Murray, a F1 designer has come up with a new car that can be built with low cost facilities:

F1 designer Gordon Murray unveils lightweight city carBy Jorn Madslien

Business reporter, BBC News, Shalford, Surrey


Imagine a car so narrow that two can drive next to each other in one lane; a car so small and short that three can park in one parking space.

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Now imagine that the car is built in a shed from glass fibre, recycled plastic bottles and hollow steel tubes, using just a fifth of the material required to build a conventional car.

Such a vehicle would have the potential to prevent gridlock on the world's roads as the number of cars quadruples to 2.5 billion by 2020.

It could also help hundreds of millions of people achieve their dream of owning a car, without depleting scarce resources such as water, energy or steel.

Well, that car has been made.

It seats three, weighs just 575kg, has a top speed of almost 100mph and is expected to cost about £6,000 ($9,000).

Legendary cars

The man behind the project is Professor Gordon Murray, long hailed by speed-loving petrolheads as an automotive hero.

During the 70s and early 80s, Prof Murray earned his spurs as a Formula 1 racing car designer, churning out cars that won a string of Grand Prix races and World Championships for Bernie Ecclestone's Brabham.


Prof Murray earned his spurs designing Formula 1 and supercars for the road Next he joined McLaren where he repeated the exercise, producing the Formula 1 car that earned Ayrton Senna his first championship, before penning two legendary road cars: The F1, which held the title as the world's fastest road car for years, and the gull-winged Mercedes SLR McLaren.

But six years ago, Prof Murray stepped off the Formula 1 merry-go-round to pursue a dream - one that he hopes could change forever the way cars are being built.

"I had made enough racing cars and sports cars by then," he says.

"I'm the sort of person who needs a new challenge all the time. I like to take something and disrupt it."

'Formula 1 thinking'

The embodiment of Prof Murray's dream is tucked away in a modest brick building on an industrial site in Surrey.

Here, Prof Murray's team - the same one that he worked with at McLaren - has built a tiny city car - the T.25.

"Over a 15-year period at McLaren, that team became probably the most powerful roadcar team on the planet, and now I've got them all here," he grins.


The T.25 has no doors; instead it opens as the front tilts forward The T.25 copies the F1 supercar's three-seat interior design, with the driver in the middle and the passengers behind.

And like the F1, the citycar is built using composite materials - only cheaper ones.

The body panels and the monocoque, or base, of the car are reinforced with glass, which costs a fraction of carbon, Prof Murray says.

"Some of the fibres are random, some are woven and some are unidirectional, and that's Formula 1 thinking," he explains.

It all sits on a flimsy steel tube frame that Prof Murray acknowledges "is nowhere near strong enough on its own".

But once the monocoque is glued into the frame, in a process similar to how a windscreen is glued into a car body, it becomes "as sturdy and safe as a conventional car".


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11301831

DR would need less road and parking space.
S.

Not a good idea, they do not contain enough scrap metal

please forgive me for being quizzical, ABC, but what the heck does this article have to do with Dominicans entering the car business?

Seems you can get a license to make these cars and the facilities are low cost.

S.

and just who is going to make these vehicles, pray tell? i mean, do we have a reservoir of car assembly technicians sitting on their hands? besides, would they be suited to the Dr, given their obvious fragility? how long would they last on these roads?

Well, ABC200, at least this idea of yours my contain a grain of possibility. Namely, the DR could be used as a component assembler and gradually work up to multiple components and so forth. But I have to agree with Dread here, DR is in no way, shape or form ready for an Automobile manufacturing process. It would be truly wonderful if DR got to participate in car manufacturing and work itself up to making many components in DR; but the future appears to hold a small piece of the pie, and many different countries specializing in one or more component with the final pieces being assembled at the actual selling country site. Perhaps DR will serve the enormous NAFTA market via CAFTA_DR and become one of those small component platforms.

it is a matter of scale. some guy in Jamaic has been making cars for the better part of a decade. they are not state of the art, nor thrilling to look at. but they are tough, reliable, utilitarian, and a breeze to maintain and repair. they are used in the rental business. so, i guess it could be attempted here, but, on a limited scale. the oligarchs who control the auto business would probably not like the idea, unless they could control that , too.

Atabey speculates

Perhaps DR will serve the enormous NAFTA market via CAFTA_DR and become one of those small component platforms.

never happen. cannot compete with the Pacific Rim.

actually, Atabey, in my world, at least, there is a difference between expressing an interest, and doing something. that intermediate little step is called feasibility studies. so, if the Koreans see where Haiti has the infrastructure and human capital needed to make ventures feasible, they will move on to the final phase. that is how i think things are usually done in the world of commerce.