was fully developed and production was stopped after 401 cars were built. That was done so that De Tomaso and Ford could start building the Pantera, mid-engine also but a totally different car. The Mangusta’s P-70 racing chassis was created by Alessandro de Tomaso and Carroll Shelby, but the iconic design by Giorgetto Giugiaro is so visually powerful that their contributions to the creation of the car have been forgotten. [Read more…] about Mangusta vs Corvette C8: The Drive

De Tomaso Mangusta vs Corvette C8

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A half century separates the 1969 De Tomaso Mangusta and the 2020 Chevrolet C8 Corvette.

By Dick Ruzzin

What drives a company like De Tomaso or Chevrolet to demonstrate its soul by creating cars that will hopefully outperform those of its peers? To put its image on the line and be confident that it will win? To challenge what is considered the best in all the world and not be afraid?

This is really a story of two companies, one very small and one very big. Fifty years separate the two landmark mid-engine efforts, the Mangusta and the C8 Corvette. For Alessandro de Tomaso, it was very personal, as he wrote in the Mangusta Owners Manual. Fortunately, in the history and heritage of General Motors and Chevrolet, there remains a spark called Corvette, which still displays the very essence of what an automobile is about.

Herein, we examine both cars from an owner’s perspective. [Read more…] about De Tomaso Mangusta vs Corvette C8

New De Tomaso P72 Debuts

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By Wallace Wyss

It’s so beautiful, you want to get closer. The interior out Paganis Pagani, it’s so rococo and SteamPunk.

It’s got a Ferrari V12.

The De Tomaso P72 street car made its debut at the Goodwood event a few days ago and was not just a static display—it went out there and buzzed the track, singing the siren song of the V12. Then, crap hit the fan as the anguished cries from the folks that spent a good deal of money to revive this shape a few years ago called out the Apollo De Tomaso as a copycat. And do you blame them?

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La Jolla Concours

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Story and photos by John Wiley

Now in its 8th year, the La Jolla Concours d’Elegance returned to the theme of the first show by featuring Italian cars for the 2012 event, held on April 1st. Held in Scripps Park which draws its name from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, the ocean front location provided a beautiful backdrop for a variety of Italy’s automotive creations. The weekend featured activities in and around La Jolla starting with a book signing Friday evening, a tour Saturday, a party Saturday night in Scripps Park, and the concours on Sunday.

Maserati-A6G-2000

The 1956 Maserati A6G-2000 Allemano s/n 2125 owned by Jonathan Segal, was awarded Reserve Best in Show next to the Best in Show 1925 Hispano-Suiza H6B Kellner Landaulet. The Maserati also collected Most Elegant Post War Car. Residing in Italy most of its life, s/n 2125 came to the U.S. in 2007 and was recently refinished in the correct original color. Before appearing at La Jolla, the car won Best in Class at Pebble Beach in 2011.

Lamborghini

Malcolm Barksdale’s1966 Lamborghini 350 GT Touring participated in Saturday’s tour and won its class for Italian Sports 1966 – 1985. Found in a small body shop in Marseille France, the car had sat for 25 years while it was debated how best to repair a small dent in the nose of the aluminum Touring Superleggera body. Restored by the Bobileff Motorcar Company of San Diego, the 350 GT now gets exercised regularly on driving events and shown in concours.

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DeTomaso Mangusta, A Critical Look Part I

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Beauty, interrupted. At its best, pictured here, the Mangusta is a work of art. At its worse...well... Car and photo courtesy Daryl Addams.

Beauty, Interrupted

By Wallace Alfred Wyss

The DeTomaso Mangusta is one of the most beautiful cars ever to come out of Italy. But it does have its problems. [Read more…] about DeTomaso Mangusta, A Critical Look Part I

Bi-Turbo: The Car that Saved Maserati

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maserati biturbo

The Maserati BiTurbo just may have saved Maserati from extinction.

By Wallace Alfred Wyss

In the late 1970s, Alejandro de Tomaso came to America to find out what kind of car Americans want. He had been building the Pantera since 1971 (continuing even after 1974 when Ford ceased importing it to the U.S.) and bought Maserati yet he wasn’t sure what kind of car Americans really desired.

It was by happenstance he dropped by Dick Guldstrand’s shop and Guldstrand invited me over to talk to Alejandro about what I thought he needed to build. I mentioned the BMW 2002 to the Italian car builder and told him what a great car it was in its time. He left and not long after I heard about the Maserati Bi-turbo. [Read more…] about Bi-Turbo: The Car that Saved Maserati

Qvale’s Mangusta

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“And here’s another fine mess you’ve gotten me into…”

A tale of intrigue from the 1990s
By Wallace Alfred Wyss

Back in the 1960s, when mid-engined was becoming all the rage, Giorgetto Giugiaro, then a designer at Ghia, penned such a car for Iso Rivolta.

Not that Iso, a car builder making sports cars with Chevrolet and Ford V8s, wanted the car. The owner of Iso, Renzo Rivolta, liked front-engined cars. He had no intention of making a mid-engined car.

But his two top engineers, Dallara and Bizzarrini, did like mid-engined cars and hoped they would talk Renzo into it once he was knocked over by its beauty. It used styling elements from the Iso Fidia, a four seat, front-engined car that Giugiaro had already designed. But Rivolta said “no” in a way they could understand and Alejandro de Tomaso, at the time owner of Ghia Carrozzeria, picked up the design himself to use as a Ghia show car. He put it on a backbone chassis he had designed for a race car he was building with Carroll Shelby until Der Snakemeister dropped out of the project.


The car, if it was really styled by Gandini, will not be remembered as much as his Countach and other Lamborghinis.

The result was the mid-engined Mangusta, which soon went into production. While the 302-cu. in. Ford powered version that came to the US was anemic compared to the car’s potent looks, the car is still revered for its purity of design. Few production cars look so much like the prototype.

Flash forwards a few decades to 1996. De Tomaso rolls out the Bigua prototype, a front-engined car using more than a little Ford Mustang input including the engine and transmission. The chassis was a box section steel chassis and the suspension independent all the way around.


Independent rear suspension and a steel box section chassis made the Qvale handle.

The designer credited is Marcello Gandini, famous in Italy for doing the Miura (although Giugiaro hints he designed that at Bertone) the Countach, and many other Lamborghinis.
It is a blunt car, somewhat reminiscent in general shape of the Trumph TR7/TR8 and its only claim to uniqueness is a unique top that rolls up out of a well, similar to the top in a roll top desk.


The best thing about the DeTomaso/Qvale Mangusta is that you can obtain engine parts at any auto parts store in America–a similar advantage by those who own Jenson Interceptors, Isos, and Monteverdis.

The engine was a 4.6 liter Ford V8 a quad cam version also used in the Mustang Cobra. It was a lot more powerful, at 320 hp than the 230-hp the 302 used in the original mid-engined US spec Mangusta. (Another source lists the Ford 4-cam as having only 305 hp.) The Mustang engine had 314 ft-lbs. of torque. Transmission choices were a Borg Warner 5-speed manual or a computer controlled 4-speed automatic. Gas mileage was 17 mpg in the city and as high as 28 mpg on the highway.

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