The only McLaren F1 Tech in North America

[false_aesthetic]

I'm not a huge car guy but I know some of ya'll are so here's a fun read.

The Only McLaren F1 Technician in North America

[seanile]

if they wanna keep the location secret, they should probably blur out the address on the granite certificate of accuracy...461 Ridge Rd, Dayton, NJ 08810

[seanile]

if they wanna keep the location secret, they should probably blur out the address on the granite certificate of accuracy...461 Ridge Rd, Dayton, NJ 08810

scratch that. emailed the mag, got this in return "Except that’s not the address of the McLaren warehouse, it appears to be the address of the place that provided the granite."

[sk_tle]

Just saw that story a few weeks ago :


A japanese collector recently put a "NOS" mclaren on sale. It spent the last 20y or so in protection sheets. I've heard about an asking price of more than 20 million dollars and the thing is currently undriveable and would need the replacement of nearly every part to be called in working order by McLaren.

[false_aesthetic]

I remember when I told my dad that my bike wheels are worth over $2k. He was dumbfounded -- my exact response to the cost of maintaining a McLaren.

[j44ke]

I'm still pretty dumfounded by $2K+ wheels.

I was told a story about a a war photog during the Vietnam era who won a bunch gambling, went into a camera shop in Tokyo where all the collectible Leicas are preserved in vacuum wrapped plastic, plunked down his winnings on some camera, ripped off the plastic and loaded the camera with film, then took a photo of all the counter guys staring at him with their mouths open.

No idea if that really happened or not, but I like it and would do it if similar happened to me (though pretty sure collectible Leicas are a tad more expensive than they were back then, plastic wrap or no.)

[nahtnoj]

Question every decision you've ever made in your life.

[Corso]

I’m loving the engine size to car ratio:
burnett-mclaren.jpg

[dgaddis]

This is interesting: '94 F1 did 0-60 in 3.1 seconds. That's damn fast, and a few of their newer cars are in the 2.7/2.8 second range. But the 2015 Corvette Z06 can also do a 3.1sec 0-60 time. It's not nearly as sexy as a McLaren of course, and certainly not as exclusive, and it's not quite as quick in the 1/4 mile, but it's hard to argue that any other car offers better performance for the dollar than a Corvette. I mean, the slowest new Corvette available does a sub 4 second 0-60 and low 12sec quarter mile!

[Christian Fox]

Love that story and love that car. Such a beautiful car that hasn't aged a day; its design looks like it could have been built yesterday. Probably my favorite car of all time.

The uber pedantic "aging out" maintenance stuff is a bit much, though. I'm fairly certain a clutch won't go bad in three years just by sitting, undriven, in a climate controlled garage.

[Ras72]

Tesla. Nothing like producing those performance numbers (silently i might add) coming back from the grocery store with the family in the back seat. ...but that talk is for another thread.

Getting back to this one... If one wished to be the second mechanic for McLaren F1s; I'm curious to know how that would be accomplished.

[sk_tle]

Tesla. Nothing like producing those performance numbers (silently i might add) coming back from the grocery store with the family in the back seat.

On the other hand while the 0-60mph performance number are impressive when the batteries are fully charged, the Tesla is completely useless on a race track and cannot even compete a lap with optimal performances as the batteries overheat in a matter of seconds :

We've seen before just how incapable Teslas are at being pushed to their limits at racetracks, but the issues that C+D lists is comprehensive. In just one lap at Virginia International Raceway, with the magazine's technical editor, K.C. Colwell, behind the wheel, the Model S P85D goes into reduced power mode in the middle of the single hot lap, displays an air suspension fault, and has a heart-stopping change of pressure in the brake pedal. Those things are not exactly ideal when you're tracking your car.

On the video embedded in the link the driver even lost the radio midlap.

Testla might be a great every day "fast" car but the intended usage and capabilities are completely different.

[72gmc]

Keeping an F1 "showroom" is fine, I guess, but my thinking is more in line with the guy I met at a car show who had a 1970ish Ferrari Daytona as his around-town car. He was proud of the paint chips on the hood and the wear on the interior. Seemed to really enjoy telling me how some Ferrari club guys shunned him because he swapped out tires and wheels to make it a better daily. Maybe the friendliest owner I met at that show.

[colker]

I'm still pretty dumfounded by $2K+ wheels.

I was told a story about a a war photog during the Vietnam era who won a bunch gambling, went into a camera shop in Tokyo where all the collectible Leicas are preserved in vacuum wrapped plastic, plunked down his winnings on some camera, ripped off the plastic and loaded the camera with film, then took a photo of all the counter guys staring at him with their mouths open.

No idea if that really happened or not, but I like it and would do it if similar happened to me (though pretty sure collectible Leicas are a tad more expensive than they were back then, plastic wrap or no.)

Hard to believe that story. If i was shooting war in Vietnam the last thing i would spend any money or even talk about would be collectible Leicas.

[Dave Thompson]

Hard to believe that story. If i was shooting war in Vietnam the last thing i would spend any money or even talk about would be collectible Leicas.

Not necessarily. In the late 60s and early 70s I was in Hawaii and met many US Army photogs that would rotate out of Vietnam, go to Japan and buy a buttload of high end Nikon gear to bring back to the US to resell at a hefty profit but well under US retail prices. I still have some lenses, bodies and finders I bought from them then.

[colker]

Not necessarily. In the late 60s and early 70s I was in Hawaii and met many US Army photogs that would rotate out of Vietnam, go to Japan and buy a buttload of high end Nikon gear to bring back to the US to resell at a hefty profit but well under US retail prices. I still have some lenses, bodies and finders I bought from them then.

Still hard to believe a vietnam war news photographer would spend poker money on a collectible Leica. Very different from what you describe but then... reality is hard to believe sometimes.

[Bob Ross]

I was told a story about a a war photog during the Vietnam era who won a bunch gambling, went into a camera shop in Tokyo where all the collectible Leicas are preserved in vacuum wrapped plastic, plunked down his winnings on some camera, ripped off the plastic and loaded the camera with film, then took a photo of all the counter guys staring at him with their mouths open.

Total thread drift: When I was 12 or 13 years old one of my Dad's clients (in the expanded polystyrene fabrication business) was the son of a camera shop owner, and said camera shop was having trouble making ends meet. The son decided to infuse his father's shop with cash by buying up a number of swanky Nikon 35mm cameras and gifting them to his business associates. He asked my Dad to come to the shop to pick it up, and I went along. In the shop they showed my Dad how to change lenses and load film -- I don't think my Dad had ever owned a camera more sophisticated than an Instamatic prior -- and then they took a picture of me and Dad in the shop. It remains to this day one of my favorite photos of me and my father.

iirc the camera and lens combo they gave Dad was north of $1200 in 1973 dollars.

[nahtnoj]

On the other hand while the 0-60mph performance number are impressive when the batteries are fully charged, the Tesla is completely useless on a race track and cannot even compete a lap with optimal performances as the batteries overheat in a matter of seconds :

This makes perfect sense if you think of the Tesla as an electric version of a 60s muscle car. Having ridden in one, I can attest to the fact that its build quality is only marginally better than a 60s muscle car...

[zachateseverything]

I've done some work with Tesla. They have a lot of really smart people working for them but culturally they've got a bit of a blindspot. They've brought in a lot of academics, ex-race engineers, and for lack of a better term, tech start-up nerds but they seem to be short on proper plant engineers. The chassis layout on the Model S and Model X is fantastic but all the ones I've seen up close look like they were built by 70's Chrysler workers on a friday afternoon.

Also to be fair to Tesla, a lot of modern production cars will have thermal or other issues with doing laps at VIR. I don't believe you've truly lived until you've managed to trip the on-star crash detection algorithm by cornering too hard.

[joosttx]

I saw this one on the way to the car wash today..... 675LT?