2022 Gordon Murray T.50 – Full Presentation / The World’s Lightest Supercar. Gordon Murray has revealed his self-styled successor to the McLaren F1: the Gordon Murray Automotive T.50. The famed automotive engineer describes it as a true analogue supercar and the perfect antidote to increasingly heavy modern hypercars.
With 2020 marking the 50th year of Professor Murray’s career, the T.50 features nods to his work in car design and Formula One. It features ground-effect aerodynamics and a bespoke V12 engine from Cosworth, while all of the major components have been sourced from UK companies.
This is our first proper look at the T.50. Only 100 will be produced, costing £2.36million each before taxes, and almost two thirds of the production run has already been sold.
Murray explains that the T.50’s design is an exercise in purity, emphasising the absence of large wings, flaps or vents, found on contemporary supercars and hypercars. As such, the low nose of the vehicle is smooth and unspoilt by a large splitter or canards, and is reminiscent of the McLaren F1.
“It looks even better than I hoped,” he told us during a walkaround with the car. “There’s not a single surface on this car that I’m not happy with. It looks really cool, and a massive change from the current crop of supercars. There seems to be a war to see who can make the most outrageous-looking car with swoops and ducts and wings. This one’s pretty pure like the F1.”
Against the tape, the T.50 is 4,352mm long, 1,850mm wide – giving it a footprint that’s a little larger than a Volkswagen Golf’s – and 1,164mm tall. Crucially, weight is kept below one tonne, at 986kg with fluids. The chassis is bonded carbon-aluminium, while the bodywork is carbon fibre.
However, the T.50’s most obvious revision over the McLaren F1 is at the rear, where a large fan capable of generating 15kg of downforce is found. It’s a nod to Prof Murray’s infamous BT46B Fan Car that raced in the 1978 F1 season, and provides the T.50 with true ground-effect aerodynamics, without the need for any large wings or splitters. Murray revealed to Auto Express that a twin-fan arrangement was considered during the McLaren F1’s development, but that time constraints ruled it out.
The drivetrain is another nod to analogue supercars of the past. Professor Murray has commissioned Cosworth to develop a high-revving, naturally aspirated 4.0-litre V12 for the T.50 developing 654bhp and up to 690bhp with ram induction. Maximum power is produced at 11,500rpm, with the redline set at 12,100rpm.
The mid-mounted motor is fully on show in the engine bay, unobscured by covers. “This is such a killer engine Cosworth has done. It’s so far ahead of anything else that’s ever been produced in its weight, layout, maximum revs and power density. In particular, the responsiveness is light-years ahead,” Murray told us.
No performance figures have been revealed just yet; according to Murray, they aren’t the point of the T.50. “The reality of chasing top speeds only adds weight, notably through ever-more powerful engines, which increase the requirement for larger, heavier ancillaries. We are taking a very different approach,” he explained.
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