Prodrive amphi-car project is full steam ahead

Banbury engineering firm is developing a car-boat that'll cost about £150,000 and be capable of 30 knots

By Sam Sheehan / Thursday, 2 August 2018 / Loading comments

Prodrive is a company famed for its successes in world rally, endurance racing and its involvement in the BAR Formula 1 team, to name a few. But soon, this esteemed British engineering company could add amphibious vehicles to its encyclopaedia-thick portfolio. A logical next step, right?

Prodrive founder and boss David Richards has just revealed his company’s plans to Autocar, but as someone who can’t sit on a good idea, he’s already kick-started a development programme. So this is no splash in the water. It’s happening.

Inspiration for the amphi-car came from the Watercar Panther (pictured top), a US-developed amphibious car, one of which Richards owns and has modified to enhance its performance. He’s now confident Banbury’s motorsport company can make one from the ground up the Prodrive way.

“I went to see [a Panther] in Los Angeles and was pleasantly surprised with the quality, so I bought one with the intention of importing some into Europe,” he said. “But there’s lots of legislation, and it’s tricky for the EU with emissions and crash testing. Even single type approval had some insurmountable problems.”

While Richards and his company are making their car-boat the Prodrive way, it won’t unfortunately be coming with a boxer engine or take inspiration from an iconic competition machine, like this Subaru Impreza P1 we found yesterday. But rest assured that it’ll be engineered to be very fit for purpose; Richards said he expects it to be capable of being driven to the beach, into the sea and then at speeds of up to 30 knots – which is about 34.5mph.

“I have some young engineers working on it – we’re all excited by it,” he said. “I have a boat engineer looking at the hull,” a person you would have to hope is good at keeping things afloat.

As for what will power this car-boat, the high resistance provided to a propeller shaft in water means the engine will drink from the black pump. “It needs torque, so a good torquey turbodiesel is needed,” said Richards.

Don’t expect road handling for this Prodrive-made amphi-car to bear resemblance to its other vehicles, because Richards said that amphibious cars can be “neither a great car nor a great boat”. Since the risks are generally higher out in the deep blue sea, the priority will be placed towards boating end of the spectrum in development.

“You err towards making it a better boat, but you can still make it a better car,” Richards explained.

There’s no word as to when this Prodrive car-boat will make it to production, but Richards suggested that a starting price of around £150,000 is likely. That anchors it firmly in McLaren 570S territory – and they’re rubbish in lakes.