1996 Alfa Romeo Issima

The main attraction of the 1996 Alfa Romeo Issima lay under its long, Alfa-badged bonnet. Nestling, a pair of Alfa Romeo 3.0 liter six-cylinder engines joined to make an in-line twelve with 500 bhp on tap. Its innovative styling was admired by Alfa's styling boss, Walter de Silva.

Experts have evaluated Sbarro's role in the development of the global automotive design. In 1995, at the Geneva Motor Show, he was awarded the Car Design Award ("For the best car design"). During the award ceremony, Sbarro met with the heads of the Alfa Romeo design center, Walter da Silva and Mario Favilla, and the coordinator of the FIAT style center, Ermanno Cressoni. Sbarro offered them to revive the former glory of Alfa Romeo in the form of a sports car with a powerful engine. "The three-liter "six" is the most powerful thing we have," they answered him. "OK, then send me two," Sbarro calmly summed up. So the Issima roadster was born — the third car in history with two Alfa Romeo engines combined in a block and mounted in front. The total capacity of this power plant with a volume of six liters exceeded 500 hp.

In the design of Issima, Sbarro laid two original technical solutions protected by patents. The first is the supporting structure of the Dual Frame spatial frame, which represents a longitudinal tunnel passing into a box in the area of the crew's legs and combining with the niches at the back. The second is a double suspension: rigid short-stroke suspension of wheels to the frame, soft and comfortable - between the frame and the body. The body for the Issima was chosen by the work of Pierre-Jean Bonnet, the successor of the glorious name of French automobile designers.

Source: www.is-it-a-lemon.com; "Человек, придумавший колесо" Дмитрий Георгиев, Журнал "5 Колесо" 5-2002