Ex-Lamborghini engineer sold a V16 supercar to Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah – now you can buy this super-rare Cizeta for a cool US$729,000
An extremely rare 1993 Cizeta V16T, formerly belonging to the Sultan of Brunei, is up for grabs through Curated, a dealership specialising in vintage supercars.
Cizeta, a short-lived supercar company founded by ex-Lamborghini engineer and exotic-car dealer Claudio Zampolli, and famed record producer Giorgio Moroder, built just 17 cars during its main production run from 1988 to 1994 – and this is one of them.
Given its history and rarity, Curated is asking a lot for the car – US$729,000 to be exact. And lest you think that the pandemic might have destroyed the market for ultra-high-end vehicles, car auctions have actually seen a boom over the last several months. Auction companies like Hemmings and Bring a Trailer have noted a spike in demand, despite overall uncertainty in the economy.
Check out the Cizeta and its story below – you probably won’t see another one on the market for a while.
The car was imported into Singapore but never actually made it to Brunei and was never even registered. Curated scooped it up earlier this year. According to the listing, the car made an appearance at the 1993 Geneva Motor Show and has only 600 miles on the clock.
The V16T was designed by Marcello Gandini, who also produced such classics as the Lamborghini Countach and Miura. Cizetas were hand-built mainly by former Lamborghini and Ferrari engineers – which perhaps explains the not one, but two pairs of pop-up headlights. Very 1990s.
But the V16T’s coolest feature, arguably, is its namesake 6.0-litre, 16-cylinder engine. It produced a claimed 540 horsepower and 400lb-ft of torque when new. That massive engine is fed by a 37-gallon fuel tank.
According to the seller, the interior shows no signs of wear and the tires are original from 1993. This specific V16T, according to them, was always Zampolli’s favourite. If you consider it worth paying more than US$700,000 for, then it ought to be yours, too.
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This article originally appeared on Business Insider
Former Lamborghini and Ferrari engineers built the cars at Cizeta, which was co-founded by Claudio Zampolli and famed record producer Giorgio Moroder, with Marcello Gandini, the man who designed the Countach and Miura, at the 1993 Cizeta V16T’s design helm