Discussion
robbiemeister said:
GuyR said:
I must have been having brain fade when I typed as I could see the uprights had the original F1 logos on them, must have just confued uprights with wishbones when typing....
Brown nose!
What a fabulously relevent comment - thanks for that!
Is it me or has this thread recently become populated by people who rather than being interested in hearing and questioning the experiences of someone who owns and actively uses an F1, would rather decry the very existance of the thread and some of the comments from those who have massive enthusiasm for the car?
If you don't wish to engage properly in this thread, then don't bother reading it.
Guy
Flemke,
Now that the F1 is 'acceptable' for use in the US do you think there's the possibility of it ever being built again (i.e. as the Elan & MGB were revived)? The tooling, instructions etc must still exist - it's still a competitive & desirable car? Or would current safety & emissions regs prevent it rather than the will to resume manufacture?
cheers,
Now that the F1 is 'acceptable' for use in the US do you think there's the possibility of it ever being built again (i.e. as the Elan & MGB were revived)? The tooling, instructions etc must still exist - it's still a competitive & desirable car? Or would current safety & emissions regs prevent it rather than the will to resume manufacture?
cheers,
steil said:
Flemke,
Now that the F1 is 'acceptable' for use in the US do you think there's the possibility of it ever being built again (i.e. as the Elan & MGB were revived)? The tooling, instructions etc must still exist - it's still a competitive & desirable car? Or would current safety & emissions regs prevent it rather than the will to resume manufacture?
cheers,
Now that the F1 is 'acceptable' for use in the US do you think there's the possibility of it ever being built again (i.e. as the Elan & MGB were revived)? The tooling, instructions etc must still exist - it's still a competitive & desirable car? Or would current safety & emissions regs prevent it rather than the will to resume manufacture?
cheers,
Steil,
That possibility is pretty much an impossibility, for a number of reasons.
- The only mechanism by which the cars are now road-legal in the US is the "Show or Display" law. It gives a car owner the opportunity to petition the Department of Transportation to waive its equivalent to Construction and Use, Type Approval and safety rules, which as you can imagine are very extensive.
This possible exemption does not apply to a manufacturer. That is to say, a new F1 would have to pass even more stringent safety tests than the ones that were deemed too stringent in '93.
- Even with a Show or Display exemption, any imported car must pass the emissions tests that were operative in the year in which the car was made. Current emissions regs are much tougher than they were in '93.
The F1s require a good bit of tinkering in order to pass all these (1995) tests (like 50 grand's worth). Many fail on the first go.
There are a couple of companies that have "Federalized" the emissions systems on most of the F1s that have been imported, and, shall we say, there is some doubt as to the propriety of their work (as in, these two places that do the modifications also do their own certifications. The Government is currently investigating.
). - Even with all that, there is the matter of OBD-II.
What is OBD-II?
On-Board Diagnostic systems are in most cars and light trucks on the road today. During the '70s and early 1980's manufacturers started using electronic means to control engine functions and diagnose engine problems. This was primarily to meet EPA emission standards. Through the years on-board diagnostic systems have become more sophisticated. OBD-II, a new standard introduced in the mid-'90s, provides almost complete engine control and also monitors parts of the chassis, body and accessory devices, as well as the diagnostic control network of the car.
copied from internet
In the US, OBD-II became mandatory on 01-01-96. If you bring into the States a car that was made after that date (in the case of the F1, roughly the last third of the build run), it must have OBD-II. This is why there are almost no F1s in the US that are post-'95 (and one would have to wonder about the legality of any US cars that are post'95). It is humanly possible to install OBD-II on any car, but as with the emissions Federalizing that I described above, it's very tedious and expensive to do properly.
All this is to say that it would be even more difficult to get an F1 into the States today than it was a dozen years ago, and even then McLaren elected not to try.
Then you have the other issues.
- McLaren made a big deal out of having made exactly 100 (plus prototypes) cars. Some of the cars' present value comes from their limited numbers. To restart the production run would be a breach of faith with the owners, and on that basis alone I doubt that McLaren would entertain the possibility.
- At the moment McLaren is a pretty dynamic place, with a lot of projects underway and potentially some transition what with the new investors, the best prospects for Formula One that they've had in some time, possible Prodrive supply for next year, the "successor" to SLR and other things. They don't have the organisational time to get involved in something like this.
- On many occasions Dennis has said that he's not interested in looking back, only forward. I find it pleasantly surprising that he's shown as much respect to Bruce McLaren and the team's history as he has done (although sadly they closed the McLaren Heritage Dep't a year ago). I cannot imagine what would attract him to repeating the past.
- They wouldn't make any money doing such a project.
In the previous thread (which, I guess it was, Haymarket chose to put in mothballs), I did a seat-of-the-pants estimate of what the marginal cost of production of the F1 was. In present money, IIRC, it might have been £550K net of VAT.
Let's say that they could do the crash tests and make the OBD-II and emissions changes for another £100K/car (mixing fixed and variable here, but whatever, and I'd guess that 100 is way too low), so we're at £650. The VAT gets us to north of £750,000.
How much are you going to sell one for? The present market value seems to be 800K-1M, but the cars won't sell themselves, so that would require additional expense, whilst at the same time the fact that they would be, say, doubling the present supply would of course put pressure on the price that they could achieve.
Maybe they could get £900K for a new, "continuation" car, but with a build cost + VAT of 750 and marketing, start-up, etc of at least another 100/car, that would leave them with a profit of 50/car (less VAT, so really about 38!) If they sold 100 cars, that would be total profit for the whole project of £3.8M. Not worth it on the economics, let alone the many other hassles.
Is it conceivable that in a number of years' time Mercedes might do some sort of F1-inspired cheap derivative, in the spirit of the Alfa 33 Stradale thingy, the new Mustang, Ford GT, and other modern cars that have been built mainly because their large manufacturers couldn't think of anything new and better? Sure. But there is pretty much no way that McLaren would do a continuation run of F1s.
jamieboy said:
flemke said:
...some sort of F1-inspired cheap derivative, in the spirit of the Alfa 33 Stradale thingy
Do you mean the 8C Competizione (more in the spirit of the TZ2 than the 33 Stradale, I'd say) or the Sbarro Diva, or is there something else in the pipeline? I mean the 8C (do you know why they tack that "Competizione" on it?).
Agreed that from many angles it's more like the TZ2. That weird wrap-over rear window in the TZs gives them a distinctive character that I cannot separate from the rest of the car.
flemke said:
jamieboy said:
flemke said:
...some sort of F1-inspired cheap derivative, in the spirit of the Alfa 33 Stradale thingy
Do you mean the 8C Competizione (more in the spirit of the TZ2 than the 33 Stradale, I'd say) or the Sbarro Diva, or is there something else in the pipeline? Agreed that from many angles it's more like the TZ2. That weird wrap-over rear window in the TZs gives them a distinctive character that I cannot separate from the rest of the car.
Not sure why they've added Competizione to the name other than possibly to distinguish it from the historic 8Cs, or more likely to make it sound more exotic.
flemke said:
I mean the 8C (do you know why they tack that "Competizione" on it?).
Love coming back to this thread time and time again, and for once think I may add something useful...or at least go for the common mistake if I'm wrong.
Was "Competizione" a nod and a wink to the Alfa 6C Competizione that Fangio drove in the Mille Miglia?
Think it was mentioned in Evo when it was reviewed.
GuyR said:
robbiemeister said:
GuyR said:
I must have been having brain fade when I typed as I could see the uprights had the original F1 logos on them, must have just confued uprights with wishbones when typing....
Brown nose!
What a fabulously relevent comment - thanks for that!
Is it me or has this thread recently become populated by people who rather than being interested in hearing and questioning the experiences of someone who owns and actively uses an F1, would rather decry the very existance of the thread and some of the comments from those who have massive enthusiasm for the car?
If you don't wish to engage properly in this thread, then don't bother reading it.
Guy
Sorry, I thought you might see the funny side of it. Just trying to lighten things up a bit.
I have to admit I'm more interested in the psyche of the people that post here than I am in the car.
I have had long conversations with two expert drivers who have driven an F1. What was interesting was thier completely polar opinions of the car. Which suggests to me that the only way one can truly experience something is to actually do it.
I have also had long conversations with the cars designer. I found over the years that he was more interested in talking about rock music and wine.
Maybe I should start a thread about the Min Bug.
flemke said:
- At the moment McLaren is a pretty dynamic place, with a lot of projects underway and potentially some transition what with the new investors, the best prospects for Formula One that they've had in some time, possible Prodrive supply for next year, the "successor" to SLR and other things. They don't have the organisational time to get involved in something like this.
- On many occasions Dennis has said that he's not interested in looking back, only forward. I find it pleasantly surprising that he's shown as much respect to Bruce McLaren and the team's history as he has done (although sadly they closed the McLaren Heritage Dep't a year ago). I cannot imagine what would attract him to repeating the past.
I suppose this means that McLaren will not do a 'lotus elise' type car in the forseeable future. - On many occasions Dennis has said that he's not interested in looking back, only forward. I find it pleasantly surprising that he's shown as much respect to Bruce McLaren and the team's history as he has done (although sadly they closed the McLaren Heritage Dep't a year ago). I cannot imagine what would attract him to repeating the past.
I guess that makes sense from a 'concentrate on your core business' point of view, always a sensible thing to do, but for me it's a shame that the expertise (even via a spin-off company) cannot be used to create a cheap and cheerful (i.e. accessible) sports car that concentrates on the agility aspects that Lotus does rather well now.
i know everyone says the breaks on the F1 are bad but in what perspective generaly bad or bad for something that is a rocket ship on wheels ? and surely there have been some upgrades for this i know that owners of such cars like to keep the stock but surely some carbon cermaics would be nice
haggle said:
i know everyone says the breaks on the F1 are bad but in what perspective generaly bad or bad for something that is a rocket ship on wheels ? and surely there have been some upgrades for this i know that owners of such cars like to keep the stock but surely some carbon cermaics would be nice
I doubt the breaks are all that bad but relative to more modern supercars arnt that good? Flemke has stated a few times that any break upgrade cant use fancy materials (carbon/ceramic) without the addition of brake servo's which he's not willing to install.
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