Gordon Murray to make a true successor to the F1- T50

  • Thread starter RocZX
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Thanks for sharing that podcast. Now I understand why GMD needs a high-revs engine. In order to make the fan effect work you must keep your engine revs high.
 
Surprisingly, I'm not as excited about it as I thought I would be. Which is surprising considering how hyped I was about Speedtail.
Also, this cars feels more like a remake of the F1 rather than its successor to me, as it seems to practically be an F1 with modern day components. That's not a bad thing at all though, as F1 would benefit greatly from being redesigned with modern tech in mind.

TomBrady
I thought the McLaren Senna was a great successor to the F1, though it's missing the center driving position, and manual gearbox it still has the ultra light weight that was the best part of the F1
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I have to say that light weight is also the only thing Senna has in common with F1. Senna was built with an entirely different purpose in mind from F1's. F1 was supposed to be the ultimate grand tourer, while Senna is a street-legal track beast.

LeGeNd-1
About the only thing I'd change is the manual gearbox. I'm all for a pure driving experience but I think that will stick out like a sore thumb in comparison to all the other tech and performance in the car.
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I so strongly agree with this. More than that, manual gearbox is more bound to hinder this car's performance and comfort of car's non-performance driving use (a reminder that 500+ supercars with stick shifts are an absolute hell to use when you're not flooring them - ask anyone who drove, for example, a Lamborghini Diablo through a city), which i believe goes against the car's goals. Almost feels like the sole point of a manual gearbox in this car is to please the "row your own" crowd.
If anything, what I think this car would deserve is a gearbox like Koenigsegg Jesko's Light Speed Gearbox, or Koenigsegg Regera's Koenigsegg Direct Drive.
 
Griffith500
The engine concept doesn't sound very far removed from the 11 000 rpm Cosworth lump destined for the Aston Martin Valkyrie. It's quite a bit smaller (lighter) and revs 9% faster, so it will be very racy, but that makes it special.

What immediately strikes me is: why isn't Ferrari, out of all of the "prestigious" manufacturers, doing this? Their racy, small-displacement V12s cemented an icon in the '50s and '60s.
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I would like to see that but I'm gonna guess they aren't doing it because they do not need to do anything specific to grab attention.
 
https://www.motoring.com.au/gordon-murray-automotive-t-50-hypercar-teased-122024/photos/
gordon-murray-automotive-t50-i.jpg
 
Ok so, we have a F1 possible front and up, ferrari 488 tail, RedBull X2014 Fan car fan, NA V12 at 12.100 RPM, and a manual transmission.
I would love to be rich in order to say: Gordon Murray, take my money you genious.

Edit: oh! And it will probably compete in LeMans... ok I´m done.
 
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It seems like the fan is only to increase the efficiency of the diffuser and not to provide a full-on ground effect suction. A bit underwhelmed but in the context of a road car I think that's realistic. The ride height and skirts required for full ground effects probably won't get you very far without incurring costly repair bills :lol: Here's hoping the track only version has an option for extreme downforce mode, fully lowered and skirts sealing the underbody.

More details and tech talk here: https://www.topgear.com/car-news/hybrid/first-pic-gordon-murrays-t50-hypercar
 
https://www.motor1.com/news/435801/gordon-murray-t50-v12-engine-revealed/

The engine produces 654 hp with a redline at 12,100 rpm. 71 percent of the car's maximum torque is delivered at 2,500 rpm, while the full 344 lb-ft of torque comes in at 9,000 rpm.

...the engine will be mated to a proper, old-school six-speed H-pattern manual gearbox to ensure that the sub-2,200 lbs (1,000 kg) T.50 will be the ultimate drivers' car...

"Above all else, I wanted it to look clean like the BMW S70/2 engine, which had no carbon or plastic covers," [Gordon Murray] said. "It was just inlet trumpets, cam covers, exhaust block and heads, and a few belt-driven ancillaries that I managed to squeeze out of sight.

"In designing the T.50 V12, I wanted it to be the antidote to the modern supercar where you can’t see the engine beneath carbon covers."

Bruce Wood, Cosworth's managing director described the T.50 project as "one of the toughest" that Cosworth has ever worked on, but said it was a "genuine thrill" to be involved with the project.

"The criteria and benchmarks set by Gordon for the T.50 engine comprised one of the toughest engine briefs we’ve ever taken on," he said. "It pushes the boundaries in every direction and it is a genuine thrill for everyone at Cosworth to be part of what will surely become as fabled a vehicle as Gordon’s McLaren F1 before it."
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gordon-murray-t.50-v12-engine-revealed.jpg
 
Compare it to other engines of similar displacement (3.9 litres).

Assuming peak power 2000 rpm above peak torque (the three-cylinder basis could mean the curve is wider than this), then we have 90% torque at 11000 rpm - this could easily mean it's 90% at 7000 rpm too.

So, on that basis, the power curve looks a little like this:

2500 - 116
7000 - 416
9000 - 590
11000 - 654

Make no mistake, it will have a peaky delivery. But it's not meant to burp along in any gear, buy electric for that. This is supposed to be special.
 
Griffith500
Make no mistake, it will have a peaky delivery. But it's not meant to burp along in any gear, buy electric for that.
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Not saying it won't like to rev but with sub 1000 kg to lug around and with the extreme gearing you can run with such a high revving motor it will probably be quite flexible.
 
It's certainly more interesting than the latest Mclaren whatever. I feel like it's a litttttle too nostalgic/self referential though. In any case, I'm waiting for Chris Harris to drive it.
 
I'm actually keen to see how the T50 does, in terms of legacy. It will be a car of few, if any superlatives...tons of existing hypercars will be considerably faster in acceleration, top speed, lap times, etc. The T50 will have zero of the F1's relative performance credentials yet it's expensive to the point of absurdity just like the F1 was. It kind of plays with the notion of what a hypercar/supercar is...does a supercar necessarily have to have superlative performance....do the goal posts need to keep shifting relentlessly into the future? Long ago we've passed into a threshold of unusably fast road cars so any additional performance is kind of pointless. I think Pagani was the first to introduce the idea that a supercar can be super for reasons other than pure outright performance...the original C12 had less than 400hp but is now one of the most coveted supercars of all time. You get the sense that Pagani's worth as a brand is not dependent on its ability to set lap or speed records in the way that Bugatti's and Mclaren's are. Why can't we have more supercars with their envelope-pushing design and attention to detail and focus on performance that aren't necessarily chasing the "worlds fastest" titles. I think the Ferrari F50 is one of the all time great supercars...the fact that would get walloped something good by today's higher end sports sedans is, I think, irrelevant - the F50 remains super. If somebody made a car exactly like the F50 today, would it still be a supercar? I think the answer is yes, but it requires you to look past pure performance. I feel like the T50 is along this train of thought - a supercar in ethos but not performance. Maybe this is the semantic divergence between supercar and hypercar - the former is about design, feel, craftsmanship and the latter is all about shattering performance milestones.

edit: Gordon is surprisingly unsentimental when talking about the F1, especially the parts he didn't like....he reminds me of an architect talking about a previous previous project that was successful but ultimately constrained by realities.
 
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Eunos_Cosmo
edit: Gordon is surprisingly unsentimental when talking about the F1, especially the parts he didn't like....he reminds me of an architect talking about a previous previous project that was successful but ultimately constrained by realities.
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The way he talks about everything he couldn't do with the F1 back then, you get the feeling it was his benchmark for this car. An F1 MKII of sorts, "tweaked" with technology that either wasn't available or simply too costly to develop 30 years ago. The ethos remains more or less the same, a usable car with massive performance centered around the driver and driving experience, with a very minimalist approach but with loads of technology dumped into it, and just looking at the thing, there are styling clues everywhere that are definitely inspired by the McLaren (the interior being the most obvious one, IMO)

The McLaren was a Monet, this one feels like, to him, it'll be his Mona Lisa.
 
Eunos_Cosmo
I'm actually keen to see how the T50 does, in terms of legacy. It will be a car of few, if any superlatives...tons of existing hypercars will be considerably faster in acceleration, top speed, lap times, etc. The T50 will have zero of the F1's relative performance credentials yet it's expensive to the point of absurdity just like the F1 was. It kind of plays with the notion of what a hypercar/supercar is...does a supercar necessarily have to have superlative performance....do the goal posts need to keep shifting relentlessly into the future? Long ago we've passed into a threshold of unusably fast road cars so any additional performance is kind of pointless. I think Pagani was the first to introduce the idea that a supercar can be super for reasons other than pure outright performance...the original C12 had less than 400hp but is now one of the most coveted supercars of all time. You get the sense that Pagani's worth as a brand is not dependent on its ability to set lap or speed records in the way that Bugatti's and Mclaren's are. Why can't we have more supercars with their envelope-pushing design and attention to detail and focus on performance that aren't necessarily chasing the "worlds fastest" titles. I think the Ferrari F50 is one of the all time great supercars...the fact that would get walloped something good by today's higher end sports sedans is, I think, irrelevant - the F50 remains super. If somebody made a car exactly like the F50 today, would it still be a supercar? I think the answer is yes, but it requires you to look past pure performance. I feel like the T50 is along this train of thought - a supercar in ethos but not performance. Maybe this is the semantic divergence between supercar and hypercar - the former is about design, feel, craftsmanship and the latter is all about shattering performance milestones.

edit: Gordon is surprisingly unsentimental when talking about the F1, especially the parts he didn't like....he reminds me of an architect talking about a previous previous project that was successful but ultimately constrained by realities.
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So, an NSX-R it is then. :sly:

I love this. Make the thing you want to make. The way you want to make it.

Not going too far wide, but like George Lucas had his vision and technology wasn't available yet. Not saying his works after were better, but being able to do what you wanted to do in the first place, with updates tools, that's the heart of it.
 
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30:22 -- "No touchscreen anywhere; absolutely hate them...it's got everything you need, but it all works off your phone."
48:46 -- "Pushing a switch and not feeling a gear change is pointless to me."

A-🤬-men.

I am so totally on board with a car that I will never own or experience in a way that has not been true since the Carrera GT, and more so the F1 before it.
 
Now I'm looking up new normal road cars, that weigh less than T-50. New Suzuki Swift is 880kg. Swift Sport 970kg.

Can't wait to drive it virtually. :)
 

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