The Porsche Tapiro is a

concept car A concept car (also known as a concept vehicle, show vehicle or prototype) is a car made to showcase new styling and/or new technology. They are often exhibited at motor shows to gauge customer reaction to new and radical designs which may or ...

built by

Porsche Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, usually shortened to Porsche (; see #Pronunciation, below), is a German automobile manufacturer specializing in high-performance sports cars, SUVs and sedans, headquartered in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany ...

in 1970. It was designed by

Giorgetto Giugiaro Giorgetto Giugiaro (; born 7 August 1938) is an Italian automotive designer. He has worked on supercars and popular everyday vehicles. He was born in Garessio, Cuneo, Piedmont. Giugiaro was named Car Designer of the Century in 1999 and inducted ...

and has a traditional 1970s wedge design, which critics say somewhat resembles that of the

De Tomaso Mangusta The De Tomaso Mangusta is a sports car produced by Italian automobile manufacturer De Tomaso between 1967 and 1971. It was succeeded by the De Tomaso Pantera. History The Mangusta replaced the Vallelunga model, on which its chassis was based ...

. The chassis is based on the Porsche 914/6, and it features gullwing-style doors.

Specifications

The Tapiro is powered by a longitudinally mounted air-cooled 2.4 liter

flat-six engine A flat-six engine, also known as a horizontally opposed-six, is a six-cylinder piston engine with three cylinders on each side of a central crankshaft. The most common type of flat-six engine is the boxer-six engine, where each pair of opposed c ...

producing at 7,800 rpm, and connected to a 5-speed manual transmission. This engine could propel the Tapiro to an official top speed of 152 mph (245 km/h).

History

The Porsche Tapiro was introduced to the world at the 1970 Turin Auto Show, in Turin, Italy. The car subsequently made its US debut at the 5th Annual Los Angeles Imported Automobile and Sports Car Show in 1971. In 1972, the car was sold to a Spanish industrialist who used it as his daily driver. The car was mostly destroyed after it caught fire. Most sources say the cause of the fire was a group of labor activists protesting its owner's labor policies, who planted a bomb under the Tapiro. The bomb exploded, burning the car but not destroying the chassis. Other sources say the car was involved in an accident and caught fire that way. The burnt shell was repurchased by

Italdesign Italdesign Giugiaro S.p.A. is a design and engineering company and brand based in Moncalieri, Italy, that traces its roots to the 1968 foundation of Studi Italiani Realizzazione Prototipi S.p.A. by Giorgetto Giugiaro and Aldo Mantovani. Best kno ...

and is now on display in its Giugiaro Museum.

Legacy

The design of the car's body would later inspire the

DMC DeLorean The DMC DeLorean is a rear-engine two-passenger sports car manufactured and marketed by John DeLorean's DeLorean Motor Company (DMC) for the American market from 1981 until 1983—ultimately the only car brought to market by the fledgling comp ...

in 1981.

References

Tapiro Italdesign concept vehicles Sports cars Cars powered by boxer engines {{car-stub Automobiles with gull-wing doors