The 1971 Lamborghini Countach LP 500 Prototype Is Reborn In Spirit

Remember when Lamborghini turned up at the 1971 Geneva Motor Show with the Countach LP 500 prototype 50 years ago which was unfortunately destroyed in crash tests three years later?  Well the folks from Sant’ Agata Bolognese have managed to reconstruct the original prototype that pioneered supercar folklore, essentially reviving the first Countach in spirit.

It all started back towards the end of 2017, when an unnamed car collector managed to convince Polo Storico, Lamborghini’s in-house restoration workshop, to reconstruct the once lost original 1971 Countach LP 500 prototype. Of course a restoration job of any classic let alone the original Countach prototype is a long-term project. And so, it took the carmaker over a whopping 25,000 hours of work to make it happen.

During the reconstruction for mechanical components, the carmaker used original spares, restored components of the time as well as completely rebuilt parts. In fact the most challenging aspect of the rebuild was to recreate the exact volume of the supercar. To make that happen, Lamborghini did a 3D scan of the Countach LP 400 (chassis 001), the first production-spec Countach, which took 2,000 hours to perfect.

In the end, Lamborghini managed to recreate the supercar down to the exact same body shade used in the original 1971 prototype, "Giallo Fly Speciale." In fact, they even made a replica of the 14-inch Pirelli Cinturato CN12 tyres, with the same tread. However, the tyres now have a modern compound and structure, which we think is a thoughtful upgrade.

The original Lamborghini Countach LP 500 prototype was different from the production-spec LP 400 in a variety of ways. First, the LP 500 used a partial space frame steel chassis compared to the production model’s tubular space frame chassis. Also, the LP 500 prototype used a 446PS naturally aspirated 5-litre V12 engine before it was destroyed in testing. The production-spec LP 400 on the other hand, used a 375PS 3.9-litre V12 engine.

This isn’t the only thing Lamborghini brought back for the Countach’s 50th anniversary. The carmaker created a modern interpretation of the Countach in the form of a limited-run model revealed back in August earlier this year. The carmaker hasn’t revealed how much a restored Lamborghini Countach LP 500 prototype costs, but the collector who commissioned it has likely paid a whole lot more than its modern counterpart.