Lamborghini and U.S. golf
equipment maker, Callaway, have signed an agreement
at the Paris Motor Show to connect the resources of
their Research and Development teams. This alliance
establishes an ongoing collaboration to develop
innovative technologies and materials designed to
enhance the performance of each company’s products. The
partnership, as well as the introduction of a new,
co-developed material called Forged Composite, was
officially celebrated today at the 2010 Paris Motor Show
by Lamborghini President and CEO Stephan Winkelmann and
George Fellows, President and CEO, Callaway Golf.
Stephan Winkelmann,
President and CEO of Automobili Lamborghini, said: “We
see power-to-weight ratio and weight reduction as the
keys for future super sports cars and carbon fiber as
the material to achieve these goals. Callaway’s
expertise in specific technologies is strategic for our
research projects and therefore we welcome this
partnership as a further, important milestone in our
over 30 years long history of carbon fiber
applications.”
“This partnership joins two of the world’s most
respected brands,” said George Fellows, President and
CEO, Callaway Golf. “Both Callaway and Lamborghini
feature rich histories of challenging convention and
employing technological innovation to create
breakthrough products. This shared dedication has
brought our companies together, and will continue to set
us apart from our competition.”
Formation of Partnership
The origins of this now formalized relationship date
back several years. Through the constant pursuit of
lighter and stronger materials that improve the
performance of their products, the Lamborghini and
Callaway Research and Development teams cultivated
similar areas of expertise. A major point of convergence
surrounded the development of advanced composite
structures. These highly developed materials, comprised
of microscopic carbon fibers, feature superior strength
and performance characteristics in comparison to the
metal alloys that are generally used throughout the
automotive and golf industries.
For Lamborghini, the lighter and stronger composite
materials enabled their designers to create important
components for their technological demonstrator, “Sesto
Elemento”, featuring an unforeseen power-to-weight ratio
and acceleration capability. For Callaway, employing
carbon composites in place of steel and titanium offered
their engineers the ability to design increasingly
advanced clubheads with a greater transfer of power upon
impact with the ball and more accurate trajectories.
While carbon-based materials have been featured in
Lamborghini and Callaway products for several years,
making its debut at the 2010 Paris Motor Show is a
groundbreaking new material called Forged Composite™.
Developed in conjunction with both Research and
Development teams, Forged Composite™ is the first
collaborative element of the Callaway and Lamborghini
alliance.
About Forged Composite
Forged Composite is the lightest, strongest, most
precise material ever used by either Lamborghini or
Callaway. Encompassing more than 500,000 intertwined
turbostratic fibers per square inch, this revolutionary
material features an incredibly high threshold for
withstanding the extreme forces encountered by
Lamborghini and Callaway products. Forged Composite is
one-third the density of titanium, yet features a
greater load carrying capacity per unit mass in bending.
The implementation of a new, proprietary isothermal
forging process enables Callaway and Lamborghini
engineers to incorporate Forged Composite™ into their
designs with a level of precision that was previously
unachievable.
“Forged Composite provides us with the ability to
engineer performance enhancements like never before, and
we’ve only just begun to tap the potential of this
material”, said Dr. Alan Hocknell, Sr. Vice President,
Research and Development, Callaway Golf. “We’re looking
forward to collaborating on future applications that
push our designs beyond any preconceptions.”
“The introduction of the Forged Composite technology
allowed Lamborghini to realize the monocoque and the
suspension arms of the Sesto Elemento with
groundbreaking quality and costs levels” said Maurizio
Reggiani, Director Research and Development of
Automobili Lamborghini. “Our next challenge is to make
this technology a standard for low volume productions.”
Lamborghini unveiled its first design featuring Forged
Composite with the Sesto Elemento technology
demonstrator making its debut at the 2010 Paris Motor
Show. Callaway will introduce a line of premium golf
equipment featuring this groundbreaking material in the
coming weeks and throughout 2011.
