RE: Good news: GMA declares its new factory open

[Pit Pony]

asci.white said:

Pit Pony said:

They should put it further north in one of the powerhouses of Automotive somewhere like erm *Cofton Hacket, Speke, Lostock Hall, Erdington, Hooton, connons quay, Etwall, or lytham.st annes where labour and brown field land are cheap and plentiful. And Engineers can afford to live.

• Longbridge, Halewood, Leyland, Castle Bromwhich, Ellesmere port, Deeside, Derby and Blackpool, might be better places in my humble opinion.

Surrey has a long history of building and racing cars (you've heard of Brooklands?).

If they can, then why not?

There are lots of amazing engineers in the area so why shouldn't it be used for this... Not being rude but that's a short sighted view...

I work with alot of amazing Engineers, (Automotivevand Aerospace) most of whom would not consider relocating South, without an increase of %%%% in salary, which suggests to me that the decision making is biased in some way.

On the other hand. if you've already got the engineers you need, you'd struggle to get 80% of them to move very far, so you are stuck building it in an expensive region.

[PIHP]

While I admire the drive and ambition to make these cars, the T50 is ugly. The T33 much more pleasing. Not sure where they go from here. What happens when GM stops?

[RSstuff]

Honeywell said:

Surely it should be Sir Gordon Murray by now?

Definitely a PH God.

Hello Gordon, say what you mean.

[rallycross]

Turn the sound up loud and just enjoy the sounds of this on its debut at Goodwood today what a fantastic sounding car

https://youtu.be/44oVACzPnBw?si=Tx4Y5hyQUyj_-JWd


It looks great as well as sounding amazing

Edited by rallycross on Saturday 13th April 16:56

[skwdenyer]

PIHP said:

While I admire the drive and ambition to make these cars, the T50 is ugly. The T33 much more pleasing. Not sure where they go from here. What happens when GM stops?

IIRC there are already three more models / variants in the wings to come off the T33 platform (although they might all be just T33 variants).

There must be a lot of consultancy work going on in the background to justify all of the expenditure. And presumably that isn’t dependent upon GM himself. But I agree there is an open question as to whether true aim is to grow and sell and, if so, to who?

[Midgster]

asci.white said:

Pit Pony said:

They should put it further north in one of the powerhouses of Automotive somewhere like erm *Cofton Hacket, Speke, Lostock Hall, Erdington, Hooton, connons quay, Etwall, or lytham.st annes where labour and brown field land are cheap and plentiful. And Engineers can afford to live.

• Longbridge, Halewood, Leyland, Castle Bromwhich, Ellesmere port, Deeside, Derby and Blackpool, might be better places in my humble opinion.

Surrey has a long history of building and racing cars (you've heard of Brooklands?).

If they can, then why not?

There are lots of amazing engineers in the area so why shouldn't it be used for this... Not being rude but that's a short sighted view...

Seriously? I doubt there is anywhere in the UK that has as much history in making cars as Surrey. Especially race cars. These are the ones I can think of off the top of my head, but there were many more obscure manufacturers in the early 1900's mainly located around the Thames-Ditton / Walton-on-Thames / Weybridge area for obvious reasons (Brooklands)

Mclaren
Caterham
Cooper
AC
Alta
Invicta
Lister
HWM

[Midgster]

Mr Tidy said:

Bernt Tuakrisp said:

asci.white said:

British Beef said:

flying in on private jet, to Heathrow, limo straight to showroom, getting measured up for bespoke seats, specifying vehicle and then heading off?
.

Pedantic perhaps, but most fly in via Biggin Hill..

More likely to be Farnborough for a GMA visit.

Blackbushe might be nearer and more stealthy, although it didn't go so well for some of Saddams relatives!

Farnborough would still be just a few miles nearer, plus an easier journey down the M3 as apposed to the A30......much nicer and faster planes available at Farnborough too.

And It was Bin Laden's family that crashed at Blackbushe......I didn't see the crash, but I drove past sooner after and saw the flames/smoke.

[Harry H]

The T33 has replaced a Pagani in my lottery garage.

That 11,000 rpm N/A V12 just ticks the boxes. The T50 with fan assist ground effect is just too complicated for me.

And luckily it's only just up the road. Where do I sign ?

[Magikarp]

"You're through to GMA, How can I help?"
"Hi, It's Les....
...
Les Edgar.
...
TVR
...
CEO of TVR
...
The Griffith
...
You, know from Wales. Just wondering if we could..... hello?
...
Bugger"

[Limpet]

Harry H said:

The T33 has replaced a Pagani in my lottery garage.

That 11,000 rpm N/A V12 just ticks the boxes. The T50 with fan assist ground effect is just too complicated for me.

And luckily it's only just up the road. Where do I sign ?

Same for me. I can appreciate the T50 as a piece of engineering excellence, but the T33 is the one I find myself really wanting. Simple, light, well proportioned, and with a truly epic engine. It's stunning.

The rear end is just so much cleaner than T50's, and let's face it any compromise in driving experience in normal road use (which is what Gordon designed these cars for) is going to be miniscule.

[borat52]

MrBig said:

I look forward to seeing what else they come up with in the next few years. As much as the T33 and T50 are awesome, I really like Gordons thinking in terms of smaller and more mainstream transportation solutions.

How many sites are they up to now? I hope they keep the Windlesham facility as its a really cool setup.

I personally think there's something of a gap which could be filled of an electric sports car, with a small battery of say 10-15KWH (which if you got it light enough should be capable of 30-40 miles on pure electric with a small combustion engine made as light as possible purely to generate electricity to charge the battery as a range extender.

So on short trip / commute you could easily run it pure EV and for track / longer spirited drives the combustion engine would be capable of keeping the battery topped up.

[eliot]

rallycross said:

Turn the sound up loud and just enjoy the sounds of this on its debut at Goodwood today what a fantastic sounding car

https://youtu.be/44oVACzPnBw?si=Tx4Y5hyQUyj_-JWd


It looks great as well as sounding amazing

Edited by rallycross on Saturday 13th April 16:56

Instead of the actual fan, couldn't you use the exhaust as a venturi effect - bit like they did on the rotary nortons?

[740EVTORQUES]

borat52 said:

I personally think there's something of a gap which could be filled of an electric sports car, with a small battery of say 10-15KWH (which if you got it light enough should be capable of 30-40 miles on pure electric with a small combustion engine made as light as possible purely to generate electricity to charge the battery as a range extender.

So on short trip / commute you could easily run it pure EV and for track / longer spirited drives the combustion engine would be capable of keeping the battery topped up.

You need a much bigger battery in order to get the current delivery needed for acceleration, it’s a chicken and egg thing and why faster EVs often have bigger batteries than you might want.

[Mr Tidy]

Midgster said:

Mr Tidy said:

Bernt Tuakrisp said:

asci.white said:

British Beef said:

flying in on private jet, to Heathrow, limo straight to showroom, getting measured up for bespoke seats, specifying vehicle and then heading off?
.

Pedantic perhaps, but most fly in via Biggin Hill..

More likely to be Farnborough for a GMA visit.

Blackbushe might be nearer and more stealthy, although it didn't go so well for some of Saddams relatives!

Farnborough would still be just a few miles nearer, plus an easier journey down the M3 as apposed to the A30......much nicer and faster planes available at Farnborough too.

And It was Bin Laden's family that crashed at Blackbushe......I didn't see the crash, but I drove past sooner after and saw the flames/smoke.

TBF I doubt Farnborough is more than 2 miles nearer the M3 at J4a than Blackbushe, and I assume Bin Laden's family were relatives.

Anyway as much as I admire the technical "tour de force" of the T50 I much prefer the looks of the T33, and in a car like that even 2 seats would be one too many!

I just need a Euromillions win now.

[borat52]

740EVTORQUES said:

borat52 said:

I personally think there's something of a gap which could be filled of an electric sports car, with a small battery of say 10-15KWH (which if you got it light enough should be capable of 30-40 miles on pure electric with a small combustion engine made as light as possible purely to generate electricity to charge the battery as a range extender.

So on short trip / commute you could easily run it pure EV and for track / longer spirited drives the combustion engine would be capable of keeping the battery topped up.

You need a much bigger battery in order to get the current delivery needed for acceleration, it’s a chicken and egg thing and why faster EVs often have bigger batteries than you might want.

Is it not possible to use something like a capacitor and construct the battery out of multiple smaller cells to provide larger currents in smaller capacities?

[pheonix478]

Why on earth didn't he do this 20 years ago instead of doing weird stuff and moaning about everyone else's cars?

[borat52]

740EVTORQUES said:

That’s over £200,000 for every car projected for the current ranges just for the building.

I know it’s all debt but how do the economics of a such a car company work with that scale of capital investment (vs just renting a site)?

You pay for it either with cash in the bank or with a loan, then as long as you built it sensibly you have an asset on the balance sheet to the value of the money you spent. So the annual cost is the depreciation in the building + interest (be it a loan or the opportunity cost of interest forgone on savings).

In recent history buildings have tended to go up in value so if you believe that will continue it's just the interest you have as an annual liability.

[Davey S2]

Isebac said:

fantheman80 said:

Is GMA the only British manufacturer that actually does things on time??

I don't think there is a single thing that they did on time, actually.

T.50: Originally supposed to start deliveries in January 2022 - Jay Kay had a "delivery event" just last week, but the car is still not registered and I don't think he's actually taken delivery of it.

T.33: Originally supposed to be delivered about 15 months after the T.50 - no clue when this is gonna happen, they only started running first prototypes this year, so it might still be 2 years out or more.

The buildings: 2024 was supposed to be the year when ALL THREE planned buildings were finished - So far, only ONE is finished and I don't think they even started on the other two.

JK Car has gone to Topaz for PPF apparently and is expected on the road late May or early June iirc.

I expect Topaz will have a few of these through their doors so probably busy getting the templates done.

[pheonix478]

Isebac said:

fantheman80 said:

Is GMA the only British manufacturer that actually does things on time??

I don't think there is a single thing that they did on time, actually.

T.50: Originally supposed to start deliveries in January 2022 - Jay Kay had a "delivery event" just last week, but the car is still not registered and I don't think he's actually taken delivery of it.

T.33: Originally supposed to be delivered about 15 months after the T.50 - no clue when this is gonna happen, they only started running first prototypes this year, so it might still be 2 years out or more.

The buildings: 2024 was supposed to be the year when ALL THREE planned buildings were finished - So far, only ONE is finished and I don't think they even started on the other two.

The timing worked out quite nicely for all the Valkyrie refugees.