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Gordon Murray Automotive T.50


Sabrejet

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Yesterday's 78th Members Meeting at Goodwood saw the public debut of the Gordon Murray Automotive T.50 Fancar. It's aimed to be 'better than the McLaren F1' and is powered by a Cosworth GMA V12 which revs to 12,100 rpm. The 'fan' bit refers to the aft-mounted fan, which sucks air from a really aggressive diffuser and prevents the airflow from stalling. It sounds incredible.

 

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GMA had prototype XP5 (silver) on-track, plus XP9 (dark blue) in the paddock. It's an exquisite thing.

 

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Also shown was a mockup of the 'Niki Lauda' track car, which I guess would fit nicely into the Le Mans Hypercar race category.

 

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I have to say I do like the pure lines of the T.50 and I'd love to know what sort of track times it would do. 

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1 hour ago, Sabrejet said:

I'd recommend the GMA YouTube programmes: it's been refreshing to see the nuts and bolts of the car and engine as it's come together.

Seconded.... and it's clear that it's impressed the heck out of Dario Franchitti, who knows a thing or two about fast cars. And that's despite only being able to drive the engine development mule flat out, and the prototype T.50 at half revs...

 

best,

M.

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I saw this yesterday too and took some pictures,hope you don't mind me adding them? This really is an impressive new car,out of all the cars at Goodwood I think this grabbed a lot of the attention there. The blurb says that this will be the last analog supercar.

Chris.

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What is the genesis of the Cosworth donk Chris. Is it a repurposed completion engine or just something I've been blissfully unaware of for ages?  I can't see this using an older design but creating a special engine for it sounds mind numbingly expensive. :unsure:

Steve.

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Hi Steve,and everyone else- it's a brand new engine commissioned by Gordon Murray.i just looked back in Motor Sport magazine from September which has a Gordon Murray article,it doesn't really mention this car but he reckons that a Tesla battery is still only 15% efficient still. Chris.

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  • 1 year later...

One thing that really stands out in that video is how clunky Tamiya's transparencies are: I'd have thought by now that they'd have followed Alpha's lead and gone for either vac-formed or laser-cut transparencies. They have some catching up to do.

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I’d much rather have Tamiya’s full detail engine and chassis than Alpha’s curbside with knobs on philosophy. And the clear parts look fine to me… rather that than fiddling around trimming a vacform piece or trying to get laser cut flat sheets to conform to compound curves…

best,

M.

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1 hour ago, cmatthewbacon said:

I’d much rather have Tamiya’s full detail engine and chassis than Alpha’s curbside with knobs on philosophy. And the clear parts look fine to me… rather that than fiddling around trimming a vacform piece or trying to get laser cut flat sheets to conform to compound curves…

best,

M.

 

The laser-cut screens aren't for compound curves, and vacform parts have moved on: in many cases kits have cutting jigs included, as Alpha also do for their awesome PE parts.

 

And you don't need 'full engine' on the T.50 because even with all the panels open you still can't see it!

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...or you could just mould a crystal clear injection part that fits perfectly... For me, part of the build process I find interesting is getting an insight into the real car, so it doesn't really matter whether you can see it when it's built. The Fujimi 288 GTO or Dino are cases in point; you can build the versions without the engine and suspension details and a simplified chassis and have something that looks as nice sitting on your shelf, but I quite enjoyed the process of putting together the more prototypically correct versions...

best,

M.

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On 20/05/2023 at 11:06, Sabrejet said:

One thing that really stands out in that video is how clunky Tamiya's transparencies are: I'd have thought by now that they'd have followed Alpha's lead and gone for either vac-formed or laser-cut transparencies. They have some catching up to do.

 

I'm guessing it's probably cost and ease-of-build driven as much as anything, after all Tamiya and Alpha are in different places in the market. Tamiya are aiming for mass-market appeal which means they need to produce a kit which the average Joe can put together and get something which looks 95+% correct without having to start experimenting with new techniques while also keeping to a price which will keep within most people's budgets. I'd imagine if they were to charge Alpha prices which seem to be about 3 times what they charge for a newly designed kit that they wouldn't be able to sell as much as a third of what they will.

 

In contrast, the Alpha model is dedicated to providing the most skilled modellers (such as yourself) with a highly detailed kit which is more like 99% correct. Nothing wrong with that way of working, but I doubt it would pay the bills for a big company like Tamiya.

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I'm not a Gordon Murray fan but I'd do anything to get the T.50.

In another forum I said I'm gonna do a spec inspired by Genesis Blue F1JOY-registered F1. Now I think I'm gonna do something else about my spec once I can order the car--I mean the model kit.

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8 hours ago, Spiny said:

In contrast, the Alpha model is dedicated to providing the most skilled modellers (such as yourself) with a highly detailed kit which is more like 99% correct. Nothing wrong with that way of working, but I doubt it would pay the bills for a big company like Tamiya.

 

You are waaaaay too kind: my models just look OK in photos (mostly). Anyhow I see what you and @cmatthewbacon mean. Horses for courses. However I do think there is a nice gap in the market for pre-cut vac car windscreens (as there are with Tasman etc in the scale aircraft market)

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2 hours ago, Sabrejet said:

You are waaaaay too kind: my models just look OK in photos

 

Hmmm, methinks that's nonsense tbh....!!  If only mine looked as "OK" as yours....!!  :)

 

Anyway my only contribution to the clear parts debate having used all types (& many vacform parts on aircraft models) is that good fitting kit parts are much easier to use than vac or laser cut parts and to my eyes don't really look any worse in a completed model. However 'good fitting' is the key. My once again stalled Tamiya Escort Cosworth 'lockdown build' had a number of annoying fit issues - worst being the clear parts. I just could not get them to fit and stay fitted using PVA, canopy glue etc so ended up using superglue (yes, I know!) and too much accelerator. This led to the bottom right corner of the windscreen dissolving in front of my eyes! So after 4 hours or so I finally finished making a replacement acetate screen for it! I would have much preferred to not have to have bothered though but in this case Tamiya's clear parts were awful!

 

Keith

 

PS one other thing I've found with flat actetate parts on resin kits is given the relatively small gluing area all the ones I've used seem to need re-gluing after a few years.

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