Sleek, graceful, understated and elegant. At the sight of a Cizeta-Moroder V16T, you can immediately erase such lovely terms from your vocabulary. No, brute, robust, tough and ungainly are more likely to come to mind. And hyper rare, that too. Because only a handful of this special brick with a remarkable story was built.
Text: Jeroen Jansen Image: Patrick Ernzen, Courtesy of RM Sotheby's
While Lamborghini was brooding under Chrysler ownership on a successor to the iconic Countach, a significant proportion of Lamborghini's former staff were working behind closed doors on a project of their own. On a car that could be called -primarily in terms of design- as much a successor to the Countach as Lamborghini's own Diablo. And that's exactly the intention with which Claudio Zampolli and Giorgio Moroder wanted to build their Cizeta-Moroder V16T.
Zampolli also once worked at Lamborghini, but he quit his job at the luxury car manufacturer, moved to Los Angeles and started a maintenance garage for Italian supercars. This is going well for him and he makes a good living from his business, but he wants more. He dreams of putting his own initials on his own supercar. 'CZ', or, in better Italian, 'Chi Zeta'. In the mid-1980s, he decides that it really has to happen. The seed for the V16T has been planted.
Collaboration between legends
Zampolli found a partner -and especially an investor- in his client Giorgio Moroder. The man is a living music legend and created soundtracks for Flashdance and Scarface, among others. He also gave the world Donna Summers' "I Feel Love". But Moroder is also a lover of fast Italian toys and Zampolli looks after the maintenance of his Lamborghini Countach. The music icon feels something for the plan, attaches his name to the project and puts in pennies.
Another legend is called in to design the first Cizeta-Moroder: Marcello Gandini. Those in the know already know: this man is responsible for the looks of the Lamborghini Miura, Lancia Stratos, DeTomaso Pantera and, there he is again, the Countach. Lamborghini also asked him to sketch the Diablo, but Gandini's prototypes didn't make it to the finish line. So Gandini decided to use those sketches for Cizeta-Moroder's V16T. And that worked out well.
The Lambo lines are unmistakably visible. The tall, colossal rear end that tapers to the flattened, sleek nose. The way the flank slopes away to the side mirrors. The wide hips with air intakes on top. But Gandini also gave the V16T perks, in the context of more is more. So the lovers of folding headlights can have their fun. For the bizarre supercar has not two, but four. Yes, at the push of a button, no less than four light sources flip up.
Order a new
That more is more concept Zampolli also pulled through in the engine bay. He decided not to go for an eight-cylinder, but -as the name somewhat suggests- a 6.0-litre V16. The mighty block was not placed in the length of the car, but transversely, or transversely. That immediately explains the 'T' in the type designation. And there you also have the reason why the car's body is so bi-zar wide. The mighty block with some 550 hp catapulted the behemoth to well over 300 km/h.
On paper, a great success. But even before the first one was built, the first financial problems loomed. To make matters worse, Moroder pulled out as an investor. Nevertheless, Claudio Zampolli decided to pursue his dream. In the end, he built no more than a dozen examples between 1991 and 1995, including three for the Sultan of Brunei. After '95, Cizeta seems to have built two more examples, one of which would have been a convertible.
Among those produced, you will also find the snow-white prototype with bright red interior on these pages. That particular car -with just a few hundred kilometres on the odometer- will be auctioned off soon and could be yours. But should you prefer to order a new one, take a look at the official website of Cizeta. That one still exists. Under the heading 'Order', it says one will be built for you for eight tonnes. But if you email, you will unfortunately no longer get a reply from Zampolli. Cizeta's spiritual father died in July this year at the age of 82.
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