Monday, November 23, 2009

Disco Volante

.




So little that can be said about this mystery car. The only known photograph is this, found in a 'For Sale' advertisement from car dealers, Metcalfe and Mundy, in the December 1955 issue of Motor Sport Magazine. Whilst it describes the car as Volanti', though I am assured that the correct spelling is 'Volante'. All I can really tell you is that it is a DB2/4. right hand drive, chassis 810, built for Lord O'Neil, body almost certainly of glass-fibre and that the Northern Irish registration number isn't on the DVLA computer. The design is obviously very closely based on that of the rare, 1952 Touring designed spyder, the Alfa Romeo Disco Volante (Italian for Flying Saucer)


MV Agusta



Disco Volante was the nickname given by the people and the press to the two sport models of the 175 MV lauched in 1954 in two versions : the 175 CS Sport and the 175 CSS.(Super Sport). The nickname was given due to the tank shape looking as a "Flying saucer" which was common to the two models.


Alfa Romeo



The very refined two-seat sporty 1900 Alfa Romeo Disco Volante featured one of the most interesting bodyworks designed by Touring with a convex lenticular profile. Only two copies of the prototype were produced. Its top speed was rated at around 140 mph.


James Bond


The Disco Volante is a fictional ship in the James Bond novel Thunderball (1961) and its 1965 film adaptation of the same name. It was a hydrofoil craft owned by Emilio Largo, an agent of SPECTRE. It was purchased with SPECTRE funds for £200,000. The craft plays a pivotal role in the seizure and transportation of two nuclear warheads. It is a high-tech ship that possesses a number of smaller underwater submarine craft.

.

0 comments: