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Lamborghini say no to turbos in supercars, for now

Lamborghini is preparing to launch what will not only be its first crossover (discounting the LM002 that was a proper truck), but also looks to be its first turbocharged model as well. But will the upcoming new Urus open the door for more artificially boosted Lambos in the future? That was the question on our minds when Autoblog caught up with Stephan Winkelmann at the opening of the new Trigeneration Plant in Sant'Agata Bolognese. "Naturally aspirated engines are still the best engines which are on the market for super sports cars, in terms of acceleration, in terms of sound," said Lamborghini's chief executive during a roundtable discussion at the factory. "And unless there is [something] better, we are going to keep them." "Naturally aspirated engines are still the best. Unless there is something better, we are going to keep them." "We are constantly looking for alternatives. We are constantly seeing what we can do to make them better," said Winkelmann. "And there will maybe a day when we are introducing turbos, when the turbos are equalizing or being better than naturally aspirated engines." That moment just hasn't come yet, in Lamborghini's estimation. This in sharp contrast to rivals like Ferrari and McLaren (to say nothing of its sister company Porsche) which are wholeheartedly embracing turbocharged engines, as well as hybrid propulsion. Any engine, turbocharged or otherwise, used to propel the Urus would not be so easily slotted into one of its mid-engined supercars, either. "Usually an SUV engine has a different stroke, so usually those engines have to be adapted if you want" to use them in mid-engined supercars, said Winkelmann. "Then they're at the front so you have to turn them, and if this is going to make sense, I don't know. At this time there are no plans to do that, but in general, these engines are not suitable" for models like the Huracan or Aventador. "There would be a day when we think that turbo can be better than naturally aspirated. And that day, we will step into it."

Lamborghini Huracan races Su-30 jet in Russia

We've seen it time and time again, but we never seem to get tired of it. We are referring, of course, to races between supercars and fighter jets. The time-honored tradition has seen a Lamborghini Reventón take on a Panavia Tornado, an SRT Viper line up alongside an F-16, even a Red Bull F1 car tackle an F/A-18 Hornet. But now it's time for the new Lamborghini Huracán to take its turn. And since this contest takes place in Russia, its rival is none other than the Sukhoi Su-30 Flanker-C, the two-seat version of the earlier Su-27 and one of the most advanced aircraft to come out of the Soviet Union.
Now there are, of course, many ways to set up a race between car and jet, but for this one, the organizers had the competitors line up on the runway, accelerate past a marker (at which point the jet is already in the air), turn around and return. We'll let you watch the video for yourself to see which won, but either way, there can be little question that the Su-30 and the latest Lamborghini are two of the most formidable performance machines ever devised.

Lamborghini spotted filming new Aventador SV completely undisguised

There is a great tradition at Lamborghini in turning its mid-engined V12 supercars into Super Veloce ("High Speed") versions. So after the Aventador hit the scene, we knew it would only be a matter of time before it was to receive the SV treatment. And here it is, spied completely undisguised during a video shoot. Now, we first spotted what we thought was the Aventador SV way back in April, 2013 – the same day, incidentally, that the LP720-4 50° Anniversario edition surfaced. That was a long time ago, however, and what we see here looks like a different beast entirely. It's got a completely reshaped front bumper, bigger air intakes, deeper side sills and a fresh set of steamroller alloys. Out back, there's a massive rear wing and below it, a new rear end with a bigger diffuser and – instead of one central exhaust – four individual pipes to let the big twelve-cylinder engine breath. Speaking of which, you can expect the Aventador SV to come with a big power bump. Just how big, we don't know for sure, but we can extrapolate. When the Miura SV hit the scene in the early 1970s, it only packed 15 more horsepower than the existing model. Though the Countach bred a series of variants over its long lifetime, it never got an SV edition. The Diablo SV arrived five years after its donor with an 18-horse bump, later raised by another 19 hp. But after the Murcielago arrived in 2001 with 572 hp and bumped up to 631 hp in 2006, the SV model came in 2009 with 661 hp. Given that the "standard" Aventador has been out since 2011, we're about on schedule for the Super Veloce, and if precedent proves anything, we could be looking at upwards of 750 horses to come riding around the mountain when they come to the Geneva Motor Show in March. Featured Gallery Lamborghini Aventador SV: Spy Shots View 11 Photos Image Credit: Borja Perez/CarPix Spy Photos Lamborghini Coupe Supercars lamborghini aventador sv