Here is something completely different – the
Caparo T1. Is it a road car? Is it a race car? Whatever it is, the Caparo T1 is claimed to have the highest power-to-weight ratio of a production car of 1,000 bhp per lite. In theory, it is the quickest to 100 mph, and for the 0-100 mph-0 acceleration-braking test. What's more the Caparo T1 shattered the lap record round the track used by Top Gear, and previously held by the 800 bhp Koenigsegg CCX from 1 minute 18 seconds by a massive 7 seconds!
Trackday, street legal
Cars like the Bugatti Veyron and Pagani Zonda F have power-to-weight ratios of 480-550 bhp per tonne, while the Ultima GTR720 was up there on its own at 727 bhp per tonne. So you can see that the Caparo T1 seems to have moved the goal posts.
But what is it? This is not a fully-equipped grand tourer to be sure, as it has no air conditioning or ABS or anything like that. Initially, the Caparo T1 was planned to be a close-coupled two-seater coupe, but now it emerges as an open car with a wide aero screen, like the Brooke Double R.
Yes, these are both street-legal sports cars, but in reality the Caparo T1 is a trackday special which can be driven on the road legally, and as a fun machine. A plastic canopy can be added to make it a coupe, but evidently you would get so hot that it needs air conditioning with the roof closed.
In essence, the Caparo T1 is the four-wheel equivalent of an ultra hot motorcycle, built for ultimate, absolute, performance.
Target: near Formula 1 car
The whole Caparo T1 plot is to get as near as top-flight engineers can to a Formula 1 car for the road. Of course, you can't get reach the performance of these racers, but using the same technologies, you can get near.
The Caparo T1 certainly looks the part. It has a pencil-slim nose, like a Formula 1 car with a wide wing at the front connecting to separate fenders that have faired in lamps and small aprons beneath. A neat design feature is that the rear-view mirrors are built into the back of the fenders where they do not obstruct the air flow.
That pencil-slim nose is not there just for fashion, but because that is the best way of splitting the air stream to create the ground effect you need to enable cornering with a force of 3g. Indeed, the whole shape of the Caparo T1 is designed to create massive downforce.
The links for the inboard race-style wishbone suspension are all exposed, of course. These fenders and the two-piece wings are far removed from the -type fenders found on Caterhams and similar cars because they are designed to provide massive downforce. The slim nose, too, divides the airflow.
The streamlined body is very narrow, and the cockpit is barely wide enough for two – but then, a trackday car doesn't really need that much space – and widens out for the twin air intakes, radiators and engine at the rear.
Behind the cockpit is a tall air intake for the engine, and then there is a high-mounted rear wing. A lot of the downforce on the body comes from the flat bottom, rear diffuser, and special flaps. Both wings are adjustable.
Were it wider, and equipped to match the Bugatti or Pagani it would probably weigh about 1,800 lb (810 kg) which would still give it a power-to-weight ratio of about 700 bhp per tonne, so any way you shake it, this is an ultra-lightweight car that challenges the supercar industry to get back on track and build lighter cars.
Caparo has a vested interest in this, because the car company is owned by the Caparo Group which makes lightweight materials and components for the auto industry, and wants its ideas to be taken up by the big auto companies as well as the specialists.
Amazingly powerful V-8 with 575 bhp
Initially, Caparo was to use a 2.4 liter supercharged engine – and a prototype was built – but later settled for a naturally aspirated unit of 3.5 liters because the huge torque from a supercharged engine would have meant a much heavier drive train.
The heart of the T1 is a naturally aspirated 3.5 liter 90-degree V-8 engine developing no less than 575 bhp at 10,500 rpm and 310lb ft (420Nm) torque at 9,000rpm – that's 164 bhp per liter. Actually, the engine is built to the specification for an Indy race engine, but the maximum speed has been kept down to 10,500 rpm in the interests of reliability. But it has been tested to 12,000 rpm, and 700 bhp on methanol!
This is a huge specific output for a naturally aspirated engine, and stems from the racing design. To get those high revs, there is a very large bore compared with the stroke - 93mm bore by 64.3mm stroke – and twin overhead camshafts per bank of cylinders.
To save weight, the pistons run in Nikasil hard-coated aluminum cylinders, and the valves are made of titanium. The crankshaft is of the flat-plane type, machined from a steel billet. Of course, the lubrication is by dry sump system.
The speed of maximum torque tells us what sort of engine this is – 9,000 rpm. This is just like a semi-racing motor cycle, and shows that you will not get much power below about 6,000 rpm, so this is definitely for the track and hard chargers. The engine is coupled to a sequential six-speed gearbox with paddle control.
To reduce weight, the gearbox has a magnesium case strengthened with carbon fiber – just like on a Grand Prix car.
Carbon fiber structure with sub-frames
The structure itself consists of a carbon fiber composite body with aluminum honeycomb for flat parts like the floor – this is an excellent approach to gaining stiffness and light weight. There is a separate deformable crash structure at the front, and the engine and rear suspension are mounted in a steel sub-frame.
Actually, the engine is not strictly mounted in it, because it is bolted in so that it is part of the structure as as far as torsion or twisting forces are concerned. This method also reduces weight, but there is a price to pay in all the engine vibration coming into the car. In fact, this is a technique used on racing cars, not road cars.
True racing type suspension
The racing-type inboard suspension features coil springs, adjustable dampers, and adjustable anti-roll bars front and rear, designed to cope with the high downforce. As on racing cars, the spring/damper units are mounted fore-and-aft, horizontally, where they are out of the way of the linkage. The front ones can just be seen through the front of the aeroscreen.
With a claimed cornering power of 3.0 g lateral acceleration, it is clear that much of the cornering power comes from the high downforce developed by the aerodynamic effects on the car. This seem mind-boggling, but evidently Formula 1 cars brake and corner at much higher rates than 3 g.
By contrast, the Pagani Zonda F, which has quite high downforce by conventional standards, achieves a lateral acceleration when cornering of 1.5 g.
The brakes consist of six-pot front, and four-pot rear calipers with 14 inch (355 mm) diameter discs, which will surely provide plenty of stopping power despite the lack of carbon-ceramic discs.
Michelin 255/35 front and 305/30 rear tires are mounted on 10-inch front and 11-inch rear Oz wheels.
The T1 is claimed to weigh about 1,270 lb (575kg), which is very light indeed for a car with a 3.5 liter engine, but a bit more than was forecast initially. That means the power-to-weight ratio is no less than 1,000 bhp per liter – 500 bhp per liter is pretty exceptional for an ultra-expensive exotic car. This is still a projected figure, and the actual kerb weight is probably going to be about ,1,300 lb (590 kg).
Amazing performance thanks to light weight and good aerodynamics
Caparo claims 0-60 in 2.5 seconds, 0-100 mph in 5 seconds, and 0-100 mph-0 in less than 9 seconds. We understand that so far, they have got to about 5.7 seconds to 100 mph, still a very rapid time, and this in a car with test equipment on board. Any time under 5.5 seconds will be sensational.
The claimed figures are incredibly fast, which if verified independently will beat the performance of the Ultima GTR720 which has 720 bhp and masses of torque.
Whether the Caparo T1 lives up to the claims remains to be seen, but it is clear that this car moves the goalposts. It is the highest-performing car you can buy at any price – top speed apart, which is largely irrelevant once you are talking of over 200 mph – with the potential for incredible performance round a track or on the road.
Once you add a driver of 165 lb (75 kg) to the kerb weight, you get a power-to-weight ratio of 880 bhp per tonne – still stratospheric, but well short of the magic 1,000 bhp per tonne. This compares well with both the Ultima (676) and Koenigsegg CCX (642) with a driver aboard. We usually give the kerb weight when quoting power-to-weight ratios, but in future we will include a driver because it makes more difference to a light car than a heavy one.
So is this real? Well, the project has clearly been rushed, but is now getting to the stage where it is real.
Yes, you will have the chance, so long as stump up about $380,000 plus tax (UK £223,000), which is a good deal more than when the car was first announced to feel The Force.
So long as you keep the engine singing, you will be able to leave everything miles behind. With distributors appointed in the UK, USA, South Africa and Dubai and more dealers under evaluation there is every chance you will be able to buy a Caparo T1, but in many countries for use on the track only.
The methods used to build this car are likely to lead to a new type of lightweight, ultra-high performance supercars. To get more power and street-cred, these will run on ethanol, or a gasoline-ethanol mix. Welcome to the new supercar world.
