Mclaren F1 pics

I see there are some real fans of the LM in this thread. We had a special 2 foot long model made of it for owners and enthusiasts, which you can see here:

http://www.collectorstudio.com/index.cfm/ID/16/itemID/3026/details/1?cl=

Here are other McLaren F1 items of memorabilia:

http://www.collectorstudio.com/index.cfm/ID/34/SearchResults?criteria=mclaren_f1

 

Stop making me look at that 1/8th LM Morry!!

Doh! Sorry about that it was late, or early I guess, when I was responding. You can see the URL tag, so I certainly started to put it in there - lol.

Anyway, here you go:

http://dugmar.smugmug.com/Cars/McLaren-LM-03/2424838_ocwpV#P-7-15

They do say it is good to set goals. Best of luck on achieving that one!

>8^)
ER

P.S.: I'd love a ride in it if you do - I missed taking advantage of the offer extended to me by the car's previous owner due to geographic challenges. Sould have definitely bought that plane ticket when I had the opportunity. <sigh>

 

Thanks for all of the info. I have been reading up on these cars the last few months, and they really do have some interesting history. I didn't think I'd ever see pics of the AMG car, and the mules were as ugly as I expected. It's a shame they had to scrap them though, I kinda like that Ed/V12.

 

You are right on the XP crashed in Namibia - it was XP1, the very first real McLaren F1 ever built which was destroyed during hot weather testing on March 24th, 1993. In "Driving Ambition" it states: "Ron Dennis had every fragment gathered, and placed in a box to be buried - with a suitable tombstone - at the McLaren Museum."

On the 'Heavenly Twins', however, I must offer up a correction again from DA (pg 120) where the "Notification of destruction to DVLA" forms for both Albert and Edward appear.

They're small, but I can read the "Date of scrapping" of |1|8|0|9|9|6|, or Sept 18th, 1996 for Albert's. The boxes for "Date of scrapping" are strangely blank on Edward's form, but at the bottom where it is signed by an agent, the date there reads 25/9/96, or basically one week later. So the pair actually lived on for quite a while after their useful lives had finished, probably tucked in the corner of one of McLaren's facilities gathering some dust.

There is this pair of photos of Edward, together with the "Clinic Model" outside the McLaren Cars factory that deserve to be added to this discussion. Sometimes when people find them who know no real details on the F1's history, they get a little confused by that "strange looking car next to the F1".

>8^)
ER
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You're quite welcome - if you can't tell, I really enjoy educating people on these very special cars whenever I can. All good questions you had too.

>8^)
ER

 

Thank you. I remember that site from when Frank owned the car. I didn't know those were the last photos of the car in his possession though.

Certainly. I'd even pay for the plane ticket.

Also, do you know by chance if the rumors are true that Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean) has a GTR? If so, are there any pictures of it around? His burgundy one was...not my taste. I'm curious what color he choose, if any, for his supposed GTR.

 

That's really too kind. Should I start clearing my schedule soon?

There were certainly rumors that Rowan bought a GTR. When I met Gordon Murray in the summer of 2005 he mentioned much the same thing to me, and it is a little fuzzy but I believe it may have also been Gordon who said it was formerly Steve O'Rourke's GTR, which would have been GTR #24R. It's this one seen below.

If he did ever actually own it, the time was brief. The car now belongs to Paul Knapfield in the UK. Latest photos of it show that it still wears the EMKA livery it had on at the 1998 24Hrs of LeMans which is how Steve eventually kept it. That 1998 LeMans race was a great result, as it was a mostly privateer effort, and it still finished an amazing 4th place overall behind two Porsche AG campaigned 911 GT1s, and one Nissan R390 GT1 put in by Nissan and TWR.

The article below talks about a revival series that has had a few events in the past few years, but hasn't truly taken off yet for various reasons.

>8^)
ER
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This is that one I ordered last week. Morry (TheCollectorsStudio) was kind enough to confirm its authenticity for me.
I couldn't read the signature lol.

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?p=139250518#post139250518

 

Very nice - I have one of those in my collection as well, but unsigned of course, and I don't keep them in the boxes.

Older photo - have a few more now.

>8^)
ER
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Nice and you even display them out of the box!
I tossed a Mclaren Plinth years ago and wish I had kept it.. They are a nightmare to find now.

 

The top shelf lineup is set to resemble this real life photo of a McLaren display at Silverstone in 1997 btw. <geek>

For the longest time, I only had the first image which was driving me a little crazy because it seemed unbelievable to me that such a display could be set up in a place where motorsports enthusiasts had gathered and there wouldn't be a ton of photos taken of it.

Eventually another set of shots has surfaced, along with one other shot (photo #3 here) but that's still not what I'd expect or had hoped to see. Unfortunately, photos were for the most part still being shot on film then, and it's rare to have people pull out old ones and lay them on a scanner to convert them.

>8^)
ER
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That might be the coolest photo ive ever seen. Talk about a dream come true having those three variations in your collection!

 

From left to right in the Silverstone display they are F1 LM 'XP1 LM' (the prototype), then '95 F1 GTR '#01R' (the 95 24Hrs of LeMans winner), then F1 road car 'XP5' (the fifth and final F1 prototype), and then lastly one of the three F1 GTs '56XPGT' (the homologation special for the longtail '97 GTRs, and essentially the prototype for the 2 production longtail road cars).

My diecast of the GT is actually black, whereas the real car in the photo you should be able to see is dark green. McLaren did make a black F1 GT for the Brunei Royal Family though - '54F1GT' it was. I only have two photos of it in total, this first one shared in a thread discussing the BRF collection here on FerrariChat actually (yay!). The second one is only black and white, and was pulled from 'Driving Ambition' and shows the three F1 GTs at the factory under construction in 1997.

For the second photo, in order by chassis number are '56XPGT', then '58F1GT' unpainted here, but eventually sprayed burgundy, and then '54F1GT' is next in line, with an unknown silver F1 road car ther on the end.

>8^)
ER
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Whoa.. Those are some killer pics.

 

Only shame here is the FChat 800x800 maximum image resolution, as a lot of the pics attached in this thread are available in higher resolutions.

Still a great sample here.

>8^)
ER

 

Thanks you very much for all thos informations Peloton25, that is very interesting.

 

Quite an incredible display Erik. Thanks for sharing.

 

Happy to do so - and thanks for your comments gentlemen!

>8^)
ER

 

Erik, your knowledge of these incredible cars is second to none. Have you ever spoken to Jay Leno regarding his car?

Best,
Tony

 

I saw Jay with his F1 at the ArtCenter Car Classic in Pasadena back in 2005. I had every intention to say hello and talk with him about the car, but when he arrived in it, there was a virtual mobscene around him. I didn't really expect that sort of behavior there, and so I dove out of the swarm and figured I'd speak with him later, but he left before I had the chance.

Meanwhile, on the grounds of a world famous design college, Gordon Murray stood alone in one corner admiring some of the cars on display. I think most people there didn't recognize him until after he completed an autograph signing session that had been arranged, or after the keynote speech he delivered in their auditorium that afternoon.

As for Leno, I bumped into him again two weeks later walking with Randy Ema (noted historian on the Duesenberg brand) in the paddock at the Monterey Historics. After seeing how he was ambushed at ArtCenter, I really wanted to just leave them alone, but my desire to at least thank him for bringing his F1 to the show got the better of me and I did stop them to tell him that. It was brief and then we both moved on.

I am not sure how much dialogue we could share about his F1. I'd like to tell him that his comment in one of the F1 vids on the JayLenosGarage website was inaccurate. He claimed that unlike other supercars there were no bits from other lesser cars in the build of the F1, but actually there were quite a few - however, for the most part they weren't blatantly obvious. Minor gripe on what is otherwise a fantastic presentation.

>8^)
ER

 

I'm curious, and wouldn't mind at all if you'd rattle off a list of all the parts.

As I picture the car in my mind nothing about any of the major components (steering wheel, seats, gauges, headlights, pedals) seems common with other cars. Would you be referring to things such as front turn signals, stalks to the sides of the steering wheel, p/w switches by chance?

 

Bingo - and because they are things you put your hands on, at least the interior stuff, that's pretty overt usage of other peoples parts. They come from BMW mostly, so they still offer that quality feel. The one exception was the side mirror adjuster which apparently was borrowed from Vauxhall.

Also the side mirrors themselves on most F1s were sourced from the VW Corrado. You can see the VW part stamping on the underside. In fact, the photo below is one I took of Leno's own car in July 2005 in an attempt to capture those markings. It ended up being a better photo of me almost, given that his car is Black.

The earliest F1s (prototypes and the first few production cars) had side mirrors borrowed from the Citroen CX, which also found there way onto many other supercars like the Jaguar XJ220, Lotus Esprit, and a few Aston Martins among others.

There are also 5 F1s that were fitted with a high-mirror option with the side mirrors mounted on the A-pillar section of the window frame. Those mirror units came off the BMW Z1 roadster.

The F1s taillamps were off of a BOVA Coach - essentially a tour bus for us Yanks. I believe the Diablos of that era used the same or similar.

There's others I am drawing a blank on, but unlike the new McLaren MP4-12C, the F1 did borrow from various parts bins to reduce costs (and still charged $1M bucks!).

Really, my goal in life is just to correct Jay Leno. Kidding!

>8^)
ER
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Interesting.

In your findings, are the driven F1s of today fitted with more modern equipment (brakes, wheels, HID lights)? Braking and lighting tech are a world apart from where they were in the mid 90s so it just seems appropriate that they match the rest of the car's potential with things that obviously wouldn't have been possible a decade and a half ago.

 

Let me add to this:

I have read that upon purchasing an F1, the owner also purchases the opportunity to send the car back to the factory and have it customized according to his own preferences. In light of ScreminRevs' question, is that still the case?

And in an attempt to answer part of his post, I would guess that F1s wouldn't have too much trouble with brakes even still today, simply due to the lightweight principles they were designed around.

 

One owner who posts frequently on PistonHeads under the username 'flemke' has made significant changes to his F1 (#040), including reworking of the suspension far beyond a simple spring change. It was less about upgrading, then it was about developing the car to handle "the way it should" to paraphrase him. He also had a custom set of 19" wheels created that look quite similar to the production wheels, but which allow him to run the exact Bridgestones fitted to the Ferrari Enzo.

No one has done anything significant with the brakes yet. I keep hoping the owner mentioned above will tackle that chore as well, as the brakes have always been the F1s weakest point. Fitting carbon brakes was a desire of Murray's and some sets were tested I believe, but the technology had not matured to the point of using them on a road car by ~1991 or so.

HIDs are a common upgrade - they actually move the primary headlamp from the outboard position to the inboard one in the headlamp housing, and then the outer lamp becomes the high beam. This makes a lot of sense too as the outer lamp is larger by design.

>8^)
ER
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