Flemke - Is this your McLaren? (Vol 5)

[Peloton25]

flemke said:

Although the threads' title and the continuity are indeed about "McLaren", I think many of the better parts of these threads have been when the discussion became more general.

Very true - hadn't thought about the diminished value from that perspective.

>8^)
ER

[flemke]

buckle88 said:

With regard to the price increasing, Flemke I'm sure early on you said that insurance was aprox 5% of the cars value at the time, is that still the case?

If so surely the yearly premium is fast approaching a point where it will come close to the fix cost of a serious accident like say Rowans.

Thanks

I'm not sure that I would have said "5%", as it has never been that high.
The most recent time that the underwriters and I reset the agreed value, the rate amounted to less than 2%.

When you figure that it cost (according to a magazine article) £910,000 to repair Rowan Atkinson's car, and that was a pretty major job (although not as major, I daresay, as the job of repairing the white one that rolled in Italy), then the cost of retrieving what in almost any other would have been unquestionably a write-off is no more than 20% of the market value. This obviously is going to reduce the required premium as a % of market value, relative to other cars.

The same applies, pretty much, to third-party liability.

Obviously, maximum loss in case of theft feeds proportionately into premium. F1s tend to be quite secure, for a number of reasons, so here too the effect on premium may be slightly less than with another marque.

[flemke]

Peloton25 said:

Spotted today in the paddock at Laguna Seca under the Virtuoso Performance tent - this is chassis 042 which has been off the radar for me since 2011. Images are courtesy of Supercars.net and are clickable for larger versions.







This car appears to have at least portions of the 'flemke' treatment in regards to suspension, wheel sizes and tires fitted. An educated guess tells me this is not some kind of coincidence.

>8^)
ER

Edited by Peloton25 on Saturday 9th August 03:26

Years ago at the Goodwood Revival I met the chap who runs Virtuoso Performance. I was impressed by him and, when I had the Gordon Murray Duckham's car restored, I had VP do the work. It took them awhile, but the work was flawless.

When I wanted to have new wheels of a very specific type made for the F1, I thought that VP would be one of the few places that could be trusted to do the work, and I commissioned them to do it.

The wheels were finished very recently. Before shipping them to me, they wanted to put them on this red car for a car show or something, and I was happy for them to do that. So, yes, those are my new wheels, temporarily on a red car.

If ever there was an example of cars looking better with black wheels than they do with silver ones, I think this would be it.

[Peloton25]

Very interesting - I certainly recalled the Duckhams connection with you and VP. Also would rate SD pretty highly from my brief conversations and certainly their presence at the Historics (now the "Motorsports Reunion") has grown considerably in the past ~10 years, implying others must agree.

Does this red F1 still have standard suspension bits then, to your knowledge? It appeared to be sitting a touch lower in the photo.

I'm guessing there isn't a chance of you coming over for any of the Monterey activities, but if you were it would be quite good (for me, at least) to say hello at any point.

>8^)
ER

Edited by Peloton25 on Saturday 9th August 10:35

[Nurburgsingh]

flemke said:

I shall be visiting the factory to view the car before they start putting the body panels on it.

Can I come?

[Mutton]

Peloton25 said:

Spotted today in the paddock at Laguna Seca under the Virtuoso Performance tent - this is chassis 042 which has been off the radar for me since 2011. Images are courtesy of Supercars.net and are clickable for larger versions.







This car appears to have at least portions of the 'flemke' treatment in regards to suspension, wheel sizes and tires fitted. An educated guess tells me this is not some kind of coincidence.

>8^)
ER

Edited by Peloton25 on Saturday 9th August 03:26

I have to say as someone who thinks the OZ style 5 spokes are about as good as it gets as far as wheel design goes, is that the combination of those wheels in black and that F1 in red is absolutely spot on!

[hurstg01]

Peloton25 said:

It just need's the 'front bumper strips' omitted and more black inside and it'd be one of the best lookers out there - I love the fact it appears to have the black rubber protection under the wheel arches and door sills missing as it makes the car look more aggressive

[Peloton25]

hurstg01 said:

I love the fact it appears to have the black rubber protection under the wheel arches and door sills missing as it makes the car look more aggressive

You may be aware, but this rubberized material was actually gone from the car mid-life when it was silver. Not sure it there had been a repainting of the car to spark this, or if it was simply stripped off?

With:



Without:



>8^)
ER

[flemke]

Peloton25 said:

Very interesting - I certainly recalled the Duckhams connection with you and VP. Also would rate SD pretty highly from my brief conversations and certainly their presence at the Historics (now the "Motorsports Reunion") has grown considerably in the past ~10 years, implying others must agree.

Does this red F1 still have standard suspension bits then, to your knowledge? It appeared to be sitting a touch lower in the photo.

I'm guessing there isn't a chance of you coming over for any of the Monterey activities, but if you were it would be quite good (for me, at least) to say hello at any point.

>8^)
ER

Edited by Peloton25 on Saturday 9th August 10:35

As they are aware of what I have done to my car, I am pretty sure that, if the suspension of this car had been changed in any meaningful way, I would have heard about it.
One thing I can see is that this car still has the standard brake calipers and rotors, which one would change if one had had new uprights made up.

[Dr JonboyG]

flemke said:

At the risk of being shouted at perhaps more loudly ( ), I would prefer it to remain in GG.

Sounds good. Now that I have at least posted in it., it's easy for me to find in "my stuff" so wherever it goes actually immaterial afaic.

[ilduce]

The red one one looks quite nice but the design is really beginning to show it's age.

But wow!.... that silver one is really ugly.
Reminds me of a Subaru SVX.

[Animal]

ilduce said:

The red one one looks quite nice but the design is really beginning to show it's age.

Really? To my mind it's looking as timeless as ever!

[HereBeMonsters]

Peloton25 said:

hurstg01 said:

I love the fact it appears to have the black rubber protection under the wheel arches and door sills missing as it makes the car look more aggressive

You may be aware, but this rubberized material was actually gone from the car mid-life when it was silver. Not sure it there had been a repainting of the car to spark this, or if it was simply stripped off?

With:



Without:



>8^)
ER

Am I the only one who can't see any difference? What am I looking for?

[ilduce]

Animal said:

ilduce said:

The red one one looks quite nice but the design is really beginning to show it's age.

Really? To my mind it's looking as timeless as ever!

Myself excepted, I don't think you'd be on this thread unless you thought otherwise.

Every car goes through the pretty > ugly > pretty, phases.
E.G.
The 308 is now pretty again.
The 355 is starting to become pretty.
The 360 is still ugly.

The McLaren is approaching it's ugly phase.

[greygoose]

HereBeMonsters said:

Peloton25 said:

hurstg01 said:

I love the fact it appears to have the black rubber protection under the wheel arches and door sills missing as it makes the car look more aggressive

You may be aware, but this rubberized material was actually gone from the car mid-life when it was silver. Not sure it there had been a repainting of the car to spark this, or if it was simply stripped off?

With:



Without:



>8^)
ER

Am I the only one who can't see any difference? What am I looking for?

The sill between the front and rear wheels is black in the top picture as coated in some rubber and it is without the rubber in the bottom picture, though it is not that clear due to being in the shade.

[Mjunkie]

Hi guys, new to commenting on the forum but have spend more time than is healthy going through the flemke volume 4 forum.

The car looks amazing, especially the high rise mirrors.

Have a few questions which I apologise in advance if they were answered in one of the 500 previous pages ??

I'm sure I read that you are currently testing carbon brakes on the car. How is this working out and how have you handled the low speed performance with no servo?

Also how do the new wheels compare in weight to the originals? (current and Oz items) you would assume they would be heavier but was unsure if advances in materials may have balanced this out (p1 superalloy anyone?!)

Have you ever enquired about the lm spec engine? I've heard only 2 have ever been fitted with this other than the lms which would make it very unique and am curious as to how much extra performance you would actually get.

One last thing (sorry for the long post) has any other owners upgraded their brakes? Probably none to the extent of yours but was we curious.

Thanks I'm advance for any answers.

Edited by Mjunkie on Wednesday 13th August 08:32

[flemke]

ilduce said:

Animal said:

ilduce said:

The red one one looks quite nice but the design is really beginning to show it's age.

Really? To my mind it's looking as timeless as ever!

Myself excepted, I don't think you'd be on this thread unless you thought otherwise.

Every car goes through the pretty > ugly > pretty, phases.
E.G.
The 308 is now pretty again.
The 355 is starting to become pretty.
The 360 is still ugly.

The McLaren is approaching it's ugly phase.

I'm not sure that you are distinguishing between something that looks good or bad and something that looks of the present time or of an earlier time (sometimes thought of as "style").

The things that make something look good are not time-dependent. Attractive proportions have always been attractive:



Elegant curves have always been elegant:




In cars, I would submit that, since they were built, there has never been a day when these were ugly:









And, since you seem to be a Ferrari fan:








The "ugly phase" thesis does not hold up. In its most important respects, beauty is constant.

Whether a particular thing is intrinsically attractive is another matter. The F1 may not the best looking design amongst sports cars of the last 30 years (since aero and big tyres became important), but it is right up there. Other top contenders would be, for example, F40, Murcielago and Carrera GT. On the other hand, we have cars that, ever since they were first shown, were unattractive and will always be unattractive. Time has not made them better looking, and never can do.

The "dating" question is separate. There are cars that did not look good when they were made, but they seemed to be of their time, and they fit into the visual landscape for that reason. These are the cars that will be progressively less appealing. That is not because they once were nice but have now entered an "ugly phase", but because when introduced they embodied stylistic elements that were common enough that people were inured to them.

[Joe911]

flemke said:

That just has to be the best looking side on car view ever - simply gorgeous, stunning.
Unfortunate though that the view from the front has the quirky headlights.

[epom]

The OZ wheels really were perfect for them.

[flemke]

Mjunkie said:

Hi guys, new to commenting on the forum but have spend more time than is healthy going through the flemke volume 4 forum.

The car looks amazing, especially the high rise mirrors.

Have a few questions which I apologise in advance if they were answered in one of the 500 previous pages ??

I'm sure I read that you are currently testing carbon brakes on the car. How is this working out and how have you handled the low speed performance with no servo?

Also how do the new wheels compare in weight to the originals? (current and Oz items) you would assume they would be heavier but was unsure if advances in materials may have balanced this out (p1 superalloy anyone?!)

Have you ever enquired about the lm spec engine? I've heard only 2 have ever been fitted with this other than the lms which would make it very unique and am curious as to how much extra performance you would actually get.

One last thing (sorry for the long post) has any other owners upgraded their brakes? Probably none to the extent of yours but was we curious.

Thanks I'm advance for any answers.

Sir,

The brakes remain a work-in-progress, largely for reasons not completely related to carbon-carbon brakes. The ones on my car do work at low temp; that issue has been solved. The niggling issue is brake balance, which IMO is the result of weight transfer under dive (although the F1 has less weight transfer than most all road cars, it has a lot more weight transfer than the high-downforce racing cars on which carbon-carbon discs have heretofore exclusively been used).
The result of the weight transfer is that, unlike w iron discs, as more weight goes onto front axle, the carbon-carbon discs get increasingly effective, which means even more weight transfer. The fronts get to the point where they appear to be doing 90+% of the braking. With the rears doing almost no work, it puts too big a heat demand on the fronts. But if you move a sufficient bias to the rears for a heavy stop, you'll have too much bias on the rears for normal stops, especially when it is wet. We are working on methods of balancing the heat transition of fronts and rears.

I have not got the numbers in front of me, but the new wheels weigh almost exactly the same as original road car mag wheels, and are a bit lighter than the original OZ racing car mag wheels. The new tyres are heavier, but there is not much that I can do about that! If we can get carbon-carbon discs to work satisfactorily, they will take out more weight than what the modern tyres add.

Wrt LM engine, that was offered in 2000, just before I bought my car, and once the window shut (with, as you say, only 2 owners taking it up), it was never going to open again.

In any case, McLaren would sell you the LM engine only if you got the high-downforce body kit to go with it. I believe that was not not to squeeze more money out of the client (although no doubt they would have been aware of that outcome) but rather for safety reasons. When I enquired in '01 as to whether we might get BMW to modify my existing engine to LM spec, McLaren told me that, without the HDK, there was no way that they, McLaren, would countenance the work.

In reality it makes no odds. My engine supposedly (according to G. Murray) is putting out IRO 660-670 bhp, as opposed to the "627" official figure. As Mika Hakkinen said, if there is one thing the F1 does not need, it is more power.

Wrt upgrading brakes, I heard that there was someone looking into it, but I am not sure whether he went forward.

You could get a bit more braking performance by using a modern caliper, but I'm not sure than there is a good modern one that would fit. The car's uprights have 130mm spacing for the caliper mounting bolts, and top modern calipers seem to be all 180 or 210.

You could improve the brake cooling, especially at the front as they did, quite effectively, with the GTRs. The snag there is that, in order to facilitate that cooling in the GTRs, they had to remove the air-con and sound systems (as of course they would have done on a racing car anyhow). The sound system is rather unnecessary, both because with the engine and tyre noise it has to compete and because nowadays one could work the whole thing through a very compact, non-CD system (as indeed I have done). On the other hand, the car without air-con can become a pretty uncomfortable place to be.

You could try a different pad (factory use Pagid Blue), which would help with initial bite. Some customers have probably done that, although I don't know of any specific examples apart from myself.

Cheers.