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    First McLaren F1 for sale

    Yup thats right, the first production F1 to roll out of the line is up for grabs, somebody give Mike a call. the car is going for US$ 3.1 million and currently belongs to Gemballa.

    http://www.topgear.com/uk/photos/first-mclaren-for-sale?imageNo=0

    http://www.jameslist.com/advert/161629/for-sale-mclaren-f1


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    I can only assume Gemballa is trying to sell off its assets to cover its losses


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    RT Moderator - 997.1 Carrera S GT Silver/Cocoa, -20mm/LSD, PSE, short shifter, SportDesign rims, Zuffenhausen collection

    Rennteam signature photo 2.jpg


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

     The description in the original Jameslist ad did not match up with known facts related to the "first F1". I emailed the seller yesterday asking for an explanation surrounding those discrepancies and while I have not received a reply (didn't expect one to be honest) the ad has been changed and no longer references the car as the first F1.

    I believe the car they are attempting to broker is in Japan as the description and price are quite close to one that has been offered there for some time now. The photos in the ad show chassis #013.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Nice work, Peloton25! And that after 9 posts here.


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    indeed shifting is ancient technology - so is a fuel burning engine..  I happen to like both :) 


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Thanks.

    It may be only 9 posts here so far, but I moderate a McLaren F1 specific forum where I've amassed over 6,000 posts since 2003. 

    Suffice to say I follow the F1s quite closely and always try to ensure that people have the most accurate information available.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

     Thanks Peloton for setting that record straight. Good to have confirmation from someone who really knows such a specific subject  


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Sure thing - always happy to discuss the F1 and share what I know.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Ok, do you have a gallery or image thread going on your forum? I've been looking for wall-paper images quite a while now.


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    indeed shifting is ancient technology - so is a fuel burning engine..  I happen to like both :) 


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Atzporsche:

    Ok, do you have a gallery or image thread going on your forum? I've been looking for wall-paper images quite a while now.

     +1    a picture thread of F1s has to be epic.

     


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Quoting this from another place, but I don't think anyone will mind - this should get us off to a good start. :)

     = = = = = =

    I get occasional requests for images from random folks on the internet who know of my passion for the McLaren F1. I usually send them a handful of files - the ones that are freshest in my mind typically - but thought it would be nice to put together a larger sample of what I consider many of the best McLaren F1 images in existence.

    My original goal was to put together my 100 favorites, but in organizing the ones I liked the most I breezed past that magic number and was well on my way to 125, so I made that the new goal. Had I kept on going I probably could have found another 25 that should be included, but I figured this was enough for now. To keep size constraints of the full set down, I didn't include them all at their highest resolutions. If there are any you are interested in getting a larger version of, feel free to ask and I will see what I have to offer you.

    I'm sure folks here will recongize some of these images, but hopefully a some are new. I tried to supply a very random sample - there have been some full sets of images that could have all be included. I am sure there are also some that I have overlooked which should be included. In that regard, I'd invite anyone else to add to this thread with a set of their own favorites that I may have missed or simply haven't seen. I'll probably do the same as time goes on.

    Here's a link to a file hosting site if you'd like to grab the entire set all at once. The .ZIP file I hosted is 33MB in size and this site was giving me an average of 300Mbps download speeds, so the entire file was complete in about two minutes.

    http://www.mediafire.com/?ftm0mjocuzd

    If you'd rather pick and choose which ones you want, here's a complete set of thumbnails that are all clickable for the high resolution versions.

    If you have questions about any of the F1s in these images post the image number and I'll be happy to address them to the best of my knowledge. I also have higher resolution versions available for some of these shots, so if you see a few you really like let me know and I'll see if I can supply a larger version than what's presented here.

    Enjoy the pics!

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Here's 10 additional images I've added to my selection but would not be included in the ZIP file linked above:

    It has been a few years now since I put this selection of shots together and it is probably time for me to skim the collection and find some more worthy additions. I can't promise I'll be able to do it soon, but when I do I'll add them in here too.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

     wow that is like the whole grail of F1 pictures thanks a lot for posting them !! when you get around to updating the collection please do post them. 


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Wow! Speaking about tapping a source of knowledge...
    Nice work Peloton, thanks for the effort!
    -Joost-


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    Porsche, seperates LeMans from LeBoys

    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    McLaren F1: "Truly awesome..."

    McLarenF1_dashboard-view.jpg

    Smiley SmileySmiley


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    McLaren F1 by Octane...

    We asked 50 ‘players’ in the historic car world what was their all-time favourite car was, and the McLaren F1 was practically the default choice. So we brought three examples to a test track, and invited contributions from the men who know it best...

    For more than a decade the McLaren F1 was hailed as the fastest production car in the world. On August 8, 1993, in the dry heat of southern Italy’s Nardo test track, Dr Jonathan Palmer nailed the throttle of prototype XP3 to record 231mph.

    With the rev-limiter removed, the car would go even faster – Andy Wallace took XP5 to 244.5mph in 1998 – but to obsess about top speeds is to miss the point. The F1 was never intended to set records or win races. Its designer, Gordon Murray, had merely set out to build the best possible road-going driver’s car. He did that by following Colin Chapman’s famous dictum ‘add lightness’, but also by building-in a quality of engineering that the Lotus boss would never have countenanced. 

    The result was the F1, introduced in 1993 and a modern classic that has still to be displaced in many enthusiasts’ hearts by the even faster, yet less pure, Bugatti Veyron. Powered by a BMW-built 6.1-litre V12, the F1 had a fighter-pilot style central driving position and dramatic lift-up doors. Perhaps more significant was what it didn’t have – power assisted steering, power brakes, ABS or traction control. All for a price tag of more than half-a-million pounds in 1993.

    You either got the F1, or you didn’t – but all true petrolheads did. McLaren built just 100 cars between 1993 and 1998. To own one, or just to aspire to one, marks you out as an enthusiast of the first order. 

    The specialist: Dean Lanzante

    The man who services McLarens for a living...

    ‘It’s just a car. Mechanically it’s very straightforward, almost basic. The brakes and steering aren’t power assisted and there’s no traction control. Everyone talks about it in hushed tones as being one of the ultimate supercars but it’s not really that complicated.'

    Brave words, but Dean Lanzante can walk the talk. Lanzante Limited has looked after maybe 15 McLaren F1s since the car’s launch, and it’s the only company apart from McLaren itself that has this level of experience. Yet it charges a modest £38 per hour labour.

    ‘We have good facilities, but we don’t have dollybirds sitting outside the workshop manning a reception desk,’ explains Dean. ‘And while our hourly rate is certainly very modest for, say, rebuilding an engine, the same rate applies if, for example, we’re transporting a car back from the Nürburgring. It all averages out to a bill that’s acceptable for the customer yet allows us to go the extra mile in making sure a car is properly presented.’

    That casual mention of the ’Ring is a clue to Lanzante’s main focus, which is motor sport. The company was founded by Dean’s father Paul (who had previously worked at Maranello Concessionaires and for Tyrrell) almost 30 years ago, and the F1 connection goes back to 1995, when the Lanzante-prepped Veno Clinic GTR won outright at Le Mans. 

    ‘We don’t actually deal with many road cars,’ explains Dean. ‘We only really got involved when a customer asked us if we could have a go at sorting out a gearbox problem. We said OK, not knowing quite what to expect, and found it was relatively simple to repair. As I said earlier, the F1 is not an especially complicated car. 

    ‘The one big job on the F1 is changing the fuel tank. It’s a bag tank and it has to be replaced every five years, for insurance reasons. That means removing the rear suspension, taking the engine and ’box out, and disconnecting the air conditioning, so it all adds up to a big bill: we usually estimate 100 hours labour, plus nearly four grand for the tank itself.

    ‘But a lot of those 100 hours will be spent in attending to other tasks while the engine is out. For example, we’ll usually give the clutch a check over. The clutch will typically need a service every 6000 miles; it’s a multi-plate carbon unit and it might last less than that if the car is regularly driven hard. Equally, it may just need shimming to be given a new lease of life. We haven’t changed the clutch in the ex-Ray Bellm car since 1996.

    ‘Otherwise there are no real nasties. The engine is chain driven, so the only belts are for the water pump and alternator, both of which can be changed in situ – just about. It uses BMW M3 plugs, which aren’t cheap but are easy to replace; if an F1 starts to run a bit rough, changing the plugs will often cure it. These are very reliable engines.’

    All very positive, but while F1 ownership may not be horrendously expensive, it is not cheap either. A flick through some recent invoices reveals that a set of brake pads costs £236 – they have to be machined to fit the calipers – and a replacement windscreen is £2500. The same money buys the lower section of a front bumper, remade to original spec by Lanzante’s carbonfibre specialist, while a pair of rear wishbones is priced at £3000. Not outrageous for bespoke items, mind you.

    Fabricating stuff from scratch comes as second nature for Lanzante’s six mechanics, who all have experience in various motor sport disciplines. The F1 is just one of the cars they look after – when Octane visited, a Ferrari 166MM and the GT40 pedalled by Adrian Newey were in the shop. As Dean sums up without a hint of boastfulness: ‘Crosthwaite & Gardiner rebuild Auto Unions, so I think we can manage an F1…’

    Le Mans authority: Brian Laban

    The inside story of McLaren's Le Mans campaign... 

    In the early 1990s the ACO looked back to its roots, shifting focus from the increasingly esoteric Group C cars towards production-based GTs people could identify with. 

    So Le Mans welcomed ‘real’ cars again – including, in 1994, the Ferrari F40, Honda NSX, Mazda RX7, Bugatti EB110S, Ferrari 348, Dodge Viper, De Tomaso Pantera, Venturi 400GTR and 600LM, Callaway Corvette, Lotus Esprit, Nissan 300ZX and, of course, various more or less road-related versions of the 911.

    But while that year’s winning Dauer 962LM Porsche was accepted as a GT car, it was really a 600bhp LM Prototype clone with a big fuel tank. It won the GT category by 71 laps, and overall by a single lap from the ‘real’ LM Prototype Toyota 94CV.

    Even with its £650,000 price tag, the McLaren F1, on the other hand, genuinely was a production car in the spirit the ACO had intended. As an endurance racer, however, the F1 GTR, launched in February 1995, was largely an unknown quantity. It was dominating the Global GT series, but those were sprint races and the GTR had never done an endurance race. Nor had it raced in the wet – of which Le Mans 1995 promised plenty.

    The mandatory 600bhp restrictor probably meant the GTR had less power than the road car, and there was little opportunity to lose weight, but the central driving position suited racing, and Gordon Murray’s preparations were thorough, if largely untested. Seeing the transmission as potentially a weak link, its oil system was modified, and all but one car adopted carbon brakes – not only for performance but for durability and weight saving.

    No fewer than seven GTRs were entered, including GTR 001, the  McLaren development car leased to Kokuhai Kaihtso UK for GP drivers JJ Lehto and Yannick Dalmas and Le Mans regular Masanori Sekiya. It was fastest of the GTRs in qualifying (for Lehto), but surprisingly not fastest GT1 – behind three F40s.

    The McLaren entry also included Andy Wallace with father-and-son pairing Derek and Justin Bell in the Harrods-sponsored Mach 1 Racing car; Bellm, Sala and Blundell for GTC Gulf Racing; Giroid, Grouillard and Deletraz in the GRT Jacadi Racing car; Maury-Laribière, Poulain and Sourd for BBA Competition; Bscher, Nielsen and Mass for West Competition; and Owen-Jones, Raphanel and Alliot in another GTC Gulf Racing GTR.

    The GTRs’ true pace soon became evident. By lap one, Nielsen was fourth overall, and one or other McLaren would lead all but eleven of the 298 laps. They proved to be quick in the wet, which meant around two-thirds of the race, and before long they were mainly racing each other. 

    For a while it looked as though there might be a fairytale ending for five-times winner Bell and crew. But clutch problems cost Bell senior a pit stop long enough to lose the lead, which was taken and held to the finish by the Dalmas, Lehto and Sekiya GTR.

    Wallace and the Bells held on to third overall, with Bellm, Sala and Blundell fourth, and the GRT car fifth. It was a spectacular result – a road car winning Le Mans. They returned each year until 1999, and even as cars like the Porsche 911 GT1, Mercedes CLK-LM and Toyota GT One stretched the ‘production’ rules to extremes, McLarens took fourth and fifth in 1996, second and third in 1997 (winning GT1), and fourth in 1998, when Porsche’s GT1 won. 

    They were great days.

    The racer: Mark Hales

    The man who pushed the McLaren F1 to its absolute limits...

    I’ve driven Nick Mason’s McLaren numerous times, on the road, at Silverstone and Goodwood circuits, and most recently at a Brands Hatch test day. It was both exciting and rewarding but, as always, I clamber in and out with slightly mixed feelings. 

    There are the sensibly small exterior dimensions, which make the car practical on the road, and the fantastic attention to detail typified by the perfect panel fit and the way the doors hinge themselves gently skywards against their gas struts, then clunk shut with the finality you’d expect from a luxury saloon. There’s the central seating position, which avoids so many compromises and, whatever your dimensions, leaves feet, legs and arms all unencumbered and with as much room as you could want. 

    Behind you is that wonderful six-litre BMW V12 engine with its curiously off-beat rattle and utterly massive, apparently endless reserves of urge. To the right is the shift for the six-speed transmission, with its slick synchros that slide the next gear in as fast as you can move the hand, and there’s no power assist for anything, which keeps the feedback pure.

    There’s a lot of performance on tap too. I did several acceleration runs against the clock at Goodwood and easily reached 180mph from a standing start without using all the back straight. And yet, driving the car, anywhere where speed limits don’t apply, always leaves me a slight sense of what might have been. There never seems to be enough mechanical grip to harness the obvious performance. It was all too easy to have the rear wheels alight in third gear going out of the pits at Brands. Then, less than a minute after leaving the pits, the front end never felt as if it had enough grip to point in and carry the speed that was surely there for the taking. Come the exit though, the big rear wing was definitely pressing hard enough that I could clamp the pedal to the carbonfibre floor. The slingshot down into the dip and up the hill to Druids was meteoric.

    Back down at second-gear speeds for Druids, you had a less-than-enthusiastic front again, only this time followed by a rear end which would light up and sling itself towards West Kingsdown, leaving two black lines along the road as proof of intent.

    All of which means that Nick’s GTR is always exciting but it has never felt, well… as all-conquering as I’d expected. I have driven a race model – Ray Bellm’s 1995 FIA-Championship-winning car – at the same circuit and it felt much more as you’d expect. But that one had the extra grip of slick tyres and a front end pinned to within millimetres of the road. It was in some ways less exciting but you felt that the ingredients had been put in place, turning a road car into a true racing car.

    Gordon Murray says that he was at pains not to convert a racing car into a road car. He is also on record saying that if he had been asked to design a pure racer from the outset, he would have done so. Stiffening up the suspension on any car when there isn’t enough mechanical grip from the rubber is always a recipe for skids at both ends, which is exactly why you soften everything off for a wet race and why Murray specified relatively low spring rates for the road car.

    And having mentioned tyres, an eagle-eyed observer at Brands pointed out that the ones on Nick’s car are now ten years old. Tyre technology has moved on a great deal since 1997 – or perhaps more correctly, the choice of tyre available has progressed. Once upon a time there were road tyres and there were race tyres and you used each for its own discipline, but now the distinction is less obvious. The most recent breed of supercars all wear road-legal track day specials as standard. Despite offers from a couple of manufacturers to provide a set for the McLaren, the appropriate sizes didn’t appear on their sticky list.

    The car remains a jewel, though, and it is still truly remarkable.

    Owner: Nick Mason

    Who better qualified to talk about the McLaren F1 than Nick Mason...

    It took me a long time to acquire a McLaren. Partly because of the breathtaking cost – treble that of an F40 – and partly timing. The bottom had rather gone out of the car market, and I think I’d spent too much money owed to the tax man on some other old motor.

    Stories were already circulating of the costs involved in getting any work done by the service department, and a couple of well-publicised accidents indicated that any more serious repair work would pay for a fairly nice Brescia Bugatti.

    It was always obvious, however, that this was the supercar to have. The win at Le Mans absolutely set in stone the car’s pedigree, and in my case the fact that I actually knew the guys involved added a personal touch.

    I had become a little involved with the development of the car. Over a period of time I loaned a number of cars to Gordon in order for him to evaluate the Good, the Bad, and the downright Mean and Ugly. He could then help himself to the good ideas, and ditch the bad ones. 

    Cars included Ferrari F40, 365GTB Daytona, Aston Martin Zagato V8 and 250GTO. There may have been others but I’ve forgotten what they were.

    I think I also suggested an external battery connection for owners who might use the car infrequently, and the CD juke system fitted in the luggage bay in order to have music, but no radio. For some reason Gordon was adamant that there would be no Radio One in this machine.

    One day I was having lunch with Gordon. I can’t remember if this was to discuss buying a car or for some other reason, but it transpired that Ron Dennis was interested in a car that I owned. It was a McLaren M15, ex-Denny Hulme, an Indy car with a ferocious reputation that burned methanol and was turbocharged. Useless for any UK competition and far too frightening for me. I’d already been trying to get all the engine bits for it for a few years and had run out of interest,  enthusiasm, financial commitment and courage.

    It also transpired that, although all the road cars had long since gone, there were a couple of GTRs still lurking at the factory. Now this really got me interested. A competition car can always send me into a bit of a dither, and I had to keep my hands under the table lest my cheque book-signing hand could be seen trembling in anticipation.

    Although the GTR (competition version of the F1) lost one passenger space, the far more basic electronic package made the maintenance elements appear easier (mark that cheaper) and Ray Bellm had already converted his racer into a street-legal machine, so it was clearly an option.

    At the time I don’t think the factory had done this but, with some support from Gordon, a deal was put together to supply the car ready for Sainsbury’s shopping on a Saturday morning.

    The car was prepared beautifully, an exhaust system designed, and reversing lights and edge trims added along with a myriad of other odd details to gain the documentation necessary.

    As with all the F1s, customers were encouraged to come in as often as they liked. Having mentioned the breathtaking audacity of the McLaren accounts department, I should credit Harold Dermot as the genius who can make even their best efforts bearable. For example, having taken Harold to task over what seemed rather pricey number plates, I received the following reply:

    ‘You will see that I have left in the labour charge of half-an-hour for fitting the number plates. This is so that Ben can drive to London with the wheels, tyres and other spares, and deliver them to you free of charge. Whilst he is there, he will attempt to drill and fit the number plates, and eat his sandwich, all within half-an-hour.

    ‘Your insight into the manufacturing techniques for the number plates is uncanny. There is no way you could know that this is preceded by mining of the precious reflective plastic ore in the foothills of the Himalayas. This is then shipped by llama across the Gobi desert to the boat in Shanghai, a process complicated by the need to keep it refrigerated to exactly 4.2° C at all times.

    ‘All this means that the final charge to McLaren is £60, and our mark-up is therefore a stunning 50% – about the same as a pair of socks from M&S, but so much more fun.’

    It is one of the attractions of the car that this bespoke approach kept most speculators away, as well as providing the most wonderful selection of idiosyncratic detailing. From good luck charms to cockpit trim and low-downforce modifications, it would be hard to find two identical cars. They all have their own style, and being privileged to have driven a few of them has shown me that it’s a bit like hanging out with The Magnificent Seven – a bunch of heroic but very different characters. Oh well, why not say it again: it’s exactly the same situation with the Ferrari GTO.

    I still like the story of one Japanese client who called in to discuss the detail of his cars. Gordon proudly displayed the compartment suitable for taking a set of golf clubs. The customer intimated that he had two clubs; Gordon patiently explained that there was room for a full set. No, no, the client explained – I have two Golf Clubs – with substantial memberships.

    To be strictly honest, we are still working on finding a handling set-up that is a decent compromise between road and track on my machine. The car had been fairly alarming on the track, with a tendency to catch out far more expert drivers than I, but to be fair on the road it’s fine, and doesn’t leave a trail of body parts at every uneven surface (at one point I went into the manufacturing business to make Ferrari F40 front splitters, as I lost so  many of them).

    But most importantly, the McLaren really works. I have a particular grievance with supercar suppliers, that once they’ve spent long hours on the track they head back to base to work on the guest list and choice of canapés and Champagne for the launch party. This tends to leave a car with stunning performance and page three looks that’s actually hell to drive on the road. Terrible side sight lines, poor rear vision, and sometimes a width that challenges a London bus.

    The McLaren isn’t like that. The centre steering wheel makes overtaking in the UK or on the Continent a dream. None of that awful passenger involvement – ‘Out a bit, more, no – yes – oooh, I mean no – ohhh, that was close!...’ On a long trip to Paris last year, my passenger actually dozed off, allowing me to lead a small convoy of interesting cars on a tortuous route through northern France in entirely the wrong direction.

    The car is blindingly quick, and it wasn’t really until the Enzo and the Bugatti Veyron arrived in town that anything else made one think that suitable fashion wear might be a G-suit rather than a T-shirt.

    And perhaps best of all, on a personal level it’s a car that has a place in our family. My daughter Holly came with me when we originally picked the car up from Woking and crawled back around the M25 – well, with the odd burst of clear air – and Mrs M has had a Ladies’ FTD at Goodwood, as well as a particularly jolly photo session where we had the McLaren team boys doing a pit stop with the car, but organising hair and make-up rather than fuel and tyres...

    Oddly, it’s stuff like that which can become as important as a Le Mans finish in one’s own valuing of a car.

    McLaren F1 Designer: Gordon Murray

    The man who underpinned winning F1 cars from Brabham and McLaren during the 1980s and '90s...

    There can’t be many times in automotive history when one engineer has had the finance and the freedom to create a factory, a team and a car from a completely clean sheet of paper. Being put in that position by the foresight of Ron Dennis and Mansour Ojjeh was indeed a dream come true for me, but what heightened the experience was the fact that I had long harboured a desire to design a sports car with a focus and purity that exorcised all my pet hates in performance cars, and to push supercar design to a new level.

    Luckily for me, most of the supercars around in the late ’80s were too big and too heavy, and generally they were heavily flawed as driving machines by poor packaging and compromised ergonomics. Some of my pet hates on the ergonomics side were terrible pedal offsets and lack of clutch footrest caused by wide front tyres and wheelarch intrusion, instruments not properly visible through small steering wheels, obscured forward vision from over-thick A-pillars, and cant rails so close as to obstruct natural head movement whilst cornering.

    A central driving position removed all these and in addition reinforced the fact that this car was to be the ultimate driver’s car. Other benefits were perfect weight distribution and, of course, room for two passengers.

    The engine was another area where I applied the no-compromise rule. After driving several turbocharged supercars and not being too impressed by the lag and general throttle response I decided we should aim for a normally aspirated engine – a V10 or V12 of around 4.5 litres and 450bhp.  Other requirements for the engine were dry sumping, light weight, short block length and ultra-low crank height.

    The bespoke S70/2 BMW V12 designed by the engine genius Paul Rosche exceeded all my expectations and in my opinion is still the best high-performance engine ever built. The V12 is unrivalled in its size and weight for a 6-litre high-performance engine but it was also unique in that it has no flywheel and that it was the world’s first road car with a carbon clutch, giving the motor incredibly fast pick-up speed – blip the throttle in neutral and it feels like a 1000cc motorbike engine! It was a great experience working with Paul Rosche and his team, developing an engine to a specification for the type of driver’s car I wanted to build.

    The transmission design and development was a similar challenge and also good fun. There wasn’t a gearbox available to modify that was small enough, light enough or that could handle the torque, so once again it was back to a clean sheet of paper and this time we enlisted the help of Californian gearbox wizard Pete Weismann. We had to develop new synchromesh with Getrag in Germany to meet my very ambitious throttle-to-throttle gearchange time target.

    I had great fun with the aerodynamics, freed from the shackles that were then current Formula One regulations. I set out to achieve a level of active aerodynamics undreamed of in Grand Prix circles – automatic brake cooling, centre of pressure control, downforce enhancement called up by the driver, automatic downforce doubling under braking and, most fundamentally, full fan-assisted ground effects – and which was not yet known in the automotive industry.

    Other areas where I had fun developing things in a completely different way from the norm were the audio system and the de-misting. We worked with Kenwood for two years to make sure that the sound system used exactly the correct loudspeaker substrates and reflex volumes for the base. I also designed the controls to be the absolute minimum in number and to be large enough to manipulate by feel.

    The air conditioning system was designed to be for the occupants only as I hated the hot, dry-eye syndrome suffered in most cars with the controls set to defrost. We developed a DC/DC converter to produce 58 volts and drive plasma-sprayed laminated glass for the front and side glasses, which defrosts in seconds and leaves the air con to handle the people.

    We also developed a remote diagnostic system using satellite communication and a modem link to help with the problem of servicing cars that are scattered all over the world.

    So I used my clean sheet of paper well to solve all my pet hates in supercars and also to achieve my ambition to create the world’s best driver’s car – but one target I failed to meet was the maximum weight.

    My fanatical approach to weight-saving by design meant that in the F1 we had the lightest fully equipped supercar by some margin, but at 1130kg we missed my original target by more than 10%. This was partly due to us not getting the carbon brakes working in time for Job One, partly due to the fact that 1000kg was a very ambitious target and partly due to the fact the ‘productionisation process’ added over 50kg.

    But where we failed on the weight, we made up for it in other areas. It was always my philosophy that the car should be small enough and practical enough to use as an everyday car. We certainly stuck to our size targets, except for a clay model mistake which grew the car from 1800mm to 1820mm wide, and the car has masses of luggage space and can be driven in traffic at very low speeds, thanks to its light weight and the normally aspirated V12.

    I always enjoy styling and the F1 was no exception. I have been lucky enough to style all my cars (apart from the SLR) and in the case of the McLaren F1 I enlisted my old friend Peter Stevens to give me a hand.

    I wanted classic (but not retro) lines right from the beginning – in fact I had very definite ideas about almost every aspect of the car’s shape – but I made sure we disciplined ourselves not to style before the engineering, packaging and homologation problems had been resolved and the wind tunnel had dictated the basic shape.

    I wanted the car to be more ‘mechanical’ towards the rear, like a Grand Prix car, and as it happened we needed so many heat chimneys and vents this was not very difficult to achieve! Designing the interior was even more enjoyable. I took ages over the instrument panel and secondary control design: everything had to be very functional, very clear and very ‘engineered’. I love attention to detail and the design of the F1 was an opportunity to take my fetish to new heights.

    Developing the car for ride and handling was a very personal process, as I did more than half of the development driving myself. We had the luxury of working with both Michelin and Goodyear to design tyres specifically for the car. I specified very low spring rates and natural frequencies for the car and I insisted on using 17in rims so that we had something to play with, to try to avoid the teeth-rattling secondary ride most contemporary supercars had with their 18in or 19in wheels.

    The result was a car that rode well enough to use on most road surfaces every day but was a little too soft for track use.

    This didn’t worry me particularly as I had stated right from day one that this should be a road car only and that if I began thinking race car I would compromise areas of the vehicle design and end up with a sports car that did both jobs badly. What I didn’t realise is that because of my racing background, I subconsciously built all the good racing stuff into the design – such as low polar moment of inertia, low centre of gravity, uncompromised pure suspension geometry, rigid chassis etc – so when we were bullied into turning our road car into a racing car by two very determined customers, we actually had very little to do.

    To create the GTR I had only one day in the wind tunnel to sort the aero and body kit. We added a rollover bar, racing instrumentation, a fire extinguisher and we went racing.

    Beating the prototypes to win Le Mans in 1995 with a road car, synchromesh gearbox and all, remains one of my best memories – winning that race first time out is, in my opinion, more difficult than winning back-to-back Formula One Championships.

    Looking back on the F1 story today, I still feel the same way about the car as I did then. There is nothing I would change from a conceptional point of view, although, 15 years on, the car would benefit greatly from modern brakes and modern lights – I would still not be tempted to add power steering or power-assisted brakes. Driving the car today is still an ‘event’, even though I have done tens of thousands of miles in an F1.

    Rather than redesign the F1, I think it would be far better to design a supercar for this century which applies all the fundamental F1 design principles but delivers the driving thrill from light weight rather than horsepower – so keep watching this space...!

    McLaren-F1_Octane-article

    Smiley SmileySmiley SmileySmiley


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Thanks a lot for these marvellous contributions, guys!


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    That Black F1, is it a rebuilt GTR or a street F1 with aero and the race O.Z.'s?

    It looks stunning, I love the interior, purposeful, but not exagerated like those typical rebuilt GTR's.


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    You're all quite welcome. Smiley

    The black F1 in the Octane article is an F1 road car fitted with the optional High Downforce Kit. Specifically it is chassis #069.  

    The car was originally a standard silver F1. At one point around 1999 it was owned by a man named James Munroe in the UK who was eventually convicted of embezzling the money he'd used to purchase the F1 with from the publishing company where he worked as an accountant. His assets were seized to cover the money that was stolen. Then the car was sold to a new owner who had the factory respray the car, fit the HDF Kit and change the interior to look similar to the F1 LM. Chassis #069 then showed up in the USA in March of 2000, but due to a failure to import it properly within the laws that were in place at the time, and then further alleged attempts by the owner to circumvent other related laws, the car ended up being seized by US Customs and held for several years while the owner was prosecuted. It first resurfaced in mid-2005 when it was scheduled to appear at Bonhams auction in Monaco. The car was withdrawn from the sale and did not appear there. Then it wasn't seen again until it finally resurfaced in the UK in February 2007.

    Today the car looks slightly different as the High Downforce Kit has been removed. This is the first F1 I'm aware of that's been converted back to its stock body configuration. Here's some recent images from an appearance at SPA in Belgium.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Thank you for the detailed info on Mclaren F1 cars Peloton 

    You should be the biggest info source for this car.

    That black Mclaren is fantastic, a true race car. Sadly, it is now impossible to produce such a great pure Car and make it road legal todays standarts. This fact makes the F1 priceless.

    I think it is the greatest car of all time. It is FAST, reliable, handles superply, solid, and pure sex on the wheels.

    Great achievement from Mclaren.


    --

    ONUR

    11 M3 Coupe AW

    09 Audi TTS Coupe - 07 997 Carrera S - 05 M3 Coupe - 03 M3 Coupe - 96 M3 Coupe EVO (PASS TIME HISTORY)

     


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Ferdie:

    Thanks a lot for these marvellous contributions, guys!

     
    +1 Smiley Thanks v much for posting Smiley


    --

     
    RT Moderator - 997.1 Carrera S GT Silver/Cocoa, -20mm/LSD, PSE, short shifter, SportDesign rims, Zuffenhausen collection

    Rennteam signature photo 2.jpg


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Peloton25:

    You're all quite welcome. Smiley

    The black F1 in the Octane article is an F1 road car fitted with the optional High Downforce Kit. Specifically it is chassis #069.  

    The car was originally a standard silver F1. At one point around 1999 it was owned by a man named James Munroe in the UK who was eventually convicted of embezzling the money he'd used to purchase the F1 with from the publishing company where he worked as an accountant. His assets were seized to cover the money that was stolen. Then the car was sold to a new owner who had the factory respray the car, fit the HDF Kit and change the interior to look similar to the F1 LM. Chassis #069 then showed up in the USA in March of 2000, but due to a failure to import it properly within the laws that were in place at the time, and then further alleged attempts by the owner to circumvent other related laws, the car ended up being seized by US Customs and held for several years while the owner was prosecuted. It first resurfaced in mid-2005 when it was scheduled to appear at Bonhams auction in Monaco. The car was withdrawn from the sale and did not appear there. Then it wasn't seen again until it finally resurfaced in the UK in February 2007.

    Today the car looks slightly different as the High Downforce Kit has been removed. This is the first F1 I'm aware of that's been converted back to its stock body configuration. Here's some recent images from an appearance at SPA in Belgium.

    >8^)
    ER

    Smiley Your knowledge goes beyond what I had expected, many thanks for that answer!

    I didin't know the High Downforce Kit was an option as such on the road F1's, I always thought it were either converted GTR's, an LM or regular F1's with GTR bumpers. Were the O.Z. wheels part of that kit, as you always see them together.

    Additional question, the LM's have always intrigued me as it's my favourite F1 incarnation. How many of those are still around, by which I mean not in the hands of the Sultan of Brunei? And what's the deal with the colors? Are they all Papaya Orange or are the rumours true that some of them are black?

    Many thanks! Smiley


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Porker:
    Smiley Your knowledge goes beyond what I had expected, many thanks for that answer!

    I didin't know the High Downforce Kit was an option as such on the road F1's, I always thought it were either converted GTR's, an LM or regular F1's with GTR bumpers. Were the O.Z. wheels part of that kit, as you always see them together.

    Additional question, the LM's have always intrigued me as it's my favourite F1 incarnation. How many of those are still around, by which I mean not in the hands of the Sultan of Brunei? And what's the deal with the colors? Are they all Papaya Orange or are the rumours true that some of them are black?

    Many thanks! Smiley


    Until the HDF Kit was removed from #069 there were a total of 10 McLaren F1 road cars that I am aware of which have had it fitted. Chassis numbers of the ones that are known are #011, #014, #018, #020, #023, #059, #072, #073. There is one additional silver car that is not yet determined. 

    A change to the suspension and fitting of the OZ wheels are typically part of the package but since there is an exception to every rule, chassis #023 has a narrower front splitter, lacks the extensions to the front wheel arches and retains the original 17" wheels. Here's a photo of that car:

    More images of it are in this Flickr Gallery.

    On the subject of the LMs, McLaren built a total of 5 production LMs and one prototype. The prototype is XP1 LM and remains with the factory. Some will recall that Lewis Hamilton has made a deal with Ron Dennis to be given that car should he win two more F1 World Championships for McLaren.

    There are two production LMs that are not in Brunei. They are LM2 which is in a museum in Nagoya, Japan and LM3 which has been in the collection of fashion designer Ralph Lauren since late 2004. Both of these cars are painted the traditional Papaya Orange.

    Brunei purchased the other three F1 LMs and requested that two of them be painted in a similar style to the GTR that one Le  Mans - black/grey - and then had some odd looking bunting-style graphics added to the nose and sides of the car. The chassis numbers for those cars are LM1 and LM4, with LM5 being their final one in the traditional orange paint.

    For the longest time these so called "Black LM's" were just a rumor as no photographic proof of their existence was available. I had several good sources who had confirmed they were built, all with basically the same visual description, but some people still refused to believe it without solid proof.

    In October of 2005, a contact sent me a link to the website of Italian artist Maurizio Corbi noting that I'd find a drawing there depicting one of the Black LMs. Sure enough, when I contacted Maurizio he informed me that he had done the drawing of this very special F1 in 1996 while working for Pininfarina in Brunei. While not a photograph - his confirmation that the drawing depicted a real car in the Brunei collection was the final piece of evidence that I'd been looking for.

    In July of 2008, someone finally stumbled on photographic proof that had been right under our noses (essentially) since July 17th 1996. It was in an issue of Autoweek magazine where they did an article on the McLaren - and pictured right in the middle of a page was a real photo of LM1 being assembled at the factory. I have a feeling that McLaren would have probably preferred that image never went to print, and that may be one of the reasons why they now require editorial review in advance of printing anything shot inside the factory. I didn't own a copy of the magazine myself, but the guy who finally produced the scan of the page had owned it since the date it was printed and had just never gone back to look through it until that point.

    It wasn't long after that, a user from PistonHeads was going through his old photo collection and shared images from the McLaren factory taken in 1996. In his set of photos were two more images of a black LM completed and ready for delivery to Brunei.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    That was an awesome read, many thanks! Would you mind if I shared it on a Belgian board?

    Now, my last question .

    What distinguishes an LM's exterior from a HDK-equpped F1 or a rebuilt GTR? I always thought the sills were different on an LM, as they seem to be lower?

    At Le Mans this year there was a Papaya Orange GTR 'M700BHP', it looks exactly like an LM, but I know it isn't one, I just can't point out the differences, I'm sure you can?

    sq2yoz.jpg


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Aha, apart from the sills the LM doesn't have a duct on the left side in front of the rear wheel, whereas GTR's do!?


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Peloton25:

    Thanks.

    It may be only 9 posts here so far, but I moderate a McLaren F1 specific forum where I've amassed over 6,000 posts since 2003. 

    Suffice to say I follow the F1s quite closely and always try to ensure that people have the most accurate information available.

    >8^)
    ER

     

    Bravo ! Smiley Smiley 

    Welcome on Rennteam. 


    --

    RC (Germany) - Rennteam Editor Porsche 997 Turbo, BMW X5 M, BMW M3 Cab DKG, Mini Cooper S JCW


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Porker:

    That was an awesome read, many thanks! Would you mind if I shared it on a Belgian board?

    Now, my last question .

    What distinguishes an LM's exterior from a HDK-equpped F1 or a rebuilt GTR? I always thought the sills were different on an LM, as they seem to be lower?

    At Le Mans this year there was a Papaya Orange GTR 'M700BHP', it looks exactly like an LM, but I know it isn't one, I just can't point out the differences, I'm sure you can?

     

     I'd be very interested in that explanation too, they look about the same but I'm sure there are some tell-tale details.


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Question from an F1-ignorant person.

    Why do some of the F1's have the mirrors on the fenders, while some have them above the windows?


    --

    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

    Enmanuel:
    I'd be very interested in that explanation too, they look about the same but I'm sure there are some tell-tale details.

     
    I'll get back to this shortly - it's not the easiest of questions to answer fully and I just have not had the time.
     

    Adam R:
    Question from an F1-ignorant person.

    Why do some of the F1's have the mirrors on the fenders, while some have them above the windows?


     The high mirrors were originally part of the early F1 concept - known as the Clinic Model. For a reason that has not been made totally clear, they were scrapped for production due to "regulatory issues" and the production cars have them mounted in a traditional location on the door. From the selection of images above here are two that show the Clinic Model:

    In 1995 there was a customer who very much wanted McLaren to find a way to integrate the mirrors on the A-pillar of his car as a customized option. McLaren ended up borrowing the mirror housing from the BMW Z1, and strengthened the A-pillar section of the door with an integrated mount for them. Four other cars have also had the mirrors added. Two were done during their original build and the other two cars had the doors replaced to allow them to be added.

    Here's some compilation images I made of each of the 5 high-mirrored cars in order by chassis number - #040, #050, #055, #071 and #074.

    >8^)
    ER


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

     Hi Peloton!

     

    Can you confirm if there is a Mclaren F1 in South Africa? I have heard through several sources that there is one but no one has ever managed to snap a pic of it. All heresay...


    Re: First McLaren F1 for sale

     Hi Peloton

    Can you also confirm if there is still a McLaren F1 in Australia. At one stage (about 10 years ago) there was one owned by the CEO of CocaCola Amtil and was often seen driving around Sydney. However, when he got it serviced, the guy giving it a shakedown from the service centre wrapped it into a pole. It was then shipped back to Mclaren to be fixed and reportedly cost $1m!!!

    He then sold the car to someone in Melbourne....and it has only been seen a couple of time (i saw it in the CBD once).

    Thanks Peloton.


     
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