F1 for the road: Freestream T1

Newswheel staff :: 08 February 2006 :: Filed under Mid / rear engine sportscar, Freestream, Europe & UK, US

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1,000bhp per tonne. Er, plums

An F1 car for the road? It’s the sort of clichéd, showbiz idea that true car junkies sneer at. Right? Probably, but it’s awfully hard not to get just a little excited at the prospect of the Freestream T1. It’s designed by a pair of former McLaren F1 engineers. It’s claimed to pack a power to weight ratio of around 1,000bhp per tonne. And it’s simply sexier than a large sex pie.

The work of ex-McLaren bods Ben Scott-Geddes and Graham Halstead, the two-seater T1 is based around a carbon/aluminium honeycomb monocoque chassis with a separate front crash structure and a tubular steel rear spaceframe. Both aero trim and suspension design are F1-inspired and fully adjustable. Freestream reckons the car will tip the scales at just 465kg. That’s a hilariously featherweight figure and less than both a Caterham Seven and a current F1 car.

Consequently, a 2.4-litre V8 cranking out 500bhp at 10,000rpm  is enough to deliver that scrotum-witheringly enormous 1,000bhp power to weight ratio. The engine is a fully bespoke design with quad cams, five valves per cylinder and supercharged induction. Just a little ambitious, then.

Needless to say, the T1’s anticipated performance is absolutely monumental. 60mph in 2.5 seconds, 100mph in five and on to as much as 200mph, depending on aero and suspension settings. But potentially even more staggering, particularly in comparison to heavyweight supercars like the two-tonne Bugatti Veyron, is the car’s handling. Thanks to that vanishingly small kerb weight and what Freestream reckon is the first aero system for the road that delivers race car levels of downforce, the T1 will achieve cornering and braking loads of over 3g. We won’t even bother to try to imagine what that sort of capability would be like on a public road.

And believe it or not, production is slated to start later this year with first UK deliveries perhaps as early as October. Freestream expects to build around 25 cars a year initially, and more when US sales start. So, that’s a brand new company building an F1 car for the road with a high tech carbon chassis and an entirely bespoke engine producing over 200bhp per litre. And it’s due out before the end of the year. Hmmm.

Linkage:
Freestream website