Yahoo Autos Here’s Why the Next Lamborghini Aventador's V12 Is Remaining Normally Aspirated
Lamborghini’s chief tech officer explains his reasoning behind why the next-gen Aventador will stick with a normally aspirated V12. Here’s what else is happening in the car world:
FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK
Talk to an automotive engineer and you quickly learn that they obsess over performance and performance numbers. Still, there are more than a few who realize the emotional resonance a truly great engine is capable of generating is a more important metric. That’s certainly the case at Lamborghini, where chief technical officer Maurizio Reggiani is determined that the replacement for the long-serving Aventador — due next year — is sticking to both V12 power and natural aspiration. In a world of downsized capacities, reduced cylinder counts and turbocharging, that really is a remarkable technical achievement. To find out more, our man in Europe, Mike Duff, spoke to Reggiani and reported the following:
“Do I want Lamborghini to be the last brand in the world with a V12? Yes, if we can do that,” Reggiani told Autoweek. “For a purist, for a lover of engineering, an engine with a regular firing order is perfection, and with a V12 you have for every 60 degrees a spark and everything is self balancing.”
Something close to fervor drives Reggiani. “The voice, the sound, the emotion,” Reggiani tells us, “the very soul of our car will be based on the naturally aspirated V12 engine.”
Not that the next V12 will be able to work unaided. Getting through increasingly tough emissions standards means it will have hybrid assistance and a system that — as with the Ferrari SF90 — is capable of fully electric operation at low speeds.
But that means, when in use, the V12 will be able to continue to sing as its predecessors have done. To do that, Reggiani insists, requires the engine stick with natural aspiration. “A turbocharger is like a damper on the sound,” he tells us. “It is filtered by the turbo and you end up trying to use artificial sound to reproduce what should be spontaneous and natural.”
Reggiani has worked extensively with both self-breathing and turbocharged engines — one of his first jobs was developing the mighty quad-turbocharged V12 powering the Bugatti EB110. But he insists that natural aspiration will always be a purer engineering solution.
“It means nothing helps you,” he tells us. “You must be able to suck as much air as possible and then, based only on this, put more fuel inside the combustion chamber to generate power.”
Forced induction, while more effective, is less elegant: “With a big enough turbo you can produce almost any output.”
While Reggiani’s intent to keep the faith might be ideological, it could also turn out to be smart marketing. Why? Because the Aventador replacement is going to have an obvious point of distinction to equivalent models from Ferrari and McLaren. Further, the Lamborghini will also be selling at a substantial discount when compared to Gordon Murray’s seven-figure GMA T.50 and the Aston Martin Valkyrie. Both of those are using normally aspirated Cosworth-designed V12s.
We can't wait to drive all three.
