Lancia D24

Piero Taruffi in a Lancia D24 at the Giro di Sicilia 1954

The Lancia D24 was a racing sports car developed by Lancia in 1953 and used in sports car races in 1953 and 1954. Apart from the rally versions of the Fulvia , Stratos , Delta and the thoroughbred rally car Rally 037 , the D24 was the most successful sports car in Lancia motorsport history.

Development history

After the D20 and the D23 , the D24 was the third sports car in a series of designs by the Lancia design department under the leadership of Vittorio Jano . The chassis of the D23 was revised for the D24, it was now shorter and lighter. The V6 engine was drilled out to 3.3 liters and now developed 198 kW, or 265 hp.

Racing history

The D24 made its racing debut in the 1000 km race at the Nürburgring in 1953 . Juan Manuel Fangio shared chassis 0002 with Felice Bonetto , chassis 0001 was driven by Robert Manzon and Piero Taruffi . Both cars failed due to technical defects. The fuel pump of the Fangio / Bonetto car went on strike after a pit stop; a defective battery stopped the second vehicle. At the Carrera Panamericana there was a double victory for the teams Fangio / Bronzoni and Taruffi / Maggio. Nobody at Lancia was particularly happy about this success, as Felice Bonetto had a fatal accident in a D24 during this race. The chassis 0002 was destroyed and later not rebuilt.

1954 was a successful year for the D24. After a triple failure at the 12-hour race in Sebring , Piero Taruffi and co-driver Carlo Luoni won the Giro di Sicilia , Alberto Ascari won the Mille Miglia and Piero Taruffi won the Targa Florio . This was followed by further successes for Eugenio Castellotti in national Italian sports car races and second and third in the Tourist Trophy .

At the end of the season, Lancia ended its involvement in sports cars and concentrated entirely on the monoposto - D50 and the Formula 1 World Championship . One of the cars was sold to Juan Perón in 1955 . In 1980 this vehicle returned to Italy and belongs to an Italian nobleman. The second surviving car is now in the Lancia Museum.

literature

Fred Steininger: Lancia. 100 years of automotive history, Podszun, Brilon 2008, ISBN 978-3-86133-420-0 .
Lancia. Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1992, ISBN 3-613-01503-X .

Web links

Commons : Lancia D24 - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files