and of course it has nothing to do with anything else. cough. cool looking car though. lets hope the performance lives up to the hype. unlike the...cough..
not sure how well it will do,at the moment it has the speed,but i think its only got 4500km under its belt ,so just a shake down for this year i suspect,ready for next season
12C around Dunsfold on Top Gear at 1:16.20. Pretty impressive time; faster than anything else with a roof and doors.
I just love reading all the people's responses here. You love the car, think it is awesome. Then a couple magazine tests come out and you hate all over it because "they" did. Then a couple of positive things start to come out again and then the mood sways again. The fact remains, there are no "regular" people that have driven it yet. The metrics measured by a factory or a pro driver or a magazine journalist that has tons more seat time and is in the business to sell magazines isn't completely relevant. This car is going to be a marvel. It' chassis and handling system along with its F1 derived traction control system is unrivaled. There is a reason that they don't want you to turn it off. Look at the lap at Top Gear track. Call it whatever you want, but it is a street car that demolished everything other than a V8 powered Ariel Atom. Stop the hate, the car is amazing. The 458 is amazing also. It is going to come down to who likes what. It is simply not a matter of the car being a piece of dung as the last few pages of posts have been inferring due to some magazine articles that are written by journalists that usually pour all over Ferrari in hopes that they will get the newest car first the next year. I think that it is amazing for a company like McLaren to come into the fray and bring out a car this good as their initial offering.
What hate? My god if you want to see hate, go to the FF or California section and see what other Ferrari owners have to say there. Now, that's hate. The Mac lovers need some thicker skin. Just because someone questions some aspect of the car doesn't make them a hater.
In the UK several potential owners have already driven the car on the road and on track and many of them have had nothing but positive comments as a result. >8^) ER
All of this banter back and forth is highly amusing. The 458 is the preferred choice for now largely based on looks and the emotional qualities of the driving experience (ie: the sound) and the ability to do a little drifting. All of the knocks against the McLaren are fair comments. 1. The styling is boring 2. The interior is boring and needs more flair 3. Driving it is sterile. The sound isn't as cool as the Ferrari. It's not loud enough. 4. Throttle response and turbo lag could be improved. The shifting feels slow. 5. It's no fun because you can't drift it. 6. It's the first year of a new car, the car is going to be a mess with reliability issues. All of these are easy for McLaren to rectify very quickly. 1. The bodyshell is not limited by the chassis and they showed us what Frank Stephenson's vision of what a cool 12C looks like with the GT3 and it is a hit. Expect the lightweight iteration to look as crazy as this. Better yet, facelift the 12C now and watch sales triple. 2. The interior is very plain. It could be jazzed up very easily. I've given my ideas to McLaren and I am waiting for their bespoke program which should be up and running in a bit. 3. Not impossible to make this car sound better and more raw. 4. I believe this has already been dealt with by the factory. 5. You shouldn't be drifting like a lunatic anyway. Let's be honest with ourselves. How often do any of us really do this? So why does it matter? It doesn't to me. 6. The first year of every new Ferrari is more or less a similar leap of faith. I'm not expecting the 12C to spontaneously ignite so how could it get worse than that? If you consider what Ferrari has to do to keep up once the current 12C's superficial shortcomings are resolved, it will not be easy for them. I love Ferraris but the results on the battleground may look a lot different 2 years from now which concerns me. Ferrari has a few new models coming up (new Cali, 599, Enzo). I hope they step up the game significantly and these cars start to shed a lot of weight and add some significantly new technology in response to McLaren.
Very well written. McLaren is currently garnering further response and feedback on the test cars that were driven by potential customers as well as journalists. They will be fine-tuning them on customer cars before releasing them. The customer spec car will be a much better car to drive than the PP cars. Am still waiting patiently for mine to come. Also, any updates on their bespoke program? I'm thinking of painting the rear diffusors in body colour but am yet to be advised by my dealer and factory.
The newest issue of EVO describes all the improvements McLaren have done on the car since the test, including positive changes to the engine note and brakes. Harry Metcalfe was actually quite impressed. It's nice to know that McLaren aren't sitting idle, but are constantly working on improving their product.
Only the exhaust noise and trottle response,you can use the track mode on powertrain all the time if you want to,if you dont want a quiet ride in town!
Have there been any deliveries yet? I know some on here had dates for later in the year but I thought some were supposed to be delivered August/September IIRC. Have there been any deliveries at all?
They are already delivering 12C's in the UK and possibly a few other areas in Europe. All of the planned delivery dates were pushed back a few months due to supplier delays on the IRIS system because of the Japanese earthquake earlier this year. There was another short delay as they reworked cars after some of the early press expressed the concern the car didn't sound raw enough. First US deliveries are due in October I believe, possibly a bit later. >8^) ER
A few have been delivered in the UK but tbh they seem to be in total disarray with delivery promises repeatedly missed and little or no communication. I was originally told May/ June then promised delivery in July, August and September, in the end a few weeks ago I asked for a definitive commitment which the dealer could not give me and the factory didn't even reply to, when I chased they would not give one, the head of planning at Mclaren finally gave me a 'hopefully' the car would be at the dealer at the end of September, out of total frustration I cancelled the car. More concerning is it now seems that a 'who shouts loudest' policy is being applied, somebody who was approx 30 cars ahead of me has just been told of yet another 10 day delay yet two people who were after me have been told their cars will be at the dealer next week and the week after respectively. Much was made of how the customer experience would be head and shoulders above the competition .......... maybe one day they will get there, right now it is utterly shocking.
