Japanese tuner Liberty Walk made waves at the Tokyo Auto Salon last year when it showed off a Ferrari F40 that had been slammed, chopped up and fitted with a widebody kit and other extreme styling modifications. Ferrari was apparently so mad that it removed that F40 from its official registry. Liberty Walk didn’t care — in fact, at last weekend’s TAS 2024 it doubled down, bringing the F40 back with a revised livery and also revealing a new Countach body kit.
Sitting alongside those two legit supercars at Liberty Walk’s Auto Salon stand was something a whole lot smaller and cuter. This is the Liberty Walk LB40, a comprehensive restyling kit for Mazda’s 1990s Autozam AZ-1 that transforms the mid-engined kei sports car into a shrunken-down Ferrari F40 lookalike. Normal F40s do nothing for me and never have — I’m much more of an F50 and Enzo guy — but this AZ-1 is brilliant.
The LB40 kit consists of a new clamshell front end and front bumper, which mimics the look of the F40 LM race cars (and Liberty Walk’s F40) with clear headlight covers instead of pop-up lamps. There are slotted vents on top of the front fenders, a low splitter, canards at the bumper corners and big intakes in the hood. New door panels, side skirts and bolted-on rear fenders further add to the F40 look, though the upper NACA duct isn’t real.
I think the rear end looks especially cute, as a stock AZ-1 is nearly two feet narrower in width than a real F40. Liberty Walk’s kit gives the AZ-1 a rear “grille” panel that houses four round taillights, a big F40 LM–style rear wing and a new bumper that even has a teeny set of three exhaust tips that are shaped and arranged like the F40’s iconic layout.
Open the AZ-1’s gullwing doors and you’ll see bright red Sparco bucket seats with racing harnesses and a Sparco racing wheel, though those items don’t seem to be a part of Liberty Walk’s kit. And the LB40 kit doesn’t actually include the headlights or taillights; you’ll have to add those yourself.
All in the LB40 kit will run you $22,660, which is about the same amount that a stock, already imported AZ-1 costs, and the forged wheels (16s up front and 17s in the rear) are an extra $14,300. But look at it this way — that’s quite literally millions of dollars cheaper than an actual Ferrari F40, for something much, much cooler and more unique. I better see one at Monterey Car Week this year.
