It’s the age-old story that tends to plague the older British sports car marques: a succession of fairly capable British cars, lack of money, ownership changes, and it usually ends up with the company either dead or sold to the Chinese. Sad, really…while some of the business decisions don’t make sense, British sports cars can work exceptionally well, especially when you reverse-engineer out the faults they came with from the factory (you know, that British “charm” that they harp on about.) The last name that wound up under six feet of dirt was TVR, the decidedly anti-traditional British nameplate. Known for cars that were light, ballistically fast and borderline batshit insane, TVRs, especially the post-1990 cars, were eye-catching pieces that were known for scaring journalists who drove them. Peter Wheeler, who owned the company from 1981-2004, was responsible for several successful models, including the Griffith, Cerbera, Tamora, Tuscan and Sagaris, but when the company was sold to Nikolay Smolensky, things started to go south quickly. Workers were fired, the company was broken up into groups, and production just flat stopped. No matter how many times PR blurbs came out that the company was going to get started with a new car, it appeared that TVR was a done deal, complete with the white lilies on the casket.
That is, until 2013 when a consortium bought the entirety of TVR from Smolensky. It’s taken a couple of years, but finally plans have been announced for a new car that is expected to start production in 2017. Here’s the basics: it’s believed to be a reasonably clean-sheet design, not twelve-year-old Sagaris bodies. Gordon Murray, the man behind the iconic McLaren F1, is on board to assist with the engineering aspect…translated, that means that if Jeremy Clarkson test-drives this car, he can leave his brown pants at home. Even better is the engine, a Cosworth dry-sump naturally aspirated V8 hooked to a three-pedal-and-a-stick manual transmission. If that doesn’t make you perk up and take note, nothing will. And finally, the company is expected to keep pricing reasonable, which would put the car into the $90,000 territory, or right about where it was (inflation-corrected) when the company went silent in 2004.
Will we see it in the States? Unless the consortium is willing to do the song-and-dance routine to crash-test and all that, probably not. If lucky, we might get it as a kit car, similar to how Noble managed to get M12s into the United States. A lightweight, Cosworth V8-powered sport stomper that is reasonably priced and looks like nothing else on the road? Yeah, we’d spend a few weekends bolting that together if it meant we could plate it and go screw with Gallardo and Porsche owners. Is there a touch of optimism about the whole thing? This early, yes there is, but stranger things have happened, and the combination presented is too damn tempting to ignore.
Don’t be screwing with us, Dr. Frankenstien. Build this monster.
If we can keep the Stupid Car Feature Police and their flappy paddle transmissions away from this thing, I’ll bet it will be very good.
Hopefully this will happen. Not gonna hold my breath, TVR has always kind of been in limbo. They just better make sure that it looks as insane as the Sagaris. Speaking of the Sagaris, there’s someone in the UK who has a Sagaris with a 750hp Lingenfelter LS9 swapped into it.
Really? A 750HP motor? That has to be a blast to drive!
With how light and small the Sagaris is, I’ll bet that if you stomp on the go pedal just right, it’ll spin end-for-end in a heartbeat.
Really ! What part of at the present time this is all a lot of vaporware speculation without one solitary prototype of any piece of the car in existence has escaped you moosey ole bean ?
Now don’t get me wrong . I’m a huge freaking advocate for Gordon Murray’s work regardless of the fact that nothing the man has done of late has reached fruition . Despite being fragile piles of crap in the long run that literally fall apart before your eyes and engines that have been more hand grenades than motors I have a deep love for TVR . Regardless of the fact that Cosworth in fact isn’t Cosworth anymore [ new owners ] and haven’t done a damn thing worth mentioning in the last five years I have great nostalgia for the company .
But really mooseface and McTaggert ….
… don’t you think it’d be just a bit wiser to be withholding judgement and our enthusiasm until we’ve finally got something real … to base it on ?
Cause like I’ve intimated … right now this should be filed in the Hype & Hyperbole drawer till further notice .. TVR’s owners are anything but forthright and transparent .. and nothing from any of the above’s recent past gives any reason for such unbridled enthusiasm .
So for the love of sanity … ” Curb Your Enthusiasm ” … hope for the best … but absolutely expect the worst
PS; McTaggert ! Y’all missed another major new flash from Blighty … this one with a whole lot more substance and traction .
Bristol Cars is Back ! With them going back to BMW power making the circle complete [ all the first Bristol’s were BMW powered with many BMW parts thru out ]
Now that … is a story we can sink our teeth into … not this remote TVR pie in the sky and a whole lotta wishful thinking announcement
Yeah, I gotta agree that these small marques have a tendency to turn out to be vaporware. But fingers crossed here.
And moosface, here’s that Sagaris I mentioned.
http://www.speedhunters.com/2014/10/prepare-blast-savage-tvr-sagaris/
A Cosworth V8?
Is that an ex F1 engine I wonder – still it’s a lot better than the usual LS hunka shit that finds its way into most old British sports car revivals these days.
This is not a car – it is automotive pornography!
Now if you’ll excuse me it’s off to the john for me with a man-sized box of Kleenex….