The biggest hopes of Melling Hellcat to catch the Veyron never happened
Of the many supercar names that did not reach the production stage perfectly and recorded sales figures or can also be said to be mere boasting. Noted there is a supercar known as Melling Hellcat in 2006.
It was a car that was originally mentioned will be the most serious competitor of the V10-engined car for Bugatti Veyron. Not only that, when it viewed from the name derived from the name of the person who developed it is clearly not just any name.
2007 Melling Hellcat is conceptualized and developed by Al Melling, a slightly mad engineer and designer who had dealings in F1 through many famous names. (Picture from: http://bit.ly/2sQtubV)
Well, the Melling Hellcat is a car conceptualized and developed by Al Melling, a slightly mad engineer and designer who had dealings in F1 through many famous names such as Lamborghini, Chevrolet, Leyton House Formula One and Benetton. Through his company called, Melling Consultancy Design was once the center of engine development that had succeded to help TWR win at Le Mans with Jaguar four years in a row and also had been known to develop the TVR Speed Six block which is used in many modern TVR sports cars.
2007 Melling Hellcat's interior could be described as simple, sparse but functional. (Picture from: http://bit.ly/2sQtubV)
But a little different for this mid-engined car, Melling decided that he didn't want to just build a custom engine and instead would take on the establishment with his own bespoke supercar. He had experience with V10s through engine development for the Lola F1 team which never came to fruition, but the engine he built for his own supercar was something else.
Al Melling in another his sports car called the 'Wildcat'. (Picture from: http://bit.ly/2Zi9Ul2)
It is a 6.0-liter quad-turbo V10 engine which is said to produce 1,175 bhp of power and 880 lb.ft of torque, with heads and blocks milled from a large billet of aluminum material. And the car comes with a weight of only 1,200 kg and can accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in just 2.6 seconds (that's a surprising acceleration time figures for 2006). And for its exterior design strongly influenced by TVR, and also has a Marcos TSO GT touches within its thundering line.
2007 Melling Hellcat comes with a weight of only 1,200 kg and said to be able to accelerate from 0 to 60 mph in just 2.6 seconds. (Picture from: http://bit.ly/377sbEl)
The Hellcat was built as Melling's motivation to enter Le Mans once again after it was previously done with TWR, with the aim being to produce a GT1 variant of the road car to take-on the endurance world. It's said to only 50 units will be produced in its Rochdale-based factory, but unfortunately, the number of cars produced has never touched or approached that numbers.
2007 Melling Hellcat used a 6.0-liter quad-turbo V10 engine which is said to produce 1,175 bhp of power and 880 lb.ft of torque. (Picture from: http://bit.ly/2sQtubV)
Although the lack of car production numbers, but the top speed proposed by Hellcat could be a nightmare for the Bugatti Veyron. Melling quoted 295 mph in full chat, but if we're honest and thought the claim is mere boasting. Sure, it has four turbochargers like Bugatti but according to some automotive observers aerodynamically the speed of this car has no hope of rising close to the 300 mph figures.
This is because the frontal area and general dimensions of the car do not allow such speed figures to be reached, especially with a power of 'only' around 1,200 bhp. Then at a price of around £ 185,000, it can almost be considered as a bargain even if it reaches 230 mph, which is why those claimed top speed figures make it look like a joke.
In the end, the Melling Hellcat never made it into any automotive showroom, and let the Bugatti Veyron have the world's top speed record for itself for years. That is a fantastic hypothetical part of the British-made V10-engined supercar that could have asserted itself as a performance legend even though in reality it doesn't make any sense. *** [EKA | FROM VARIOUS SOURCES | AUTOBLOG | DRIVETRIBE | SUPERCARS]
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