Gordon Murray's T25 Project vs Tata Nano? Bring it on!!
Gordon Murray, the man responsible for the 1990s McLaren F1 supercar, has his sights set on something completely different these days. Murray’s company, Gordon Murray Design (GMD), is looking at designing a radical new ‘personal transport vehicle,’ which will be ultra-light, have very low running costs, feature innovative architecture and packaging, and which will facilitate low cost manufacturing. Er…, does this mean they’re going to their own version of the Tata Nano?!
According to the GMD website, when this new class of vehicle is adopted by one or more manufacturers, a quantifiable reduction in fuel usage, emissions and road congestion will be achieved within two years of start up. Mr Murray says that current car design, marketing and sales trends are all heading in the wrong direction, and that these will have to change in order to support our shrinking reserves of fossil fuels, curtail damage to our global climate, and reduce congestion on our roads.
From left: Gordon Murray, and a look at how the T25 car will compare with existing small cars
Murray also says his Type 25 car will be different from existing small cars. His car will have a significantly lower number of components, will be constructed so that it can be assembled easily, will weigh as little as possible (and much less than existing vehicles of a similar size) and will be designed for maximum maneuverability and ease of parking.
GMD wants to achieve four things with its small car: The car must be less costly to buy and run than other cars, it must be ‘cool,’ it must be safe and it must be easy to drive in heavy urban traffic.
The company expects Europe and Japan to be the new car’s primary markets, but with an anticipated price of around Rs 4 lakh, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t do well in India as well. Of course, it wouldn’t be taking on Mr Tata’s Nano, but there could be plenty of other hatchback buyers in the country who should happily buy a radically innovative car from the man who designed the McLaren F1!
