Born at a time when virtually only old Volkswagens – including many Beetles – were running in Brazil, this car is a bold attempt to produce a local super car. Here is his strange story.
It doesn’t happen every day to come across in a story like this. To make the car on the cover so special, in addition to its very bold design vaguely reminiscent of the third generation of the Corvette, today’s car has a very particular origin: the Brazilian automobile industry is not all that famous in fact. Europe although there are several indigenous brands also with a certain tradition behind them.
The history of the White S, the particular coupé that you can see in these photos, begins in the seventies in a black period for the Brazilian car industry: in fact, a law at that time prevented the importation of any car into Brazil if not at such an astronomical price as to make the operation a luxury for the few. This measure had to To make grow local industry, in the intentions of the Government. And indeed, something moved.
Among the small industries born in that period and dedicated to the production of strange four-wheeled projects, there is also that of a man Ottorino “Toni” White. Famous for building the first homologated racing car for Formula 3 in the South American country, Bianco had it in 1970 free field to create his own carmaker, aided by this government measure. The most important model of him would arrive a few years later.
A white fly
The Bianco S arrived at the Sao Paolo Motor Show in 1976 and it immediately proved to be an interesting project, made with ingenuity and passion. The car was a sports car with an attractive line and two doors, rather simple to assemble: it is said that at the peak of its production momentum, Bianco was able to assemble 20 of them a week with almost artisanal methods.
Despite the sporty appearance that also winks a bit at the American Ford GT, a similarity perhaps desired by Toni himself, the S it’s not a particularly fast car: the car is equipped with a 1.600cc engine derived from that of the Volkswagen Beetle capable of pushing it to a maximum speed of 146 kilometers per hour with a soporific acceleration from 0 to 100 obtainable in just under 20 seconds!
Most of the components under that chassis were actually taken directly from the VW Beetle, arguably the most common car in Brazil at the time of the government’s import embargo. Among them, we find the transmission and gearbox. If anything, what makes the S a small cult object is its rarity: Bianco closed its doors in 1979 and it seems that by that date only 320 cars had been built. Ask Toni Bianco who at the age of 86 years playedaccording to his friends, he still works in a garage where he assembles home-made sports cars!
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