The Ferrari SP48 Unica Doesn't Have a Rear Window Because Who Needs Visibility
Photo: Ferrari
If you’ve collected enough coin in this cursed world, and the people at Ferrari like you enough, eventually you get to sit down and have them make you a car — a Ferrari unique to you and your tastes — the classiest version, I suppose, of modding. Such is the case with the SP48 Unica, a car with no rear window and smaller side windows that is a one-off built to give the impression that it was cut from a block of metal.
It is not, of course, and Ferrari says it is actually based on the F8 Tributo, also taking the F8 Tributo’s twin-turbo V8. What’s changed from the F8 Tributo, exactly? Ferrari says the headlights are different, along with the brake air intakes, the front grille, and the engine air intakes. As for getting rid of the rear window and making the side windows smaller, Ferrari says that was done to “highlight [its] powerful muscularity,” which, sure.
Ferrari wants you — excuse me, wants its client — to know that, really, it has done a lot of work on this car and it’s not just any old F8.
The SP48 Unica’s thermal-fluid-dynamic design has been honed and perfected to guarantee it satisfies all cooling requirements in addition to delivering a different aerodynamic balance. The biggest changes compared to the F8 Tributo’s styling include the air intakes for cooling flows for the engine on the front bumper and beneath the rear spoiler. Each has a deep procedural grille, every section of which is optimally angled to maximise the amount of air passing through. The car’s configuration also allowed the engineers to locate an intercooler intake immediately behind the side windows, which in turn enabled them to reduce the dimension of the intakes on the flanks. The longer rear overhang reduces suction from the roof area, boosting rear downforce.
Ferrari also says that the interior is more or less what you get with the F8, aside from the whole not-having-a-rear-window thing and various modifications to the trim. Really, what happens with these one-offs is that some rich person has commissioned a new piece of artwork, and done a real service to the community in that we all get to look at it and yell about it.
From the client’s perspective, I would be wary of my own failings, as Ferrari says the “long-standing” client “was deeply involved in every step of its creation,” I suppose in the same way that one might be involved with an architect building you a new house. Some people really get into that sort of thing, while others prefer to trust the professionals, because am I really going to think of something they haven’t? Just give me a regular F8 Spider. Yes, in red.
Photo: Ferrari
Photo: Ferrari
Photo: Ferrari
Photo: Ferrari
