Ferrari 458 Italia to get folding Hard Top

Looks like the Ferrari 458 Italia Spider is getting a folding hard top

You don’t need to be a supercar guru to know that Maranello’s latest mid-engined wonder – the Ferrari 458 Italia – is going to spawn a convertible version in the not too distant future. And if you claim to be a Ferrari aficenado you can probably proclaim – with reasonable certainty – that it will be a rag-top Spider. But it looks like you could be wrong.

The boys over at Teamspeed – who are a pretty well-informed bunch of less than poor petrolheads – are convinced that the 458 Italia Spider is going to get a folding hard top. Which at first thought seems pretty daft idea.

For starters, where do you put the roof when it folds? In the engine bay? Secondly, why bother with a tin-top if there’s a folding hard top? The answer to the first is probably that Ferrari can now get a folding hardtop to come in at less weight than a folding soft-top – as in the Ferrari California – so if they can they may as well go that route and have a second 458 model for which a premium can be charged.

The answer to the first question seems to lie in a patent application Ferrari made for a new folding roof last year. To quote the guys at Teamspeed ” It’s a two piece design that pivots like the roof on the 575 Superamerica with the two pieces rotating through 180 degrees and stowing stacked above each other in a compartment above the engine”.

We just have to wonder who’ll bother with the 458 Italia Coupe if you can have a tin-top, folding roof 458 Italia Spyder?

By Cars UK