Ford Pinto
Offered with an inline-4 engine and bucket seats the Pinto's mechanical design was conventional, with unibody construction, a longitudinally mounted engine in front driving the rear wheels through either a manual or automatic transmission and live axle rear end. Suspension was by unequal-length control arms with front coil springs; the live rear axle was suspended on leaf springs. The rack and pinion steering had optional power assist, as did the brakes.
Semi-automatic transmission
Ferrari's first automated gearbox in a road car (used them previously in their Formula One cars since 1989) went on sale in 1993 in the Ferrari Mondial; the Mondial Valeo retained the traditional gated shifter, but removed the clutch pedal. Four years later, a paddle-shifted transmission arrived in the 1997 Ferrari F355. The most recent version of its semi-automatic was introduced in the Ferrari 599 GTO which was capable of changing gear in 60ms. In the Ferrari California & Ferrari 458 Italia, Ferrari opted to use a double-clutch transmission. Since then, Ferrari has expanded use of their double-clutch transmission to all new models.