A Brief History Of The McLaren F1...

It’s got more seats than an MX-5 and can reach speeds of 240 MPH. It is of course the McLaren F1. So, how did this car come about? Well that’s what we’re about to find out…

The year was 1988 and Gordon Murray was on a flight back home from the Italian Grand Prix when he got bored and started to sketch what he called the “Ultimate Road Car”. The car he drew had three seats, an engine in the middle and one purpose. To go really fast. When Mr. Murray got off the plane he went to Ron Dennis of McLaren and pitched his idea of the ultimate road car. Ron liked the idea and the F1 was born. It was called the F1 because it would use every thing McLaren’s Formula 1 team knew about making things go fast.

During the same year Murray and Dennis went to Honda’s Tochigi Research Center to gauge an idea of what they were going to do. During this visit Murray said that he drove an NSX and was immediately blown away and because of this Murray knew he had to make a car that was better in every way. No small job that. After Murray’s joyride he asked Honda if they could produce him either a 4.5 V10 or a 4.5 V12. Honda refused and so did Isuzu but in the end BMW said yes and so the S70/2 engine was produced. This massive 6.1 V12 could dish out a whopping 618 BHP and only weighing 266 KG. This engine would go down in history as one of the best V12s ever!

So now Murray had his engine and his design all he needed now was some materials to build his dream. He wanted the F1 to be light and nimble like the NSX so he called upon high tech materials to do this. Materials such as: Kevlar, Carbon Fibre, Magnesium and good ol’ fashion Gold. The gold was used in the engine bay as a heat shield because it’s a good heat conductor. The F1 was the first road car to use a Carbon Fibre monocoque. This of course made it very light and very tough. In fact, during hot weather testing in Namibia a prototype F1 hit a large “rock” and flipped several times. The driver left unscathed and he was only wearing a T-Shirt and shorts.

The F1 was built between 1992 and 1998 with only 106 cars leaving the factory. In 1998 the XP5 prototype hit a radar confirmed 240.1 MPH. This speed was achieved by taking the rev limiter off. It still remains one of the best engineering feats ever and is still praised today. And I expect for many more years to come…