The Lamborghini Essenza SCV12 is breaking the mold, literally, when it comes to safety. It’s the first ever car on the market with a carbon fiber roll cage to pass the FIA’s Hypercar safety standards.
Before the Essenza SCV12, hyper cars, even those made of carbon fiber switched back to good, old steel roll cages when it came to safety. However, the technicians at Lamborghini Squadra Corse understood that carbon fiber had its benefits, and worked to reinforce the carbon fiber monocoque to pass FIA scrutiny.
The result is an extensively modified production chassis that can withstand up to 12 tons of crash force without significant deformations.
The testing required by the FIA for chassis homologation is extremely rigorous, involving both static and dynamic tests.
There are more than 20 static tests which, in addition to the chassis, involve the pedals, belts, and fuel tank. The dynamic crash tests, on the other hand, involve impacts at speeds of up to 14 meters/second. In this type of test, the chassis must not be subjected to any intrusion of external elements that could come into contact with the driver, and the fuel tank must not leak.
According to Lamborghini, by not mounting a steel roll cage, they not only reduced overall weight, but also improved cockpit space for better driving comfort.
The carbon fiber chassis of Essenza SCV12 are produced in the autoclaves of Automobili Lamborghini’s CFK Department in Sant’Agata Bolognese, a division that also produces the chassis of the current Aventador line.
In the Essenza SCV12, the driver sits on an OMP FIA 8862 homologated seat, mounted on carbon fiber cradles designed by Squadra Corse and produced in Lamborghini’s CFK laboratories. The seat has been lowered compared to the road models and the driver and passenger are protected on the door side by two side impact guards, also made of composite material.
Another new solution is the cradle situated in the rear part of the monocoque, which houses the engine perfectly positioned on the longitudinal axis, while the gearbox has a load-bearing and structural function. This characteristic also made it possible to achieve torsional stiffness values 20 percent higher than those of the Huracán GT3 EVO.
The first units of the 830-horsepower Lamborghini Essenza SCV12 were delivered to customers in April 2021, and the dedicated program of track events will start at the end of this month.
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