Crack open the throttle of the new 488 GTB and it lunges forward with stomach-churning ferocity and almost no hesitation between right-footing and hotfooting.
Though it may result in fewer parking-lot fistfights, the turbocharged versus naturally aspirated argument is as tribal as Mustang versus Camaro. There's a line in the sand, and the "no replacement" faction doesn't take kindly to defectors. The rev counter in the new 488 GTB is those purists' greatest fear: a 10,000-rpm readout with a red dash at eight grand, a full 1000 rpm earlier than the outgoing, all-motor 458 Italia. Ferrari, a company that hangs its Borsalino on engine craft, ditching heady atmospheric V-8s in favor of smaller, forced-induction lumps? Maybe there'll be some action in the parking lot after all.
Here's the thing, though: Some of the greatest Ferraris featured forced induction. Cars like the F40 and the car to which it owes its existence, the 1984–1987 288 GTO. The Gran Turismo Omologato nameplate is just as steeped in Ferrari lore as wailing, naturally aspirated eights and twelves.
While the GTO wasn't Maranello's first boosted mid-engine road car, it's the first one you should care about. Back in 1982, in the midst of F1's dalliance with turbocharging, Ferrari bolted a turbo to its home-market 208 GTB, upgrading an emasculated 2.0-liter V-8 from a pathetic 153 hp to a respectable 217 hp. It's worth acknowledging the correlation between the 208 GTB Turbo and today's 488. But the technology available at the time meant delivering big power from a relatively small V-8 couldn't be done without massive lag.
Now it can. Crack open the throttle of the new 488 GTB and it lunges forward with stomach-churning ferocity and almost no hesitation between right-footing and hotfooting. It wouldn't be true to say there's zero lag—that'll come within the next five years when Ferrari starts electrically spooling its turbochargers. But the delay between asking for power and full boost is so small that on a graph Ferrari showed, the 488 is making the next gearchange while a McLaren 650S is still waiting for the torque tsunami.
The 488 GTB's 3.9-liter engine shares its aluminum block, but little else, with the California T. The heads, pistons, crank, and rods are new, and the turbo technology goes much further in eliminating off-boost torpor. The California T minimizes lag with twin-scroll turbos and expensive, three-piece, equal-length exhaust manifolds. But the 488's turbines—made by IHI—feature ball bearings and titanium-aluminum compressor wheels for reduced friction. An abradable seal between the wheel and the housing maximizes efficiency.
The result is 660 hp at 8000 rpm, up from the California T's 552 hp and the 562 hp produced by the outgoing 458 Italia. Impressive, but look at the torque: The Italia phoned it in below 6000 rpm, where its 398-lb-ft peak was achieved. The 488 makes 41 percent more twist at half the crank speed. And it transforms the way this 488 drives.
Where once you needed second gear for switchbacks, now third or even fourth will do. Instead of dropping two cogs to wake the motor for that impromptu overtake, you can do it with one. Or none. And all that despite the engine's full 561 lb-ft of torque being available only in seventh gear. As on the California T, Ferrari has tailored boost curves for each gear. So in seventh, you get a torque curve as tall and wide as possible for freeway passing. In the lower ratios, boost is artificially restricted at low revs to avoid the dull blare so many blown engines emit and to mimic the character of a naturally aspirated engine, encouraging you to chase the redline.
Drive a 488 as hard as you dare, then tell me it's not exciting enough. I'll look you straight in your dead eyes and call you a liar. This thing is intoxicating, and the responsiveness only makes it more engaging. Waiting an eternity to spool up and then being hurled forward like you've been rear-ended by a semi is base-level fun, but it also removes the connection between man and machine. And when you're slithering sideways through an epically fast left-hander at Fiorano, deep into fifth gear and wondering whether to feed in another inch of throttle, that relationship is kind of handy.
Still, something nags. It isn't that this engine sounds less sexy than the 458's (true). Or that design director Flavio Manzoni's revised bodywork trades delicacy for drama as it cleverly integrates the blow-through rear spoiler, active diffuser, and double-height front splitter that help improve downforce by 50 percent.
No, it's more a philosophical musing. Every time engineers opened their mouths during the technical briefing, it was to explain how they've minimized unwanted side effects of turbocharging, to explain the lengths they went to make this feel like a naturally aspirated engine. The 3.9-liter is incredible, but is it what Ferrari would've built if CO2 targets hadn't forced its hand? Did any of them really want artificial aspiration over natural? No one is saying, but I'm convinced the answer is no.
Later, Matteo Lanzavecchia, head of vehicle testing and development, told me to look at it another way. "If we'd stayed with a naturally aspirated engine, we might have pushed to 610 hp, but there's no way we could have delivered 660 hp, and certainly not this much torque. Even without the pressure to meet emissions targets, we would have had to switch to turbocharging to meet our performance goals."
Those goals include beating the track-focused 458 Speciale's 1:23.5 Fiorano lap time, which the 488 GTB does by a half second, making it two seconds quicker than the base 458 Italia. Acceleration to 62 mph requires the same 3.0 seconds as the Speciale, but when the GTB hits 124 mph at the 8.3-second mark, the Speciale is almost a second adrift. The Italia can't get out of the 10s.
At a claimed 3252 pounds, the 488 is 22 pounds lighter than the Italia but 177 pounds heavier than the Speciale. The tires, downgraded from the track car's supersticky Michelin Pilot Sport Cups to regular Pilot Sports, sacrifice some outright grip for better wet- and cold-weather performance. There's a little more understeer than in the Speciale, but a little less than in the regular 458. More steering precision and a touch more weight, too. The carbon-ceramic brakes, lifted from the LaFerrari, feel fantastically strong and progressive underfoot. The seven-speed dual-clutch transmission upshifts 30 percent faster, downshifts 40 percent faster, and now accepts commands for multiple downshifts. I miss three pedals as much as the next guy, but this is an astonishingly good transmission.
Dynamically, though, the biggest change between the 458 series and this 488 is the magnetorheological dampers. They're now looped into the second-generation stability-control system. No mid-engine car with this much power has any right making it so easy to drive far beyond the tires' natural limits. The compliance of the GTB—arguably the single greatest trait of any modern Ferrari—is staggering. Whatever the road, however bad the surface, you know you can keep the hammer down and make every single horse count. That never comes at the expense of body control—the 488 GTB's stiffer springs and revised shocks clamp down on rock and roll harder than John Lithgow in Footloose.
I have to admit, I missed extracting those last 1000 revs on track, and the noise that accompanied it. And I suspect Speciale values will go stratospheric in coming years as it takes its place as the last of a pure breed. On balance, though, the 488 is so much better than the car it replaces. Faster and more flattering and talented over a much broader spectrum, it's more fun more of the time. When the 288 and F40 died, so did the turbocharged Ferrari—left to look like a curio, a technical dead end. But, even at 8000 rpm, the 488 GTB proves it is anything but.
Source: www.roadandtrack.com
