Countach, the ultimate supercar

Oranized the shop today, Countach got a breath of fresh air.
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Great stance! Love how the front wheels are buried in there.

 

how friggin awesome in silver!

Love the picture. One of the best angles.

R

 

Morning gents, Joe is correct on on comments about my car, the original color was red but it had been white pinstriped on every edge of the car, it was hideous and painted on not tape. The color now is from a 90s model dodge I'd seen, its black cherry pearl, the interior was snow white and every time I got into the car there was a new mark on the leather, (just call me Pigpen) so I changed it to black. The picture Raymond posted was taken in I think in 2004 at Italiano in Monterey in 2004, I'm the guy at the back of the car, the other person is my long time friend Mike Trusty who helped me do the EFI conversion back in 1993. There is a great story about Mike driving my car from NW Arkansas to his shop in Little Rock which at the time we didn't have a freeway from NWA to Hwy 40 and you had to take Hwy 59 which goes through many small towns (less than 1000 people) it was about 1.5 hour drive and of course the countach stuck out like a spaceship going down the road. All the cops monitor the same channel and one cop said "that car looks like its going 180 mph just sitting still", some other cops in the town down the road mistook the comment and though he was doing 180 mph so they set up a road block and stopped Mike as he was cruising down the road at the speed limit. They took him out of the car and had him ready to handcuff when they made the call that they had the speeding Lamborghini driver in custody, Mike all the time was saying "It wasn't me!" then the officer from the town prior cleared up the mistake by say "I said it LOOKS like its going 180 mph not going!" They of course let him go and had their own private car show.

The motor that is in the car is the original motor just was updated to EFI and distribuless ignition. I've put almost 20k miles on the car since the conversion and have never removed or replaced the spark plugs, it runs unbelievable for a 2 valve car but since the value has gone up my plans are to take it back to original as I kept all the parts and this is just bolt on items I replaced. I sold the Bob Wallace twin turbo motor and it went back to the car it came from, took me a few days to crate it all up but the motor is with the car in Sweden. This brought me great joy knowing that piece of history is together again. I do have a anivercery model transmission that is for sale, these transmissions are beefier than the early model transmissions and have a larger input shaft, it can be used in an early model car you just have to change the clutch disk to accept the larger shaft. Also a spare rear end for countach although I've never heard of one failing, and a triple disk clutch set up for an early car with lighten flywheel. This came from Bob also, there is an experimental Lamborghini plenum with intake runners drilled for EFI not CIS (several blank runner too) for a 2 valve car which I selling also. Don't know of many people who would do what I have done to the car now they are becoming more valuable but its still a piece of history.
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very cool. thanks for sharing your car story Jack.

A typical encounter with the law in Arkansas huh?
"they set up a road block and stopped Mike as he was cruising down the road at the speed limit. They took him out of the car and had him ready to handcuff"

 

Nice writing Jack, fun story.

 

Gurlso my writing and typing sucks, my hands are far better under the hood. Thank you tho! Sometimes I read my post and think to myself WHAT A DUMB ASS.

 

Nice to hear from you again Jack.

 

Ahahaha, I'm with you. My thoughts often read a bit differently than what I was thinking too.

 

Great story! Do you have any more pics of this car? It's beautiful!

 

Here are a few old pictures
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Looks lower than the GT40.

 

Good eyes, its .5 inch lower

 

Nice pics.
That GT40 looks like she is determined to get into some trouble, and have a lot of fun finding it.

 

LP400 tail lights?

 

no, have a look again...

 

Yes sir Joe that's the old girl going down my driveway, its a very old movie about 10-11 years old. Did you see any of the GT40 movies?

 

You don't see many vids like that one with a Countach.

 

Now that's a story that I am sure both of you never get tired of telling.
Fortunately it has a happy and kind of funny, (you can laugh about it now) ending.
Today one might get shot or crashed on purpose with that type of confusion.

Jack, I am curious if you have ever dynoed your Countach?
Any idea on how much HP you are making?

Sincerely Vic

 

Only using a G-tech pro and the results are not that impressive, if I recall it was 355hp to the wheels. Strangers to the car really think the motor in the countach is huge and yes they are correct in one respect but as all of you know not in displacement. When I tell them its only 244 cu in they look at me like I'm lying to them.

We know to make HP you have 2 factors torque and rpm, so either you have lots of cubic inches moving as many cfms in and out of the engine as possible per event (as in the late model cars) at the proper AFR for maximum extraction of energy from a drop of fuel or you have the same as above in smaller cubic inch that whines to 9000 rpm because of low reciprocating mass of the internals. This is why in the early 90s I was considering turbo charging the car, forced induction is crazy fun but glad I did not do it to the countach, there is no replacement for displacement and the GT40 at 2300 lbs and 427cu in @ 620HP naturally aspirated is a monster. Sorry for my long explanation but the LP400s motor is doing the best it can to make 355Hp.

 

sorry, but i do not get it: was not your car turbocharged by Wallace?

355 rwhp was with or without turbos ?

i guess it is with turbos because the 4000 cc engine are known to be 310-330 at flywheel stock or with a sport muffler, so likely around 270 hp at the wheels
the diablo makes around 400-410 hp at the wheels and is a 5700 with 4 valves

 

No my engine is stock the one that came with the car except running electromotive EFI and DIS. You can normally add 15% on HP of a stock engine that normally would have carbs and distributors by controlling the AFR and timing via TEC1 computer. Also remember that's not a real dyno result but a G-tech pro which I doubt gives you an accurate measurement. I also owned a 91 diablo euro version which was light years advanced in performance and torque.