deposit on a new car!!

that titanium screams SEX!! lol

 

Mark there are other alternatives than buying a kit car.
I mean serious...
A Ford GT??? Wanna offset one kit car for another???

 

amazing to see how people throw around the word "Supercar" like it is something that is achieved by strapping a high power engine to 4 wheels.

"Conceived as a new kind of supercar company..."
They do not develop their own engines, neither do they have any claim on track experience or racing experience. They use whatever engine they can find to strap into a tube chassis. Overpower the chassis and call yourself a "Supercar Company". Maybe its a typo and they wanted to say we are a super car company.

Sorry Mark but in reality you are better off with a 355 that you tune and dial in with new suspension and some performance mods. Not just that it will look better it will drive just as good. Replace all the fine leather with cheap plastic crap and you have the making of a Ford GT.

...now ask me how I really feel

Hey I suggest they let you test drive that kit car on the track for a day. Mid Ohio is close by. Let me know when and I will fly up there to meet you.

 

They should have approached this idea from a different angle. Noble at least has some form of a name and there are many more opportunities for racing and marketing rather than trying to rebrand something. The market does not respond well to these things.

Noble has a great concept and a great chassis and a decent looking body. But there is where it ends. There is no polish and no dressing. The interiors look like the many lambo replicals. The engine bay just looks like it was "put" there rather than it BELONGS there. It looks clumsy and out of place. I am not sure of the price on these but if it is like a Noble then I expect a LOT more for 60K for an M400 and 130K for for an M12.

I mean look at Spyker Cars N.V. They have a cool looking car, great performance and a awesome interior. But that is where it stops. Their stock has droped almost 70% since January and trades at less than 4 euro. They do 36M but yet have an actual profit of only 2%! In 2004 they sold 15 cars and if you do the math they sold about 150 in 2006. They can barely manage their own company and now they own an F1 team. Risky business just like Rossion cars.

The market these cars are in is a big boys market. Hope they can carve out their own piece of the sandbox.

BUT!!!

Hey if it floats your boat then all the power to you. Congrads on the purchase regardless. I am still a car guy at heart.

.m

 

the interior looks a bit better than nobles though ill give it that much...but i have to agree there are much better options. What are you looking to get out of this car ? is it going to be a daily? dedicated track toy? both ?

 

Though not directed towards me I feel like I must.

Lotus S4S would do the trick or a something a bit heavier though GM like would be the 97+ TT.

Cheap:

Turbo E46 M3 - Lot's of carbon available for this and you are putting out 640 on pump gas and 750+ on race. = 60's

Cheaper:

Turbo NSX - Armando has one for sale right now (http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=159604) and it would more than fit the bill. = 50's

Cheapest:

91-92 ONLY MR2 + mods - My little 450HP and 2200 lbs. mid-engine made this little guy get up and go. I know... I know... It's an MR2. You would really be surprised at what it can do (think handling of a lotus, feeling of a 348, top end of a vette and the power of a viper). One of the few (4 I can think of) mid engine Japanese sports cars. = 40's.

Of course there is always a Tesla Roadster!

Here is a neat clip showing an F40 VS GTR R32 VS RUF VS NSX VS RX7 VS 512TR VS MR2 on the same track

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI7qe2AMx6E

 

Mark,
You should just buy my M400. I'm painfully letting her go at 3980 miles. Save a ton of money and the car is already dialed in & here NOW, no 10-12 month wait.

 

This would work too!

 

Mark I am open minded.
So open minded that I was considering to open a dealership for Noble here in Miami at one point last year.
I deceided against it becasue at the end of the day you are selling a kitcar for a lot of Dollars. The reason why Noble had somuch problem with it. Now the car is being re-invented and built here but it still it a kitcar.
As M400 said he has his car that "is already dialed in.." Well, that proves my point. You did not have to "dial in" your Porsche, your Ferrari or any other car you ever bought that comes from a real car manufacturer. Why, because they do the dialing in for you.

Having a Roush engine again makes my point that it is a kit car. They built some tube chassis and stick an engine into it.You can put the Roush engine, or a Mustang V8 or something else. They sells tube frame chassis with a body kit. They do not sell a car. Their research and development cost is nowhere near that of any car manufacturer. They operate under a different requirement by DOT in order to avoid having to deal with safety requirements that any other car manufacturer has to deal with.

My point is, yes the car looks nice and probably is fast (hell buy a Yugo and strap a rocket booster to it and it will go fast ) but at the end of the day...it is a kitcar.

 

Actually a good point.
I would suggest to look into Armando's NSX as well. Already heavily turbo'd and very reliable.
NSX a true Supercar, just ask PikeMike

 

...or look into the upcoming GT2... lighter, rear-drive, with the turbo upped to about 540hp

(and "dialed-in" too )

 

also waiting list of hell and expensive as $*(#). Anywhere else in the world the noble is sold "dialed in and not as a kit" the only reason its being sold as a "kit" is due to safety regulations. It has to be one of the quickest cars out there. Yes its powered by a V6 but its TT with 300 hp. Think of a Porsche. Also they have a network of builders for you so that in theory you could pick your car up all built and "tuned in" "if you want to know how a car should drive drive this!" - Jeremy Clarkson on the Nobel. Nobel FTW!

 

I still believe (call me old fashioned) that if you want to prove your car as being the best out there, you should enter it in competition. They claim to have the best, fine...get a race version licensed for SCCA or IMSA or GrandAm and prove you are competitive.

Ligier USA is doing just that before they introduce their sports racer to the market. They started racing the car in several events already obliterating the competiton and the time sheets. They have yet to make a real announcement that their cars are being sold here in the US. www.ligierusa.com

To me, that is the way to go in proving you have something special out there.

 

There is another kit car out there called: Arial Atom. Sounds great. Looks like a race car for the street but in reality is just a kit.
They use a Honda power plant in a special built tube chassis. Light, because it does not have to comply to rigid crash tests, hence fast.

I did the custom built thing on their website and came to $86,000 + and that is simply WAY TOO MUCH !

 

Well said. Though it really only applies to people that are really into the core of what a sports car should be or is. There are plenty of people lining up to drive "The new hotness" and have money to do it. In the Lambo section here they are talking about this exclusive (20) lambo coming out and is going to go for 1M - 1.5M Euro! Deposits were 300K Euro and they are sold out. Lot of people looking to capitalize on this market. More to the point, I would love to see a Murci on the track running ALMS or LEMANS without the clutch disintegrating. Heck with Audi and VW backing they could easily buy into F1. BUT... Maybe this is why you go pay 300K+ for your Murci and sell it two years latter for 200. But hey if I would love to add a Lambo to a COLLECTION! They are a beast and are smokin' hot.

But back to what you said, this is why I am interested in Radical Extreme Cars. Though not a street car, a purpose built race car, they have their own series and also compete in ALMS, IMSA Lites and LEMANS. Now take that knowledge, tech and name and turn it into a street car!

 

Well Mark certainly does not fit the "new hotness" type. He is an old racer and I am sure he is looking at it from the performance perspective more than anything else.

Radical is a great example as well. They put their money where their mouth is. Build a good car and back it up. The most fascinating video in a Radical at the Ring for 8 minutes blasting the record. Of course not build for the road, which is an entirely different ball game.

Lambos are great fun. Their racing "backing" though always failed WAY short. Everytime someone is trying to prove how great they are, they land on their face a few months later by finding out those cars are not the greatest track toys, certainly not for endurance racing.
They are very very fun though. I remember howmuch fun I had last year test driving a Diablo GTR.
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I have not seen any of them on the track yet.
Would love to see them though. He is probably running the Alabama Chapter. Wonder if he was in Daytona for the SCCA Nationals? Have to say though, never really looked much at the other classes. Was busy with my own car.

What class is he running at?

 

actually thinking about it I think I saw a Noble in NASA Sebring this summer. You are right. Its a private team though. They had some serious issues with the car that weekend from what I remember.