- 112
- Kingdom of Sweden
The Abarth Scorpione is different from the Abarth cars that we know today, with the first clue to this being right in the name. Modern Abarths aren’t branded exclusively as Abarths, but rather as a trim/sub-brand for Fiat . The Scorpione is indeed the last car developed entirely by Abarth, although there are still plenty of Fiat parts to be found in it. The car is a reworked tuner version of the Lombardi Grand Prix, itself a heavily reworked version of the Fiat 850. Making the Scorpione doubly tuned, if that’s a thing. This one was sold to be a race car, but was modified once again by its second owner, who made some motorsport -specific changes to the car.
The car was first developed as a Lombardi for 1968, with the Abarth Abarth model following shortly thereafter. The Lombardi would last until 1972, but when Fiat bought out all of Abarth in 1971, one of the first things it did was kill off the Scorpione. So with as rare as the Grand Prix is, the Scorpione is even rarer. But the one you see here, from 1969, is a unique version of the car, and quite possibly the most powerful example in existence.
The styling of the Scorpione is largely unchanged from the Grand Prix, but is unrecognizable as being based on the Fiat 850. The 850 was a (very) small economy car with a very utilitarian design. Lombardi saw its potential as a sports car platform because of its rear engine layout. It is still a very small car though, and one that weighs just 1,390 pounds. This specific Scorpione has been modified, particularly the nose, which was changed completely by the second owner. The original wasn’t quite as steeply sloped and featured pop-up headlights. The NACA ducts in the rear of the bodywork are also custom. It has to be said that a lot of people would probably consider this less attractive than the original, but then it wasn’t designed to be attractive, it was designed to go fast.
Calling the inside of any race car an interior is being generous, and this one isn’t really any different. Still, a surprising amount of the original equipment has survived the conversion. The seats, for example, haven’t been replaced by buckets, and the big center-mounted gauge cluster has stayed. The carpet and radio are gone, but the fact that not much else is tells you a lot about how much was originally included.
In its various forms, the Grand Prix was offered with quite a few different engines. The original Lombardi just used the engine out of the Fiat 850 that it was based on. This was an 813cc, four-cylinder engine that produced 43 horsepower. This was a very light car, but the horsepower figure was still entirely too low, and this was part of the motivation for Abarth to make some changes. So the first Abarth upgraded to a 903cc engine that made 52 horsepower.
Upgrades to this came out quickly, and soon there was an “Abarth 1300 Scorpione”, with a 1280cc engine out of a Fiat 124 Fiat 124 that made 75 horsepower. This was upgraded for the Scorpione SS, of which only four were built, to 100 horsepower. The car here was originally fitted with the 903cc engine, but was retrofitted with one of the 124 engines (1280cc). This was further tweaked to eventually produce 125 horsepower. Being such a light car, it performed admirably for its class on the track.
Original text from here: http://www.topspeed.com/cars/abarth/1969-abarth-scorpione-prototipo-ar171102.html
