Ferrari Service and Repair Bay Area - Retro car review: 1971 Ferrari 512M - Zucchi Motorsports Sonoma - 707-334-3700

Photos by Don Heiny

Specifications
620bhp, 4,993cc DOHC light alloy V-12, Lucas fuel injection
five-speed transmission
double wishbones and coil springs front and rear suspension
four wheel hydraulic vented disc brakes
Wheelbase: 2,400 mm (94.5 in.)

512S: The Legend

In 1968 the rules for sports car racing were changed, limiting Group 6 prototypes to a maximum engine capacity of 3.0 liters. For 1970, Ferrari decided to do what Porsche had done earlier with their 917, and, build 25 examples of a 5.0-liter car to allow homologation into the FIA’s Group 5 Sports Car category. Ferrari made the risky investment with the financial help of Fiat, and they intended to sell surplus cars to customers.

Ferrari’s 512S represented yet another attempt by a manufacturer to thwart the homologation rules laid down by the Commission Sportive Internationale. It was a practice the CSI was trying hard to avoid; manufacturers would build prototype racers, produce them in the required quantities and fit them with lights, horns and spare wheels, ostensibly to look like a road car. In reality the 512 was the fastest car that Ferrari had ever built, capable of in excess of 235 mph.

Assembly of the first new cars began at the end of 1969. The chassis was similar to the one used on the P4—a semi-monocoque design. The engine was a direct development of the 612 Can-Am series unit, now fitted with twin overhead camshafts, four valves per cylinder and Lucas indirect fuel injection. Initially it could produce 550 bhp at 8,500rpm. A year after initial production began, they made changes to improve reliability, lessen the weight and increase the power output. The engine could now produce 620 bhp at 9,000rpm.

The 512S was first introduced to the public at a press conference on November 6, 1969 outside the Gatto Verde (Green Cat) restaurant near Maranello. The chassis was a tubular steel space frame with stressed-alloy paneling around the cockpit area and once the design was complete, the Vaccari workshop in Modena was assigned the task of building the 25 chassis. Over the next three months, enough chassis were produced for homologation and soon after the qualifying inspection was made, several of the assembled cars were taken apart to be used as spares. Giacomo Caliri was given the job of designing the body and the firm of Cigala & Bertinetti from Turin was contracted to produce them. For the first time in Ferrari’s history, they were made from fiberglass and attached directly to the alloy-paneled center section of the car. The basic design concepts of the engine were Mauro Forghieri’s, but the detail work was carried out almost entirely by engineer Franco Rocci. Giancarlo Bussi was in charge of development work.

All of the completed chassis were originally built in berlinetta configuration. Almost immediately, the 512S began to undergo modification. The most noticeable change was the removal of the center section of the bodywork or roof panel. On April 1, an addendum was accepted by the FIA and written into the homologation papers noting the availability of a spyder version of the 512S.

The 512’s competition debut took place when five identical cars were lined up for the Daytona 24 Hour race on January 31, 1970. Three of the new 512s were official entries, customers entered two and all had been fitted with two substantial spoilers combined with fins and two deflectors on the front wings.
Mario Andretti put the 512S on pole position, but in the race the Porsche 917s led throughout. Only one 512S survived the race, driven by Andretti, Arturo Merzario and Jackie Ickx. The car finished a remarkable third.

The 25 cars manufactured were given even chassis numbers from 1002 to 1050. Of those cars, 18 were raced in 1970, five of them spyders.

The Factory team used nine cars for international endurance racing. Scuderia Filipinetti and NART raced two cars each. Ecurie Francorchamps (Belgian importer of Ferrari), Escuderia Montjuich, Gelo Racing Team, Earl Cord Racing and Picchio Rosso raced one car each.

In the second race of the 1970 season, the 12-Hour Endurance race at Sebring, Mario Andretti, Nino Vaccarella and Ignazio Giunti won the race in their Ferrari 512S. Mario Andretti, determined not to be beaten by a movie star, drove an incredible final stint, narrowly beating Steve McQueen and Peter Revson in their Porsche 908 by just 22 seconds.

Later in the season, at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, there was an epic duel between Ferrari and Porsche, and it was this story that was told in the legendary movie Le Mans (also known as A French Kiss With Death”). Steve McQueen’s Solar Productions bought several 512Ss for the making of this film; one was destroyed during filming by Derek Bell. McQueen’s immortal line from the movie, “Racing is life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting,” endures to this day.

512M: The Inheritor

After Le Mans, the Mauro Forghieri-led development team started to work on a slimmed down and more powerful version of the 512S. Called the 512M (for modificato), the revised car produced 620 bhp at 9,000rpm and weighed 1,797 pounds, compared to the 512S spyder’s 1,887 pounds. Bodywork revisions included a more aerodynamic nose, and a large airbox mounted on top of the engine to force air into the intake trumpets. Further modifications included new rear bodywork, and no spyder version was made available. Fifteen of the 25 512Ss produced were converted to M-spec.

The Ferrari 512M was competitive out of the box. One was entered for Ickx and Giunti at the final race of the 1970 championship in Austria, in the 1000km at the Österreichring. The car suffered from fuel feed problems during qualifying, but with the problem solved in time for the race, Ickx lapped faster than the Porsche 917’s pole position qualifying time, with full tanks, in the opening laps. He continued to destroy the lap record, finally beating his own F1 record set two months earlier. Alternator problems eventually ended the race for the Ferrari 512M but for the first time in the 1970 season, the Porsches had been outpaced by quite some margin, and Ferrari had clearly proved that the development gap had finally been closed.

The next stop for Ickx and Giunti was the Kyalami 1000km race in South Africa. Although it was a non-championship round, Jo Siffert, who was the 1970 champion, and Kurt Ahrens, the runner-up, were entered in a works Porsche 917K. The Ferrari completely dominated, taking pole position and winning the race by two laps. In 1971 the 512M was campaigned by customer teams while the factory concentrated on the 3.0-litre 312PB. The 5.0-litre class was abandoned in 1972.

Of the 512s constructed, some were driven beyond their useful life and written off, others were destroyed in accidents. A fortunate few remained with private collectors, ex-racers and enthusiasts. As the desirability and collectability of these cars continued to rise, so did interest in owning them, with the result that many of the 512s that were written off have now reappeared, some having been rebuilt from the remains or parts of cars destroyed whilst racing. While 25 512s were supposed to have been constructed, only 22 actually were, and a mere 16 are believed to survive today. Just four remain in 512S configuration and only 12 in “M” spec.

source: http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/2008/05/21/days-of-ferrari-2008-day-17-1971-ferrari-512m/
by David Travel Adolphus