Monday 18th July 2011

Noble M600 - First Delivery Imminent

1200kgs, 650bhp, a full carbon body and yours for £225k

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PH bumped into this Noble M600 on the Michelin stand at CPoP, with lustrous red paintwork concealing the car's all carbon fibre body.

It's the left-hand drive factory demonstrator, we were told, and although we couldn't get inside it - the chap with the keys wisely spending CPoP in the beer tent, probably - a cursory inspection revealed a level of fit and finish that belies the Noble car company's small size.

Just 15 people are employed directly in the making of the beasts, and all their names are engraved on the sill tread plate of the first full carbon-bodied prototype (the one Sutcliffe wrote about for PH here), and in alphabetical order too, as company MD Peter Boutwood pointed out to us with a grin.

Peter was campaigning the black M600 on the track at CPoP, but as he was officially only 'demonstrating', no time has been recorded. Still, we watched him fly (literally) over the bridge on one run on Friday, and a certain amount of commitment was evident!

The M600 has been around for a while now, so it's surprising to learn the first customer car is only due to be handed over to its lucky owner next week. (In fact we wrote back in January that the car was finally 'production-ready'.) Peter tells us now they're really ready, and that the firm is currently on course to build one a month this year, at a cost of £225k a pop. That's slightly down on the 15 cars a year originally mooted, but its early days - especially as the car hasn't been 'marketed' at all while under development, so all the interest has come from media coverage.

£225k sounded like Lamborghini Aventador territory to us, but Peter reckons nobody is going to walk away with the keys to the new Lamborghini without being £270k lighter once they've dipped into the 'essential' options.

In contrast, the Noble M600 is more of a 'what you see is what you get' proposition, and of course it appeals to a different type of driver with its (shock horror!) traditional gear lever jutting up from the centre console, and lack of driver aids. Oh, and that not insignificant 542bhp per tonne from its twin turbo V8.

Looks good in red too, we thought.

	Riggers ruins another picture...

[JNR77]

I think its a lovely looking car; two things;
1. why not make it out of GRP and slash the price dramatically
2. hope the red one is better built than the black one - check the passenger wing mirror in the shot of it coming over the bridge!!!!