www.QV500.com - Ferrari 166 Part 4: 166 Spyder Corsa
 

166 Spyder Corsa chassis 010 I 		By early 1948, Ferrari had further developed their race-winning Tipo 125 and 159's into the even more impressive 166 Sport and Spyder Corsa's, both of which featured two-litre Colombo engines. The little cycle-winged Spyder Corsa's became the definitive long wheelbase 166 competition cars as their successors, Ferrari's 166 Mille Miglia's, used a chassis with a much shorter wheelbase. As mentioned in Part 1, two of the eight 166 Spyder Corsa's (010 I and 020 I) were originally completed as Tipo 125's prior to being re-manufactured by Ferrari and given new chassis identities in recognition of the changes made.
   
Riding a welded tubular steel chassis, the 166 Spyder Corsa had an identical 2420mm wheelbase to the 159, modifications including new independent front suspension as fitted to the trio of 166 Sport's. Powered by the same Gioacchino Colombo-designed engine as found in the Targa Florio-winning Sport, this two-litre 60° V12 was good for 150bhp and endowed the lightweight Spyder Corsa with bags of performance. Minimalist bodywork was just as rudimentary as the original cycle-winged Ferrari 125 and 159's had been, however, the 166 SC's featured a noticeably less heavy-handed profile, particularly around the cockpit which lent the pretty new model a much more purposeful stance. As one would expect from such hand crafted bodywork though, no two Spyder Corsa's were totally identical and it is easy to find detail differences from one car to the next, especially around the nose and grille. The first examples were constructed over the winter of 1947/48 in readiness for the 1948 competition season. The last chassis was completed around the middle of that year. Although rumours of two additional Spyder Corsa's persist, those chassis’s listed below are generally considered to be the only genuine examples although but have themselves undergone extensive modification.

166 Spyder Corsa Chassis Index
 
004 C Barchetta

Early race history
006 I Barchetta 1948 Pescara 2nd, 1949 Giro di Sicillia 1st, re-bodied by Vignale in 1951
Re-numbered as 0076 E, Turin Salon '51
008 I Barchetta 1948 Rheims 1st, re-bodied, 1949 Naples GP 1st
010 I Barchetta Re-manufactured from 01 C, Swedish GP 1st
012 I Barchetta 1948 Coppa Gallenga 1st, Como - Lieto 1st
014 I Barchetta 1948 French GP 1st, re-bodied by Scaglietti in '57
016 I Barchetta 1948 Paris 1 Hour 1st, various '48 speed records in France
020 I Barchetta Re-manufactured from 02 C, re-bodied as Touring Berlinetta '49