Top-Speed Testing the 1992 Lamborghini Diablo

From the August 1991 issue of Car and Driver.

At 204 mph on the Nardo test track, you can either worry about the mountain of paperwork it takes to ship a body home from Italy, or you can try to enjoy your­self. We recommend the latter if you are lashing the world's fastest production car, a Lamborghini Diablo, to its top speed.

Intense, stressful serenity describes the Diablo at 204 mph. The world barrels by at nearly 300 feet per second, the big V-12 screams at a high-pitched bellow, and you sit virtually motionless behind the wheel. You gaze at a point maybe a quarter-mile ahead, which slows the moving scenery to a pace that your eye and brain can absorb. The long view also gives you a few critical seconds to avoid any problems—because at 200 mph, a sudden swerve might not be the only thing you execute.

Fortunately, we found no emergencies on the vast test track near Brindisi in the heel of Italy. We were the exclusive occu­pants of a circle 7.8 miles in circumfer­ence, an ideal 200-mph environment. The table-smooth pavement is 52 feet wide and the outer lane is banked 12.5 degrees, which means you don't even have to turn the steering wheel until you exceed 150 mph. At the Diablo's 204-mph top speed, lateral acceleration is a mere 0.18 g.

It's a piece of cake.

Or it would be if the Diablo were stable.

But the Diablo demonstrates an eerie ten­dency to weave from side to side above 180. At first we back off, but it's soon ap­parent that the Diablo will go where we point it. It just waggles a bit in the process, like a horse letting you know that you're in charge by his leave. More important, the waggling increases only slightly as we ease the throttle to the floor, though our knuckles pale noticeably.

The people at Lamborghini understand better than most that car enthusiasm is a schizophrenic obsession. They know that a car must satisfy needs both rational (transportation) and emotional (ego, one­-upmanship) of the discriminating buyer if they are to separate him from the nearly quarter-million dollars needed to acquire a Diablo. After testing the new flagship in Italy, we're here to tell you that it suc­ceeds brilliantly on both fronts.

On the rational side, the Diablo achieves the epic feat of being the first pro­duction car to crack the 200-mph barrier. We've never been able to coax a Porsche 959, a Ferrari F40, or any other series­-built car to such a velocity. The Diablo turns the quarter-mile in 12.4 seconds at 123 mph and pulls 0.95 g on the skidpad, figures that should satisfy any enthusiast's objective demands.

On the emotional side, we never doubt­ed that Lamborghini would succeed with the Diablo. After all, this is the firm that turned the supercar world topsy-turvy in 1966 when it introduced the Miura with its transverse mid-engine layout and ultralow profile. Lamborghini followed that automotive grand slam with the 1973 Countach, whose wildly chiseled look made contemporary show cars appear tame and thrilled car lovers well into its second decade.

The Diablo is a worthy addition to this family tree with its stunning Gandini­-styled coachwork (with a bit of helpful ki­bitzing from Chrysler). Its appearance may not be as arresting as the Countach's, but its long, low, flowing, voluptuous lines hunkering down on its four fat Bridge­stone tires suggest speed and power even more strongly than the earlier car.

With three air intakes on each side, two on its hood and three in the grille, the Diablo is every bit the breather that the Countach was. On the new model, how­ever, these various orifices are faired into the bodywork rather than haphazardly tacked on. Other details are also handled in a more sophisticated fashion. The inte­gration of the DOT-required bumpers, for example, is masterful—the rear looks more like a ground-effects diffuser than a parking protector. Two huge scallops out of each body side accommodate enough glass to afford excellent visibility for such a low car. Most important, the Diablo boasts a 0.31 drag coefficient—a signal improvement over the Countach's brick-­like 0.40.

Similar advances are apparent in the Diablo's running gear. The driveline maintains the gearbox-ahead-of-the-­engine layout, for relatively even weight distribution and direct shift linkage, but the engine is stronger. The displacement of the 48-valve, four-cam V-12 is up from 5.2 to 5.7 liters, and a sophisticated en­gine-control system now manages the ex­ertions of the hefty mill. As a result, pow­er is increased from 420 to 485 hp. Torque makes a similar leap, from 369 to 428 pound-feet. Both figures are achieved with catalytic converters.

That thrust, in combination with the Diablo's wind-cheating shape, pushed the big Lambo to a two-way average of 204 mph, electronically measured on the 7.8-mile Nardo test track.

At the other end of the performance spectrum, the Diablo experience is equal­ly stirring. Despite its 3520 pounds and a marginal clutch, the Diablo reached 60 mph in 4.2 seconds, 100 in 8.5 seconds, 130 in 13.6 seconds, and 150 in 18.4 sec­onds. That's virtually a dead heat with the 478-hp F40, though the Ferrari, 500 pounds lighter and shorter-geared, starts to pull away above 140 mph. The four­-wheel-drive 959 launches harder than ei­ther car, but it has ten percent less power and loses its edge by 100 mph.

The Diablo is more accommodating than the Plexiglas-windowed, starkly fin­ished, near-race-car F40; it's as plushly outfitted as a Testarossa. Sumptuous leather covers most interior surfaces, power windows retract fully into the jack­-knife doors, the air conditioning is auto­matically controlled, and there's a fine Al­pine stereo that you can actually hear at cruising speed.

Even more unexpected, at least in an Italian GT, is the Diablo's excellent driv­ing environment. A tilting and telescop­ing steering wheel accommodates both the classic arms-out Italian driving style as well as more practical positions. The view forward and to the sides is excellent. Even the rear view isn't bad, thanks to two huge external mirrors, mounted on aerodynamically shaped struts.

If we could change anything inside, it would be the instrument cluster—the speedometer and tachometer are too high, positioned above the top of the steering­-wheel rim. The high pod doesn't block any critical perspective, but it detracts from an otherwise open-feeling cockpit.

Despite its creature comforts, the Dia­blo is no luxury cruiser, and you know it the first time you depress the clutch. It's not so stiff that it becomes intrusive on a mountain road, but we would tire of the left-leg exertion during rush hour on the Santa Monica Freeway. The Diablo's shifter is heavier than most, but its action is smooth and positive.

Steering effort is another indicator that this is a demanding machine. Highways and gentle curves require little muscle, but the effort increases exponentially as you corner harder. A few laps on a skidpad in the Diablo would fit right into a body-building routine.

On a relatively tight low-speed circle, the Diablo reaches 0.95 g with steady understeer, but push the limit on faster, more open corners, and you'll find your­self constantly working the high-effort steering wheel to keep the tail in line. Like most mid-engined Italian supercars, the Diablo demands expertise and steady nerves of the driver who drives it at its high-speed limits.

Inevitably, a firm ride is part of the pro­gram. The front tires have no more than two inches of upward travel before they start rubbing on the fenders, leading one to expect a harsh, spine-jarring ride. That was not our experience on the relatively smooth Italian roads. We'll report soon on the ride under American conditions.

These few shortcomings suggest a somewhat unsophisticated car, and we'd say that's correct. There are no novel multilink suspension layouts, variable­-valve timing systems, or power-assisted clutches. Rather than cutting-edge tech­nology, the Diablo relies on a smooth body, big sticky tires, and a big engine with lots of cylinders, cams, and valves to deliver its considerable gifts.

Lamborghini's approach, however, does produce impressive numbers. Whether you duplicate the figures your­self or just use them to settle dinner-party arguments is your affair. More important is the exhilaration of accelerating hard enough to keep you pinned to your seat as the speedometer passes 140 mph. And the audacity of downshifting to second gear at 85 mph to pull away from a Porsche 911 so quickly that he won't even think about trying to keep up.

Finally, there's the egotistical rush you get from knowing that when you pull up in a Diablo, everyone who sees you is wondering just how rich and famous you are. We'd call the total experience mechanical shock therapy, and Dr. Diablo gives the best treatments on the planet.