20:03 29-07-2026
Eccentrica V12: an open-top Diablo restomod heads to Monterey Car Week
Eccentrica shows its next Diablo restomod on August 10 at Monterey Car Week. The V12 stays naturally aspirated, the gearbox manual, and the teaser points to a roofless body. The closed car costs 1.2–1.3 million euros without a donor.
On August 10, Monterey Car Week opens in California, and on that very first day Eccentrica will show a new version of its Lamborghini Diablo restomod. The company has already posted a teaser, promising that the car stays naturally aspirated and manual, but will bring the driver “even closer to everything around you”. The clip was shot against the clouds, so the hint at an open body is hard to miss — even though Eccentrica has not used the word Roadster yet.
The current Eccentrica V12 is based on a first-generation Lamborghini Diablo. The naturally aspirated 5.7-liter engine, fitted with new camshafts, electronic throttle bodies and a fresh calibration, delivers 550 hp and 600 Nm. Drive goes to the rear wheels through a bespoke six-speed manual with shorter ratios. Reverse is engaged by a button through an electric actuator and sits in the gearbox casing exactly where the all-wheel-drive VT versions had their power take-off for the front axle.
If the teaser really does hide a roadster, the key question is where the body comes from. Eccentrica could use a factory Diablo VT Roadster, which Lamborghini built from December 1995 and only with all-wheel drive. The alternative is a deep conversion of a coupe, with extra reinforcement for the sills, floor and door openings. Lamborghini assembled 2903 Diablos of all versions and only a few hundred of them were open-top, so a rare donor would push the cost of the project up noticeably. The drivetrain layout is not being revealed either: whether the newcomer stays purely rear-wheel drive or gets the VT viscous coupling is still unknown.
A missing roof changes more than the looks. The body has to keep its stiffness, the doors their precision, and the car its composure on broken surfaces. Extra reinforcement adds weight, and the aerodynamics have to be recalculated so that the cabin does not turn into a zone of heavy turbulence at speed. It is not even clear yet what exactly Eccentrica will offer: a removable panel, a folding top or a fully open body.
The closed Eccentrica V12 is being built in a run of 19 cars. Whether the new version joins that run or gets its own quota has not been specified. Production has already started and the first customer cars are going through testing and fine-tuning.
The price of the open version has not been announced. Third-party sources put the conversion of a regular Eccentrica V12 at roughly 1.2–1.3 million euros, not counting the donor car. The roadster could end up dearer because of the rarity of the original Diablo and the extra bodywork, but until the premiere that remains speculation.
At the presentation, four things matter: the type of donor, the drivetrain layout, the change in weight and the way the roof is stowed. Those parameters will show whether Eccentrica has delivered a standalone piece of engineering or simply an open variation of the V12 everyone already knows.