The words “affordable” and “vintage Lamborghini” rarely appear in the same sentence, unless you’re a member of the kind of clubs that have antique Chesterfield sofas and long white pebble driveways. It’s relatively well-known that Ferruccio Lamborghini manufactured tractors before he started building high-end performance cars – partially to vex his rival Enzo Ferrari.
The story goes that Ferruccio, who owned multiple Ferraris over the years, was plagued by reliability issues with the clutches. He finally cornered Enzo Ferrari about it, as he later recounted in an interview with Thoroughbred & Classic Cars in 1991:
“I decided to talk to Enzo Ferrari. I had to wait for him a very long time. ‘Ferrari, your cars are rubbish!’ I complained. Il Commendatore was furious. ‘Lamborghini, you may be able to drive a tractor but you will never be able to handle a Ferrari properly.’ This was the point when I finally decided to make a perfect car.” – Ferruccio Lamborghini
As it happens, Ferruccio Lamborghini was remarkably adept at running a performance car company. Lamborghini quickly became a significant thorn in the side of Ferrari, and in 1965 he gave the green light to a project that Lamborghini engineers Gian Paolo Dallara, Paolo Stanzani, and Bob Wallace had been working on in their own time.
This mid-engined vehicle was essentially the first modern supercar, it had a sleek body designed by the great Marcello Gandini who was then working at Bertone. They called it the Lamborghini Miura after a famous Spanish fighting bull breeder.
Lamborghini Trattori – The Tractors
Ferruccio founded Lamborghini Trattori in 1948 they initially used mostly WW2 surplus parts but as the years passed they developed more and more of their parts in-house. By the 1960s the company was one of the most significant tractor builders in Italy, in 1973 the company became part of the multinational group SAME Deutz-Fahr (SDF), which also owns the brands Deutz-Fahr, Hürlimann, and Grégoire A/S.
It’s still possible to buy yourself a brand new, state-of-the-art Lamborghini tractor today. There company is going strong, offering dozens of models around the world.
The 1962 Lamborghini Tractor 2 R Shown Here
The model you see here is a 1962 Lamborghini Tractor 2 R, it’s powered by a 2193cc 3-cylinder, air-cooled diesel engine producing 39 bhp, it has a 4-speed manual transmission and a rear portal axle. The tractor also has a hydraulically-actuated hitch assembly and dual rear-mounted power takeoffs (PTOs) for powering farm equipment.
Interestingly this 2 R tractor was built just a year before Ferruccio Lamborghini opened his car factory in Sant’Agata. The traditional color for Lamborghini tractors is blue and orange, a beautiful combination which this one is wearing proudly.
This tractor was delivered new to Signor Milani in Codrea di Ferrara, a small village about 40 kilometres from where it was built. It was bought by its current owner in 2015 who had it completely restored by Agostino Amaducci, Cesena. In order to preserve it, all fluids have been drained, and it’s also fitted with new tires.
It comes with its original registration and tag, service booklets and owner’s manual, and it’s doubtless one of the best restored examples of the Lamborghini Tractor 2 R in the world. If you’d like to read more about it or register to bid you can click here, it’s due to cross the auction block with Artcurial on the 7th of February in Paris, with an estimated value of between €20,000 and €40,000.
Images courtesy of Artcurial and Peter Singhof 2020©
Articles that Ben has written have been covered on CNN, Popular Mechanics, Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, Autoweek Magazine, Wired Magazine, Autoblog, Gear Patrol, Jalopnik, The Verge, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with well over a million monthly readers from around the world and many hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
