GLOBAL SPINS
LAMBORGHINI AVENTADOR LP 700-4 ROADSTER
Chief executive officer Stephan Winklemann’ s product brief to his director of styling Filippo Perini said that the Roadster needs to look as good if not better than the coupe.
First they awed the world with the Aventador J in 2012, an outrageous
Speedster-like concept with barely any windscreen. The effect on the audience was calculated, to whet our collective appetite for the Roadster’ s appearance. While the Aventador J could be driven, it would be impossible for it to pass today’ s stringent regulations.
The aim then became: maintain the performance of the Aventador; provide extreme open top motoring; and make it look sexier.
The new Aventador is unlike the other CF designs, in that it is a CF monocoque rather than a tub design – providing extremely high strength to the closed coupe shell as the roof is a structural component. The Roadster without the roof may lose a third of its rigidity but at 22,000Nm per degree, it is still extremely rigid and surpasses many current closed coupe offerings.
To aid matters, the unique CF roof, when locked in place, is so strong that it behaves like a structural component, adding another 10 per cent to rigidity.
It is not a motorised roof, it takes over a minute to remove and store away in the front of the Roadster, reducing the already meagre luggage space to a a compartment that can fit pair of modest sized backpacks. Otherwise, it would easily fit a pair of overnighters.
The decision not to motorise the roof was one driven purely by a focus on aesthetics. The folding roof and its mechanisms would require a compromise to the shape of the
34 M N M 2 0 1 3 | I S S U E 3