Solved -PJ635- Ficai 750 Sport Boxer, 1956

[Paul Jaray]

What is this?
1 point for you!

[Paul Jaray]

Experts?

[Paul Jaray]

This one won't take too much once you know where to look...

[Majeko]

Porsche based?

[Paul Jaray]

Not Porsche.

[Paul Jaray]

Pros?

[SACO]

Ficaï 750 ?

[Paul Jaray]

Almost there! 

[SACO]

Ficai sport 750 ?

[Paul Jaray]

Wrong engine

[SACO]

Ficai 1100 ? 

[Paul Jaray]

Yes! I hoped you could add a little more about this particular car.
It's not the usual etceterini.
It's your point anyway.
If you want I can fill in the details or leave them to you to find

[SACO]

Just a photo ! 

[Paul Jaray]

Alright, here you are:
Brothers Paolo and Pietro Ficai, who previously built a nice Allemano-bodied berlinetta in 1949, received by Franco Bertani the Jap 1100 engine of his Cooper. Ficai designed a tubular chassis and these designs were converted in technical designs by Nardi and materialized by Gilco. It was 1953 and this was a powerful but unsuccessful front engined barchetta. Ficai then realized a new barchetta, the puzzle car, rear-engined this time, using his old tubular chassis with some modifications but with a totally original engine: he tried first with the carters of the Jap engine with 2 cylinders and DHC heads of the Norton Manx 350 then finally realized his original engine, with Norton-derived cylinders but carters cast by Riva Calzoni in Bologna.

Point for you! 

[Paul Jaray]

I'm sorry SACO, I made a mistake.
The car in the puzzle is called in many different ways, and I do not know if it was restored with the specifics of a previous stage of its life (a Jap engine?). The configuration is closer to the last one and that was a 750, not 1100. Somewhere it is called Ficai-Jap, and here's the origin of my error...the original 1100 Jap was used in the 1st front-engined version. The 2nd, read engined had a Norton derived engine and 2 different bodyworks: the puzzle car is closest to the 3rd version, the one that had the custom built boxer engine.