Sadly there was no Paris Mondial de l’Automobile in 2020, the famous French motor show was canceled because of the pandemic that was still ongoing in September, but let’s go back 10 years to the 2010 edition of the Paris Motor Show … when Automobili Lamborghini SpA unveiled the stunning Sesto Elemento on their stand.
It wasn’t the first V10 powered concept Lamborghini showed, that honor went to the Concept S five years earlier in Geneva, and while I love the idea behind the Concept S, this Sesto Elemento was a totally different beast altogether with her exposed carbon fiber body and bright red details.
The Lamborghini Sesto Elemento wasn’t built as a road car, in 2010 it was merely a concept vehicle, a one-off showcase of what Lamborghini could do with carbon fiber, taking the underpinnings of the Lamborghini Gallardo LP570-4 Superleggera that was just unveiled months earlier in Geneva, the Sesto Elemento went into extreme weight saving mode … 1,340 kg on the Gallardo compared to less than 1,000 kg for the Sesto Elemento.
The 570 hp V10 engine would allow acceleration from 0 to 100 km/h in only 2.5 seconds with a top speed well over 300 km/h, but those figures didn’t tell the entire story. Thanks to the low weight and extensive use of carbon fiber, the Sesto Elemento was very rigid and offered a driving pleasure not possible in other cars … the Sesto Elemento offered a totally new dimension experience behind the wheel of a supercar.
While being a concept car, the Sesto Elemento was fully driveable … on the track, this Lamborghini was not street legal, only one was to be built initially, purely as a high-speed show car during track events … but that would turn out differently … Lamborghini received a lot of requests for this car, and in the end, they decided to build a very low production run of slightly modified Sesto Elemento cars to be sold to customers … still not street-legal mind you.
Lamborghini never actually published official production numbers for the Sesto Elemento, but rumor has is it between 11 and 15 of the intended 20 units were built, which were sold at €2,200,000 each, the Sesto Elemento was completely built from carbon fiber, even the seats were molded in this lightweight material before they received the contrasting red upholstery, the dashboard was almost non-existent anyway, but those parts that did remain for rigidity were naturally again finished in carbon fiber, very nice and extremely lightweight.
The Sesto Elemento customer cars were built in the Lamborghini Prototype and Pre-Series building that was inaugurated in July 2012, built over only five stations, the carbon fiber sections are made in an adjoining building, the Carbon fiber production facility Lamborghini opened February 2011, when the Sesto Elemento reaches the third stop it receives the 570hp V10 engine … once all connections are made it is fueled up and the Bull roars into life for the first time with exhaust fumes being released through a Pyrosic exhaust system … which emphasizes the deep growl even further.
I for one have always loved the way the triangular exhaust tips on the Sesto Elemento were fitted into the struts for the large rear wing, add the 10 hexagon air vents over the engine, and the similarly red-painted intakes just behind the roof combined with the use of red screws all over the body, and the Sesto Elemento has a style like none other.
We’ve recently seen photos of a new car being tested by Squadra Corse which looks like a cross between the Aventador J, the Aventador SVJ, and parts of the Sián … so is Lamborghini working on yet another, limited production car, but this time based on the V12 drivetrain … isn’t it time they do another concept study with the successful Huracan V10 base? A kind of successor to the 2010 Sesto Elemento?
