First transaxle?

What year did Ferrari first put a transaxle in one of their cars? Road or race? For that matter, what was the first year that ANYBODY put a transaxle in their cars? (I don't really consider a VW as a real car!) I was just wondering about this while studying up on the 1961-3 Pontiac Tempest which used a front engine with rear transaxle. The Ferrari 275GTB used a transaxle but that wasn't until a few years later. Don't tell me that Ferrari copied the idea from a Pontiac???!!!

 

Good question

250LM springs to mind, need to think longer for .......Dino SP race series maybe?

 

Many of the 4 & 6 cyl. competition cars, Monza and Mondial for example, had the transaxles in the rear.

 

1st Ferrari road car to use a transaxle (rear-mounted five-speed) was the '65 275 GTB.

According to this article, front-drive Miller 91 racers were 1st to use transaxles... check out the year - 1926.

 

But the 250LM is a road car. Year of production is before 275

 

Ah, but the 250LM's were prepared as road race cars.

As miked mentioned, the 500 Mondial, like the one this f-chatting gent's father (scroll to post #4) has, uses a transaxle.

 

I recall that Enzo Ferrari bought, prepared, and raced some Alfas with transaxles (through Scuderia Ferrari) before he began building his own cars.

Kind Regards, Chris