WTF Happened to Lancia?

now i'm gonna go out on a whim here and assume that a lot of you are familiar with a show called top gear the show in which three middle-aged men reviewed tested and destroyed cars on the weekly sure the car versus public transport races were great and the cheap car challenges were always a source of entertainment as well as an insight into the genius of jeremy clarkson sometimes my genius is it's almost frightening but some of my more favorite moments from the show include the history rundowns of certain car makers one that particularly stands to mind was that of lancia yeah that's the correct pronunciation i think in that piece clarkson and hammond emphasized the greatness of the brand claiming it to have produced more great cars in history than any other manufacturer in the world the stratos the delta integrale the o37 this whole piece made me fall in love with lancia it made me realize what a brand it was and then on the grand tour clarkson detailed the intense battle for the 1983 world rally championship between audi and lancia about how launcher took on the might of the audi quattro in a squadron of drivers to win the world rally championship these two pieces of film may convince you to go out and buy your very own lunches only to discover that the company has now descended to the bottom of the food chain going from producing world-beating rally cars in the 70s and the 80s to producing a rebadged fiat 500 with the name made out of spare scrabble tiles what happened to this brand well let's take a look [Music] 1906 was a unique year for italy this was the year where mount vesuvius through fit again the nation ran through prime ministers like mustangs ran through people and in may that year saw the inaugural running of the targa florio it was only a three-lap race but each lap was over 92 miles long thus it took alessandra cargo nine and a half hours to win the first tiger florio on the entry list for that year's event was one vincenzo luncha he was quite a fast driver and highly regarded by fiat but by the end of 1906 he had his eyes set on his own car company because why not along with his friend claudio the company that we would know today as launcher was formed its first car was the typo 51 or as it would later be known the launcher alpha try wrapping your head around that piece of italian brilliance this car gained a reputation on the racing scene as did the brand itself which would play a fundamental role in its future years something else that bran was known for was the push for innovation the lambda for example was the first car to be designed with a monocoque chassis and came with independent suspension the theta was the first european production car to have a fully electric system as standard the series 3 idea was the first car to have a 5-speed gearbox they were among the first to design a cart using a wind tunnel with the aprilia they were the first to sell a production car with a v4 and v6 engine obviously not the exact same car but twinning two lots of power together was pretty much what they did with the delta s4 which was turbocharged and supercharged all this innovative doings meant that the cost of production went up as did the sticker price of the cars themselves the plateauing demand for cars was decidedly unhealthy for vincenzo luncha who died of a heart attack in 1937. control of the company was given to his son gianni and after the world cup had ended he bought on board former alfa romeo designer vittorio jano it was with this man that the aurelia was born which was the first production car to have a v6 engine it proved to be quite successful in the motor racing scene which was the primary focus with gianni lancia who also decided that one way to cure their financial woes was to pour more money into their racing program and take part in the frugal world of formula one the d50 was lunch's first and only attempt at creating a formula one car making its debut in 1954. lancia carried on its will for innovation it was a little odd in shape compared to the likes of the maserati 250f but these features helped to secure pole position in its maiden race at the hands of the fastest warthog that ever graced land but while he would score the fastest lap of the race the d50 would not survive past lap 10 with the clutch having sort of died things look promising heading into 1955 with ascari keeping up with the mighty combo of juan manuel fangio and mercedes but after askari died while testing at monza lance's efforts in formula 1 were dwindled despite some good results coming in from eugeno castelotti lancia was starting to struggle quite badly financially their push to make a car as good as a car can be was crippling them by the end of 1956 their formula one assets were sold to ferrari and the company itself was sold to the pacenti family despite this the company still losed money well into the 60s a solution was needed to be found and perhaps rather fittingly then it launched a bid to take over the company at the end of the 60s with the massive financial losses incurred that year the percentages handed the keys over to fear essentially saying if you can get this thing to work good [ __ ] luck mate well out of this marriage came cars like the gamma the beta the stratos all three were quite well received and the stratos in particular highlighted lunch's continued foray into motor racing we've already delved over their formula one forays but in addition to this they had also achieved quite a bit of success in series such as the drm series in germany but where lancia made their mark was on the rally scene they achieved success with the fourvier winning the manufacturer's title in 1972 but when they brought along the stratos in 1974 the trophies really started to stack up it boasted a ferrari v6 and the short wheelbase setup meant that it handled like a dream now here's where i'm going to cinema since the grand tour's larger car park story a little bit back in the time of the stratos the group 4 rallying rules dictated that 400 road legal examples of the car that you were entering were required but in their eagerness to get going launcher had only produced 200 examples at the time of the inspection from world rally officials so not the o37 but the stratos the part of them using lunch as a diversion while they repark the cars that actually did happen because launcher the stratos would help launcher win the world manufacturer's title in 1974 1975 and 1976. it carried on winning rallies until the group b monsters such as the audi quattro delivered a hammer blow to anything that wasn't four-wheel drive or produced 79 million brake horsepower but for the 1983 season launcher turned up with the oh so amazing o37 the oh standing for oh my god this car is [ __ ] nice but despite the supercharged inline four cylinder producing 325 brake horsepower all that power was sent to the rear wheels only it was kind of an outcast with almost everyone else having followed the lead of audi now i'll explain this rivalry in depth in another video but to cut to the chase the o37 as well as the immense driving skill from drivers such as walter rawl and some ingenious ideas from the head of lunch's rally division helped lancha capture the manufacturer's title against the might of that audi outfit while the o37 hung around in the championship for a further three years it just couldn't keep up with the other group b cars as their development ensued but when 1987 came around motor racing's biggest headache jean-marie ballest banned group b rally cars on safety grounds now while group b cars were spectacular to watch and were developing biblical amounts of power they were only extremely dangerous us group a rules were initiated with a new set of regulations for the manufacturers of the world to tackle launcher turned up to the first round of the 1987 season with the delta s4 and it won everything in its path it won the world manufacturers championship in 1987 1988 1999 1990 1991 and 1992 it all seemed to be going well for the italian brand but away from the rallying scene back on planet earth things were a little bit grim with regards to their production cars most of their cars were pretty much rebadged fears and the issue of them turning to rust with the slightest amount of moisture in the air gave lunch a reputation for building rust-prone burdens destined for the scrap heap sales plummeted with the beta recall being particularly damaging to the uk market of course today lunch's range consists only of one car the long despite having the stupidest name attached to a car next to the honda logo it was the second best selling car in italy in 2019 and continues to sell in impressive numbers today despite the end of the world happening right now but from developing innovative cars for the road that would take on the might of the world's largest and most well-funded manufacturers to selling re-badged fiat it's a very far cry from what this company used to be on the 115th anniversary of the company's inception a recovery plan was put in place for the brand with jean-pierre polo being employed as the chief designer and hired the italian jason statum as the brand's new leader it's set for the year 2024 launcher models will be developed jointly with alfa romeo and ds what does this mean i mean i have no idea because i know nothing about cars obviously what i do hope for rather selfishly as a rejuvenation of the launcher rally program maybe not a works team but at least a customer car for you know customers i realize this makes little financial sense when the company only really sells in one country and is doing perfectly fine sales-wise in it but rally is a part of launch's identity as is innovation which is also something that was kind of lost sure the ipsw is not a bad car but it's hardly something in line with launch's earlier creations which were teaming with new ideas and a will to push the automotive industry further ahead okay maybe a bit overstretched but while it is a dream to see launcher return to their ways it was ultimately what led to their initial downfall pushing the envelope in this industry will almost certainly come at a cost financially and it doesn't particularly help when the car would change shape overnight depending upon what time the neighbor put sprinkler on it's all a bit of a pipe dream i know filled mainly by those aforementioned stories from top gear and the grand tour but hopefully with launch's new parent company some of the ethos of the launcher of old can be rediscovered or it won't be and they'll go bust because my videos tend to age that way [Music] anyways thank you all for watching drop a comment below subscribe to the channel if you're awesome and always remember keep it respectful be wholesome don't be a manas and as always i'll see you all later

Channel: Josh Revell

Views: 214,191

Keywords: Lancia, Italy, WRC, World Rally Championship, Rally, Lancia rally, Vincenzo Lancia, Gianni Lancia, Lancia Ypsilon, Stratos, 037

Id: vJubHuh6Lhs

Length: 10min 17sec (617 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 08 2021