(car revving)
- You might not know about this car yet,
but legends never die.
And sometimes, like right now, they're reborn.
(upbeat music)
There's nothing else quite like this.
It's made, not just for the street,
but also for dirt, gravel, snow.
It's a fricken super car, that you can rally.
And we're gonna see how it stacks up to its famous dad.
It's time to go fender flares to roof spoiler,
bumper to bumper on the new Stratos.
(rushing wind)
(upbeat music)
You can't talk about the worlds best rally cars,
without bringing up the Flyin' Wedge,
the Lancia Stratos.
The Stratos was the first car purpose-built
to go rally racing.
It won three straight WRC championships in the mid-70s.
And it looks so alien, that when we storm Area 51,
on September 20th,
you could probably drive in right up to the gate
and get waved on in.
Production of the Lancia Stratos ended in 1975
with 492 cars built.
In 2008, billionaire business man,
and gentleman racer, Michael Stoschek,
decided, hey, he wanted a new Stratos.
He had a few extra Euros on hand so he was like,
"You know what,
"I think I'm just gonna go ahead and get one made."
Must be nice.
And the first prototypes were developed
and built by famous Italian coachbuilders,
Pininfarina, in 2010.
Based on design by a fellow Stratos freak, Chris Hrabalek.
They planned to build several new Strati,
but Pininfarina's longtime partner, Ferrari,
did not like the idea of their BFF
getting into close cahoots
with some other exotic super car builder.
Ferrari, having an opinion about something?
No!
Pininfarina didn't wanna ruffle the prancing horse's mane,
so no more cars were built.
Until now.
Today, there is a new Italian coachbuilder in town.
The guy who managed the first new Stratos project
at Pininfarina, left the company and started his own shop.
His name is Paolo Garella.
The company is called Mani (coughs)
Manifattura Automili (coughs)
Manifattura Automobili Torino.
But, I am just gonna call them MAT.
And MAT don't give a flying fox what Ferrari thinks.
Doo-doo.
They've already gotten started
on building 25 of these new Stratoseses.
Mat is a cool dude so,
they asked Lancia if they wanted to be involved.
But, the brand has long since lost their sporty vibes,
and they just flat out were like,
"Nah."
After all these years,
they never even trademarked the Stratos name.
Their loss is Stoschek and MAT's gain.
Because now,
we have this incredible car
with the same sick original name.
Covered with the same sick original logo.
(upbeat music)
When you first see it,
there's absolutely no question it's a Stratos.
A handful of companies have made, more or less,
exact replicas of the Lancia Stratos over the years.
But modern retro is all the rage right now, baby.
This new Stratos takes all its cues from the original,
but like today's muscle cars,
it's a totally new version of it.
There's the same overall shape, obviously.
But, everywhere there would've been a Lancia badge before,
there's now a Stratos badge.
The proportions mirror the original,
with everything scaled up a little bit.
That's because,
this thing is built on a Ferrari F430 Scuderia.
And if you want new Stratos,
you gotta BYOF.
And I don't know if you guys
have been hitting Craigslist,
shopping for beater F430's lately?
But I have.
And as you might have guessed,
the cost of entry ain't cheap.
On top of that, MAT charges an additional €600 000
to cut up your Ferrari.
So you're looking at more than $800 000
for your limited production, one of 25 rally super car.
Yes, they do turn it into an entirely different thing,
but, for $800 000,
you can turn a lot of different kinds of cars
into a rally car.
As I was saying, MAT takes your Ferrari,
then chops it up.
The aluminum chassis gets a much shorter wheel-base,
hacked by almost eight inches.
Next, they weld in an FIA certified steel roll cage,
and drop off a a new full carbon fiber body.
The end result is a wheel-base, about five inches longer
than the original Stratos, which lands right between
the new Miata and the BRZ/86 twins for reference.
The whole car is 13 inches shorter in length
than the F430, but a full 18 inches longer
than the original Lancia.
It's also about eight inches wider than the old Stratos,
which is crazy.
'Cause this thing is not large.
The original Stratos had
♪ Pop, pop, pop, pop, pop up up and down headlights. ♪
But, those aren't allowed anymore
because of pedestrian safety regulations.
So, the new Stratos has these geometrically shaped units,
flush with the hood.
The front end is pretty pointy,
and includes enough of a lower lip
to be considered a splitter.
Now the look is a little bit more traditional
than the original car, in my opinion.
Which had this crazy sharp nose
that would take your legs off at the knees.
They shoulda called it a, a knee splitter.
Am I right?
(screaming)
The new Stratos's hood line is so low and narrow
that the big front fender flares wrap over the top.
The entire front-end is actually one big clamshell,
and so is the back.
The 19 inch center lock wheels are inspired by
a classic split five spoke design.
The rear has extra aggressive flares
to cover the fat 305's
which stick out quite a bit from the car's curved sides.
Those back wheels are an insane, traction snagging,
11 inches wide.
That's as wide as this regular old piece
of letter sized paper, is long.
That's also as wide as the Dodge Demon's drag racing wheels.
Them boys is thick boy.
Windshield wraps around the cockpit,
and is framed by narrow A-pillars,
to give the driver the best possible forward view.
Which is a thing
that I think a lot of us lack in our lives sometimes.
Eye on the prize.
The body lines echo the UFO look of original Stratizes.
With the high rigged belt line, small side window
and rounded door skins.
And you can't have a Stratos without the usual hoop
over the roof.
Now that's actually a spoiler, and on this new car,
there's intake vents over a heater
at the sides to suck air into the mid-mounted engine
just behind it.
That's a trick new set up the new car has
that the old one doesn't.
"You know what Dad, I'm better than you."
(upbeat music)
That's a screaming Ferrari power plant tucked behind
the (beep) pit, homes.
Just like on the old car.
Only this time, it's a 4.3 liter V8,
instead of a 2.4 liter V6.
There's more power baby.
More power.
You lift up the rear clamshell,
and you'll see custom carbon fiber intake manifolds,
baring the Stratos font S.
It's been fine tuned with custom intake and exhaust systems,
and a new ECU to make 540 HRSPRS.
That's 40 buff horse boys more than the Scuderia.
With a feathery curb weight of like 2800 pounds.
That's good for zero to 60,
in 3.3 seconds.
Which is this fast.
(finger click)
You're at 60.
Now MAT can tune it up for 600 HRSPRS too,
if 540 isn't enough for you.
So like if, I don't know, you're a psychopath.
With the engine in the middle, and a short wheel-base,
the new Stratos has pretty snappy boy handling.
But the weight distribution is a pretty even 44% front,
56% rear.
Which makes it theoretically balanced and responsive.
The big rear lip spoiler tips out
over the tops of the taillights,
which are simple round lenses, surrounded by mesh.
Drop further down and the dual exhaust tips
just poke out of the body work,
beyond some heat shield wrap.
The carbon fiber, and aluminum construction,
combined with the steel roll cage
give this new Stratos extra stiffness.
That rigidity in the mid engine layout,
give it the catlike agility
you need for darting around tight switch backs
with the crowd on one side and a cliff on the other end.
Like, "Oh no, there's a tree."
And your guy's like, "It's a gold six race."
(car sounds)
And as I mentioned before,
the cage is already FIA legal.
So, theoretically, you can just hop in this thing,
and start rallying.
To me, that sounds very expensive and very scary.
So let's go look at the interior.
The interior looks straight up like the business.
With race style bucket seats
and four point Sparco racing harnesses.
This seat is extremely narrow,
and I don't think that it was made for the likes of me,
and my buff son, Nolan.
The upholstery is a grippy suede like material,
that Velcro's your butt to the seats in the corners.
If you're not already wedged into it.
Which I currently am.
I'm not sure if I can get out of this car.
If this new Stratos has seats this small,
and this close together right now,
then Lancia drivers and co-drivers from the 70s,
must have been the size of Italian leprechauns.
Mama Mia, get your hands off of me, you lucky meatballs.
Much like me, the steering wheel is fatter than normal.
And it looks like it's made of carbon fiber.
Which it is.
Yup, carbon fiber.
And it's got suede grips right where your hands should be,
at nine and three.
There's no flat bottom steering wheel here boy.
'Cause those can't slide through your little fingers
when you're all crossed up,
sliding sideways down a rally stage.
And the coolest part, is this bright red button on the left.
It starts the engine.
Although it does also come with a real key.
(car starting)
It does sound pretty cool though.
(car revving)
Ooh, yeah.
It is a Ferrari engine, yes.
The gauges look really really cool and old school,
and are mounted on a flat piece of aluminininium.
And there're no big screens anywhere,
showing you how many G's you're pulling,
or what's playing on your serious XM radio.
There's not even a radio in this,
I don't think.
If you can afford this thing,
you get a choice between
a modified six speed automatic transmission,
with carbon fiber flappy paddles on the steering wheel
that are bang and shift out in 60 milliseconds,
or, if you're cool like me, you'd opt for
the six speed manual, with a gated shifter.
'Cause we like them 70s vibes.
Now rally cars usually have black felted or flock,
flock dashboards, that eliminate the glare of the sun
on the windshield.
And the new Stratos kicks it up a skosh,
with stitched black suede.
One of the coolest parts about this whole car,
is that the carbon fiber door panels
have a huge crevasse for storing your helmets
between rally stages.
Just like in the original car.
There's literally nothing else on the door panel.
Now whether or not you drive it,
this car is built for driving.
Everything is totally true to the old formula.
Just updated and modern.
(upbeat music)
This new Stratos does beautiful justice
to the original WRC Lancia Group Four legend.
We can only hope that we'll see more of these things,
tearing up back roads,
and throwing rocks in rallies like they were built to do.
And not sitting in some old rich guys fancy barn.
Thank you guys for watching Bumper to Bumper.
If you didn't watch it,
then I'd just be some weirdo sitting next to a car,
talking to his friends.
We got a lot of new shows coming up this summer,
if you don't wanna miss any,
make sure you hit that bell down there.
Hit the subscribe button,
which is right here.
We got a new show that I'm really excited about.
It's called HiLow.
Nolan and I bought identical 350Z's.
His got cheap e-Bay parts,
and mine got really nice parts.
It's currently on the other social media thing.
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get yourself some new merch.
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I love you.
(coughs)