Mclaren P15
Stripped-out, lightweight, track-focused Ultimate Series model due next summer
Hardcore, track-focused hypercar
Mclaren has confirmed that it will launch its most extreme, track-focused road car yet next year. Referred to internally as the P15, the forthcoming Ultimate Series model, scooped by Autocar earlier this year, is being developed with a hard focus on track driving – so much so that the Woking-based manufacturer admits that it will sacrifice daily usability in order to maximise performance.
The two-seater is due to make its public debut at the Geneva motor show in March, sporting what Mclaren calls a “brutal” design representing the “purest expression” of its form-follows-function styling.
Autocar understands the 675LT development car that has been spotted testing at the Nürburgring in recent weeks is a mule for the P15, offering insight into the advanced aerodynamic layout of the final production car.
The mule’s bodywork features large intakes on the nose that are designed to channel air out of openings on the bonnet and direct it around the car’s windscreen. Such a system will be employed by the P15, meaning it ditches a front boot in favour of aerodynamic efficiency. The mule also wears a large rear wing, held in place by two centrally mounted swan neck arms. A source revealed that the mounting arms will be fixed so the wing can’t fold away into the rear deck, but it was suggested that the wing itself could rotate in a similar way to the drag reduction system fitted to Formula 1 cars.
It is understood that the P15 will forgo a hybrid drivetrain, as used by the P1, for a lighter, combustion engine-only setup. The engine will be based on the M840T turbocharged 4.0-litre V8 used by the 720S but will feature upgraded internals and a bespoke turbocharger set-up to boost power far beyond the 710bhp offered by the 720S Super Series model. A mooted figure of around 789bhp would give the P15’s V8 a 62bhp advantage over the 3.8-litre combustion engine featured in the hybrid P1’s drivetrain.
The P15 will be built around Mclaren’s Monocage II onepiece carbonfibre tub and is set to be the company’s most pared-back road model to date. It will have a raceinspired interior with seats adapted from motorsport and little in the way of passenger comforts. The P15 is expected to weigh less than 1300kg – considerably lighter than the 1547kg P1 and enough to ensure that its power-to-weight ratio will eclipse that model’s figure of 647bhp per tonne.
Mclaren is expected to produce 500 examples of the P15, each of which has already been allocated for a price of around £840,000 in the UK.
Customers will be invited to a private showing of the car before the end of this year. The name will also be confirmed in 2017. First deliveries are due in the summer of next year, close to when the next Ultimate Series model, the three-seater codenamed BP23, is due to be revealed.