.

the car junkie daily magazine.

.

Blackpool Madness: TVR, The Brand That Is Seven Shades Of Mental


Blackpool Madness: TVR, The Brand That Is Seven Shades Of Mental

The video game Gran Turismo introduced a whole generation of budding gearheads to vehicles that they had never seen before. It was easy to get into the game and to get set up with a Dodge Viper, Chevy Camaro or a Honda Civic, if that was your sort of thing, but the cars that we didn’t know about were suddenly in our faces: the Mitsubishi FTO, the Nissan Skylines, the Subaru WRX/STi lines, and one car company that even to this day I’m surprised made it into the game at all, TVR. Ford wasn’t even in Gran Turismo, yet the mental patients from Blackpool were. That’s either a statement to what TVR vehicles were capable of or a testament to the ability to get somewhere when you aren’t charging heavy licensing fees. I’m not sure yet on which is which as far as TVR goes.

But what a lineup we got to see: the Griffith, the Tuscan Speed Six, the Cerbera, and the car so violent it not only murdered a 1,000 horse dyno but managed to put the fear of God into then-company owner Peter Wheeler, the Cerbera Speed Twelve. After realizing that I could use any of those cars to lay waste to just about everything else on the list, I had to do research. And as a young kid, I was impressed. I wanted one. I wanted a Cerbera with the AJP8 engine. Which one to choose, the 360 horse 4.2L V8 or the 420-horse 4.5L unit? I wouldn’t care. It’s only now that you can start looking at those cars (25-year importation rule) and considering the lack of ABS, airbags or other safety equipment that the U.S. authorities have deemed vital to your health and well-being, it might still be a little bit of a bitch to make happen.

But 1990s TVRs are barely scratching the story of a tale of mental machines and dramas that would play out like a bad soap opera if they were ever to hit the small screen. Check it out below!


  • Share This
  • Pinterest
  • 0