Ferrari 550 Barchetta

Ferrari 550 Barchetta

The 550 Barchetta Pininfarina was specifically designed to be reminiscent of legendary Ferrari road race stars of the likes of the 166 MM, the 250 GT California and the 365 GTS4 Daytona. The aim, in fact, was to create an open-top front-engined 12-cylinder with a retro feel to it. The 550 Barchetta Pininfarina was designed and developed to be a unique interpretation of Ferrari’s purest and most extreme sports cars. In fact, it was a deliberate and provocative departure from the rest of the current range. As such, it was made available only as a limited edition of just 448, all of which were built in Maranello in 2001. Each car was numbered and its number displayed on a special in-car plaque signed by Sergio Pininfarina.
The 550 Barchetta Pininfarina was the perfect new millennium interpretation of the classic, open-top front-engined V12 Ferrari sports car, complete with modern styling and technology. One of its signature styling cues was a traditional barchetta-style cut to the windscreen (around 100 mm lower than the 550 Maranello) with a body-coloured finish to the lower section of the surround. It was also, tellingly, a model aimed exclusively at open-air use, providing just a manual soft-top for emergency use. The functional and unadorned barchetta-type solution with a simple manual soft-top allowed Ferrari's engineers to offset the additional weight gained by reinforcing the chassis and additional safety features (rear roll-bars). Consequently the 550 Barchetta Pininfarina weighed the same as the 550 Maranello. The 550 Barchetta Pininfarina's exclusive design included other distinctive flourishes, such as Ferrari badges on the wheelarches, two-piece alloy wheels and an aluminium fuel cap. It was also available in any colour in the Ferrari range.
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