Mclaren F1 - A Supercar
The McLaren F1 supercar is one of the fastest, most powerful and most expensive road cars ever. It was developed by McLaren Cars Ltd, a subsidiary of one of the world’s leading Formula One Teams.
Much of the experience gained with the team’s F1 effort, combined with Gordon Murray’s motivation to make the best road car regardless of profits, helped the McLaren F1 become the car it is.
The McLaren F1 was the first production to use a complete carbon fiber chassis and body. Such lightweight construction, combined with the BMW S70/2, 620 horsepower engine, helped the McLaren achieve 240.14mph in its XP5 pre-production trim. The success didn’t stop on the road however, with special GTR versions winning Le Mans outright in 1995 and taking two FIA GT World Championships.
The Mclaren F1 has a top speed of 231 mph, restricted by the rev limiter at 7500 rpm. The true top speed of the Mclaren F1 was reached in April of 1998 by the five-year-old XP5 prototype. Andy Wallace (racer) piloted it down the 9 km straight at Volkswagen’s Ehra test track in Wolfsburg, Germany, setting a new world record of 391.1 km/h (243 mph) at 7800 rpm.
As Mario Andretti noted in a comparisson test, the F1 is fully capable of pulling a seventh gear, thus with a higher gear ratio or a seventh gear the Mclaren F1 would probably be able to reach an even greater top speed (something which can also be observed by noticing that the top speed was reached at 7800 RPM while the peak power is reached at 7400 RPM).
Only 100 cars were manufactured from 1994 to 1998, 64 of those were street versions, 5 were LMs and the rest were GTR models. After the initial production run 100 cars, McLaren have continued to maintain and add custom appointments to customer cars.
Treatments such as new aerodynamic packages and custom interiors have been ordered by customers and McLaren has been happy to comply for right price.