A new British sportscar has been launched that is designed to be the spiritual successor to TVR and Marcos. The Breckland Beira is a 400bhp British-built two-seater that uses GM’s LS2, 6-litre V8. The car is based on the GM Kappa platform and uses many of the company’s tried and tested parts in a bid to keep the costs down. The Beira weighs in at a not exactly flyweight 1,400kg but should be good for 0-62mph in under five seconds, although the top speed is curiously limited to 155mph.
‘Beira carries on from where Marcos and TVR left off in terms of providing maximum performance for money spent, and real individuality,’ said Breckland director Mike Rawlings. ‘We wanted to showcase Breckland’s design and engineering capabilities and produce an exciting driver’s car, with excellent handling dynamics, terrific performance and great looks,’ he added. Breckland is based in Norfolk but is part of Hong Kong-based multi-national Riche Holdings. The company normally specialises in prototypes for other car manufacturers such as Mosler, but this time has decided to create its very own vehicle. The Beira has been designed to run on Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) as well as petrol, which the company says gives it a range of 700 miles between stops.
‘We didn’t set out to reinvent the wheel with Beira,’ continued Easton. ‘The Kappa platform offers a highly competent chassis, which has been subject to intensive crash and safety tests, and is readily available. ‘Since all of the hard work has been done, it has enabled us to keep development costs low. Over the years, and through our own experience, we’ve seen many supercars come and go, due in part to their massive development costs, and we were adamant that we would not fall into the same trap. ‘That’s why we developed the Beira where we needed to, not for the sake of it. It has also enabled us to bring the project to fruition in less than 12 months.’
The car features fully independent suspension engineered by Breckland in association with KW Suspension which is said to be focused towards good handling with a firm ride. Stopping power is provided by 325mm ventilated discs on all four corners, the fronts being grasped by six-pot callipers, with four-pot at the rear, both from UK specialists, HiSpec. Inside there are such luxuries as a 7” TFT colour touch screen, DVD player, direct iPod and Bluetooth connectivity, and an in-built 30Gb hard disk drive (HDD) navigation system. Buyers can also opt for the rear reversing camera, which relays the view behind onto the same in-dash display. The Breckland Beira on-the-road price will be confirmed shortly but is expected to be in the region of £55,000 in the UK. The car is expected to break cover at Motorexpo, Canary Wharf, and will be on sale from this November.