Tuesday 26th February 2008

Caterham Announces Official Performance Arm

Caterham teams up with RS Performance to offer official V8 Sevens

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Caterham cars has announced a new official performance arm to offer bespoke V8-engined Sevens.

The company has joined forces with RS Performance to offer an ‘everything is possible’ service to Caterham customers who want truly unique cars.

RS Performance is an exclusive, niche engineering house that has spent 16 years developing the 40-valve, 2.4 litre RS-V8 motor.

It reliably delivers 400bhp in normally aspirated mode, or over 500bhp as a supercharged variant, whilst weighing only 90kg in full running gear.

Matched to the featherweight Seven chassis the V8 delivers a power-to-weight ratio of over 1000bhp per tonne – more than double of a Bugatti Veyron.

The RS Performance badge will sit alongside the established, and soon to be expanded, Ford powered Caterham Seven range.

Caterham said in a statement: ‘This unique partnership will be open to customers looking for the ultimate in exclusivity, and carry a price tag to reflect the tailoring, detail and hand-built craftsmanship that will go into every RS-badged Caterham.’

The first Seven to rollout of RS Performance’s Hertfordshire doors, and which only seven more of this type will be available, is the supercharged ‘Levante’.

With a 12 week waiting time and costing over £115,000, the car boasts a modern interpretation of the Seven’s classic looks, but has a sophisticated electronics package including traction and launch control to help get the power to the floor.

Weight reduction runs throughout the car, from the carbon fibre interior finished with Kevlar seats down to the hosing used on the cooling systems.

Ansar Ali, Caterham Cars managing director, added: ‘Caterham and Russell Savory have a long history, and this seemed a natural progression of that relationship and shared engineering philosophy.’

[z_chromozone]

£115,000


You could buy an old F3, transporter, and a nice everyday car for that.

Are people really going to drive these things on the road, or just the track.

Z

If I had money to burn I would still buy one.

[Martin_Hx]

Very very nice but the pirce is erm...

[Fetchez la vache]

115k? Holy Moley!

[james_tigerwoods]

Couldn't you just buy a Westfield V8 and tune it?

Looks nice though - but the pricetag is a bit eye-watering....

[superlightr]

90 kg for the car? thats unbelievable light. running gear... is that with or without the engine?

[DJC]

Will they do just a V8 in the basic car?

Its a Caterham, I want it basic, I want it light, a heater, radio and 2 speakers and thats it for me. And a V8!

They would have my money sooner than my wife could say divorce!

[MarkoTVR]

superlightr said:

90 kg for the car? thats unbelievable light. running gear... is that with or without the engine?

I think the 90kg refers to the weight of the engine.....

Edited by MarkoTVR on Tuesday 26th February 10:56

[Fetchez la vache]

superlightr said:

90 kg for the car? thats unbelievable light. running gear... is that with or without the engine?

90kg for the engine...

[HeavySoul]

£115k?

[MarkoTVR]

Is there an echo in here?!

[dinkel]

Wow and wow . . . I believe it's worth every penny but that's a lot of blue for a car.

'Ringrecord anyone?

I bet you need to be a monsterdriver to handle this.

D'voort Audi V6 has 270 brake . . . and did the 'Ringrecord a year or so ago . . .

Edited by dinkel on Tuesday 26th February 11:00

[The Black Flash]

115K!!!

Methinks you can build a 500hp seven for somewhat less than that. And have enough left to buy an ultima, probably.

Looks cool though.

[RobM77]

There's at least one RST V8 Caterham knocking around isn't there? If I remember rightly that was in the smaller traditional chassis as well

It's crazy to think that this thing is twice as potent at an R500, which was already thought by some to be a bit too much and yet it still has half the power and half hald the power to weight ratio of an F1 car...

Personally, for the money I'd take an R400, a Radical SR8 and a secondhand M3 or a 911

Edited by RobM77 on Tuesday 26th February 10:59

[lord summerisle]

RobM77 said:

There's at least one RST V8 Caterham knocking around isn't there? If I remember rightly that was in the smaller traditional chassis as well

Yip - it was a supercharged RST v8 on display at the caterham stand at the Autosport show

[Jonty355]

How is this going to be any better than a well built dax rush?

[chris_w666]

Surely a well specced westfield cosworth could provide that kind of power to weight at a fraction of the money, and you'd still be able to buy an rs4/rs6 audi as a tow car, probably enter a race series or at least do a couple of years worth of track days. Still anyone building mental cars at any cost sounds good.

[jfp]

I just hope they have sorted the "issues" the engine has already had. It's performance to date in race cars has been questionable, putting it in a road car such as the Caterham (didn't work in the T1) might mean it's so understressed (can't imagine holding it at full throttle for long in a 7) that it may just work...!!??

[mk1fan]

Caterham have a specialist performance division???

[RobM77]

I suppose the problem that Caterham have is that they build, in my opinion, the best fun weekend cars and track day cars available. In the past, with track days relatively rare, they held a unique position in making such a car, and as such it was massively quicker than anything on sale, which represented a great marketing point for them.

Now though, with trackdays becoming more and more common, the outright speed mantle has been grabbed by other companies offering either more powerful cars (Noble M400) or ones with downforce (Radicals), so Caterham have lost their unique selling point.

It's a great shame that things come down to pure speed, because, having driven and ridden in some of the faster opposition to Caterham, I still think that Caterham build the best road and track car in the world with their R300 and R400.

Of course, Caterham responded with the independantly sprung CSR range. Sadly, these cars haven't been as well received as the original chassis, and I believe the De Dion cars still outsell the newer more advanced CSRs.

It's a shame that the emphasis is so much on speed and lap times these days, rather than pure fun. For pure fun, I'd still choose an original Caterham (R400) every time.

[james_tigerwoods]

Personally, I applaud the sheer insanity of it all