Touring Superleggera Aces Nostalgic Vision With Streamline-Inflected ‘Aero 3’

Touring Superleggera Aces Nostalgic Vision With Streamline-Inflected ‘Aero 3’

Published: September 24, 2020 | By: American Luxury Staff

Venerable Italian coachbuilder Touring Superleggera is closing out the summer of 2020 with a third entry in their series of neo-traditionalist automotive designs. Neatly conflating the golden era of road-going touring with contemporary ideas, the Touring Aero 3 recalls the age of flight—and the roots of the Milan-based company—with a prominent rear stabilizer ‘dorsal’ fin.

The Aero 3 follows the Berlinetta Lusso and the Disco Volante. The Berlinetta Lusso was Touring Superleggera’s alteration of a customer’s Ferrari F12berlinetta, while the Disco Volante reached back to the track-inspired designs of the mid-1950s through the early 1960s, turning an Alfa 8C into an idealized version of a period.

The Aero 3 looks to Alfa Romero for inspiration, specifically the 6C that had evolved in Touring Superleggera’s workshop by the late 1930s. The company’s decades of experience has yielded, in 2020, a build technique that uses extremely thin carbon fiber sections over a frame constructed of aluminum alloys.

All signs indicate that the build uses a Ferrari F12berlinetta donor car, so the Aero 3’s engine is a V12 that produces 740 horsepower. It is outfitted with a seven-speed paddle-shift gearbox with an automatic mode. The interiors feature hand-crafted leather and aluminum and carbon-fiber accents, but the bespoke nature of the build allows for extensive customization during the construction process, which—according to the company—involves about 5,000 man hours per vehicle.

Earlier this year, Touring Superleggera introduced the Maserati-based Sciadipersia.

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