Yes, you read that right, both bodies are heavier than the currently offered versions, thus negating any actual benefit gained by the effort of carbon fiber and negating the entire exercise to one of obnoxious indulgence. We knew SEMA would eventually show its true form.

Update: We've pulled the video at Lexus' request, look for it again in the near future.

They're guesses range from this being an unpainted car (there's extensive fiber use on the Enzo) to it possibly being a mule of some kind (probably not). Either way, it's certainly captivating to look at, isn't it? [Autogespot]

[Autogespot]

[Autogespot]

[Autogespot]

[Autogespot]

Say what you will about the preposterousness of the Pagani Zonda, the man who builds them has certainly got his material science nailed. The foundation Horacio Pagani has built his eponymous company on is comparable in solidity only to the material he creates his Zondas from: carbon fiber.

For Pagani did not set out at a foolish young age to make his as-close-to-kindergarten-art-as-possible supercars. He paid his dues at Lamborghini, working his way up in the organization until he designed the very Zonda-like 25th Anniversary Countach. Lesser men would then jump headfirst into car construction, but not Pagani: he followed by founding the carbon fiber consultancy Modena Design. By the time he finally got around to building the first Zonda in 1999—the C12—he had been working non-stop with carbon fiber since the first days it cropped up in car design. Allowing the Zonda to become the nimblest yet most rigid supercar of its day.

The last version of the Zonda is the R and its street legal offshoot, the Cinque. On a recent episode of Top Gear, the Cinque was featured in connection with the material it is made out of: an amalgam of carbon fiber and titanium. As quoted from a press release by Richard Hammond, the material is called carbotanium by the Pagani people—only for James May to retort that an equally obvious linguistic move could have resulted in titbon.

The timestamp on this blogpost shall also serve as an anchor for a countdown to the inevitable day when a pair of Oakley sunglasses will be manufactured from the same material. The name itself is so Oakley it hurts. And they certainly don’t shy away from working with titanium.

The artwork above is Natalie Polgar’s “The Incompatibility of Zondas with the Subantarctic Environment,” from The Pagani Zonda Field Guide.

If you're like us, then you know. If not, then we'll have to point it out loud and clear. Roofless exotics are for rich poseurs. Or are they? With the same Mercedes-Benz AMG-sourced V12 as the equally limited edition Pagani Zonda Cinque hardtop pumping out 678 horsepower and a tire shredding 578 lb-ft of torque, this is no poseur ride. To clarify even further; any car with full carbon fibered bodywork, carbon-titanium monocoque chassis (engineered specifically for the Cinque), Cima six-speed sequential gearbox and a titanium and magnesium adjustable suspension means business.

Sitting pretty at a dry weight of 2,667 lbs, the Zonda Cinque slingshots to 60 mph in 3.4 seconds, 125 mph in 9.6 seconds and fights the wind until it reaches its 217 mph top speed. Massive lateral grip in the Zonda Cinque allows it to maintain 1.45g with its massive Pirelli PZero tires (front 255/35/19, rear 335/30/20) wrapped around aluminum and magnesium, APP monolithic wheels (front 9x19, rear 12,5x20).

Sounds to us like there's plenty of fun wrapped up in this $1.8 million non-poseur mobile, but regardless of all the awesome, you just know that all five of these beauties will end up in some collection, never to be seen or heard from again.

With the help of alcohol, we can imagine an automotive future where NSX’s and Estoques roam a street lined with buildings whose swimming pools are not becoming fetid pools of algae or jury-rigged half-pipes.

To our help comes V8 Studio, a British design company who make things from carbon fiber. Said things are mostly for storing bottles of alcoholic beverages.

So there you have it. A bottle of burgundy served from a carbon fiber rack, to toast the body panels of cars that have never made it to production. Farewell, farewell.

Photo Credit: V8 Studio

This 2002 Type 72 JPS Lotus Elise took six months to complete and was built by TW Auto Limited of Hong Kong, China for customer Jimmy Wong. The interior and exterior has been fully replaced with a custom raw carbon fiber body allowing for a weight savings advantage of 66-88lbs under the original weight of the Lotus Elise. Additional aftermarket parts were added to supplement the weight loss including a KW suspension package, JP Racing wheels, Lotus Racing exhaust, a larger intake and air filter.

We questioned if the effort was really worth it, but it certainly does look cool. Just make sure to clean up the drool when you're done.

[via Carbon Fiber Gear]

For more on this carbon fiber seat check out CarbonFiberGear.com]

If you've got the need or desire for 19" and 20" wheels you can pick up a set for somewhere between $2,500 and $4,000 per wheel (somewhere around $10,000 to $16,000 for a set of four). They go on sale in January and with a weight of only 21 pounds it's a great way to shave some pounds for, you know, a mere $16,000. [Source: Carbon FIber Gear]

If they'd made the rest of the car flat black it would match better. Or perhaps they should have removed the rear wing. Do you think it would look better with normal "wet" carbon fiber, or is there a way to salvage the "dry" look? [via GTRblog]

You can forget all about those silly Sang Noir, Pur Sang, or Hermes editon Veyrons. You want a special edition? Have your EB110 GT turned into a Super Sport by Dauer, and you'll up the power of that 3.5-liter V12 from 560 HP up to 650 HP. Sure, you may get 1001 HP from that W16 in a Veyron, but at nearly 4200 pounds, a light car it is not. By comparison, the EB110 SS weighs about 1000 pounds less than that, partially thanks to 330 pounds of weight shed from the GT model. Yet, this still has all the mechanical whiz-bang components like quad-turbos and all-wheel-drive. So while this may be the only unpainted example in existence, if you're lucky enough to get your hands on one of the 30 other units you'll likely be in for an experience much more raw and involving than anything the cocoon of a Veyron can offer.
[via supercars.net]

"Yeah, go slow over this cable tray cause the nose is so low, but in the tunnel why don't you punch it and see what it can do"—those were the orders of the cars' keeper gave. Though styling is not necessarily the car's strong point, its simplicity and performance are respectable. The car starts with a tubular space frame and adds a 78 kW direct drive, a three-phase brushless A/C motor powered by 10 maintenance-free lithium ion battery packs. Those batteries will charge by way of 120V power in 8-10 hours and run for 100 miles on a charge. All of that is shrouded under a completely carbon-fiber body, which encases leather-clad seating. The whole shebang weighs in at 2300 lbs. and considering electric motors make max torque at zero RPM, this thing scoots pretty well. 0-60 will pass in about 5 seconds, and the car has a top speed around 120 mph.

Now that the formalities are out of the way, we're ready to go out on a limb and say this is a better concept car than Die-Hardigree-with-a-Vengence's obnoxious Audi. Lets look at it objectively. The Audi's glorious V12 turbo diesel has been neutered and runs at a mere 250 HP; the electric car runs wide open with full power off the line. The Audi is constructed of soft, malleable aluminum; the electric car is fabricated of a race-car style tube frame and delicious crunchy carbon fiber. The seats are firm but nonadjustable, a clever strategy to simplify operation and cut a substantial amount of waeight compared to the leather ensconced, powered Audi helms. Whereas weight like that forces the audi to add baloney like power steering and power brakes, the little pop top is all direct connect. the steering is heavy as are the brakes, but that just makes you feel like Juan Fangio in his '57 win at Monaco. Sure it's simple and unrefined, but that means it's also simple and unrefined. The utter lack of pretension and the delightfully direct nature of the car was refreshing. Topping it off, we folded in behind the mob squad surrounding the Audi while in traffic, and we were the ones who got the natives asking about it. Clearly, the electric emerges triumphant. [Hybrid Technologies]

"Even though the T1 is exceptionally light at around 570kg depending on specification, the very high speeds it is capable of mean that conventional road car safety systems can not manage the extreme levels of kinetic energy that could be involved in a crash," explains vehicle co-designer Ben Scott-Geddes. "To solve this, we have incorporated many of the safety systems proven in Formula One, where drivers regularly walk away from horrific accidents that would be fatal in normal road cars."

We'd love to see more mainstream manufacturers adopt a similar, cost-no-object approach to safety. In the average road car, unless you're extremely lucky, you're going kaput at anything over about 50mph.

Caparo

Like most important ideas, the McLaren F1 was conceived on the back of a napkin. While waiting for a plane, designer and chief engineer Gordon Murray proposed the idea of building the very best, ultimate, super duper driver's car ever to McLaren's CEO Ron Dennis. Ron bit. The idea wasn't new or earth shaking: stick lots of power into a light vehicle to give (horribly wealthy) enthusiasts the ride of a lifetime. Carroll Shelby had been doing exactly that for years. However, what did make the turf move was the execution that is best described as flawless. No, better than flawless. The F1 is supercar 2.0.

What's so special? Well, actually, everything - but we'll break it down for you, starting with the amazing engine. From the start, Murray specified that the engine had to be normally aspirated. Forced induction, while creating gobs and gobs of power, does have a few downsides. One issue is that as complexity increases reliability correspondingly decreases. Certainly not a deal breaker but if your goal is to create the greatest driver's car in history, time spent in the shop is bad. But the other problem with super and turbochargers is that when they are spinning, the driver has less control over the engine as an additional layer of buffering is inserted between the mill and the driver's right foot. Not cool, said Gordon Murray.

Murray shopped around for an engine, initially trying with Honda and then Isuzu. Honda was a real possibility, as their engines had been powering McLaren's Formula 1 cars for some time. Honda eventually backed away and McLaren decided that as nifty as Isuzu's 3.5-liter V12 would be, they needed to go with a manufacturer that had racing cred. Enter BMW and their M Division. Who better to build you an engine? Murray specified an output of 550 hp and a weight of 250 kilogram (550 pounds). The boffins of Bimmer handed him back a 585 pound, 6.1-liter all-aluminum V12 mill with DOHC and variable timing for all 48 valves that cranked 627 horses and 480 ft-lb. of torque. Murray took it.

Obviously, a customized M70 is a pretty spectacular motor. But, if your aim is to produce the very best driver's car in the world then it is going to take much more than big power.

The McLaren F1 was the very first production car to feature a carbon fiber monocoque chassis that was derived from McLaren's successful race cars. In case you are wondering, the word monocoque is French for "single shell." What that means in car terms is that the vehicle's body actually supports some of the stress load, rather than building a truss and then covering it with non-load bearing skin. That's right; it's a fancy French way of saying "unibody." But building it from then hyper exotic carbon fiber was a major breakthrough, as this gave the F1 an unparalleled power-to-weight ratio. How unparalleled? The F1 debuted in 1994 with a power-to-weight ration of 501 hp/ton. When the Ferrari Enzo debuted in 2002, it achieved "only" 434 hp/ton. It took the maniac Bugatti Veyron with its 530 hp/ton to best the F1 (just for fun, the SSC Ultimate Aero TT boasts a ludicrous power-to-weight ratio of 1003 hp/ton).

If you haven't figured it out by now, the McLaren F1 is fast. Actually, calling the F1 "fast" is like calling Mariusz Pudzianowski "strong." So, let's revise that to read the McLaren F1 is insane. 0-60 happens in 3.2 seconds. 0-100 in 6.3. The quarter mile is dispatched with in 11.1 seconds at 138 mph. 0-150 takes just 12.8 seconds, and 0-200 mph happens in 28 seconds flat. But of course, the F1 isn't done yet, not hardly. On a long enough straight the McLaren F1 hits 240 mph. In 1994! And that's just the "regular" version.

Disregarding the 7 prototypes, McLaren built just 100 F1s. 72 "normal" cars and 28 modified racers. 5 LM or "LeMans" cars were constructed. The F1 LMs were over 100 pounds lighter (the standard F1 weighed in at a Lotus-like 2513 pounds). The LMs also had their engines tweaked to the tune of 680 hp. A new transaxle meant that the top speed was down to just 231 mph, but it could hit 100 mph in just 5.9 seconds, a world record. The F1 LM could also go 0-100-0 mph in 8.5 seconds, also a world record. All the LMs were painted Papaya orange except for the two sold to the Sultan of Brunei which are painted black and spaz.

As McLaren was indeed a race car maker, 28 F1 GTR races cars were built, one of which won the 1995 24 Hours of LeMans. A whopping 2 homologation F1 GT cars were built. They were essentially wingless, road going versions of the long-tailed, third generation GTRs. Interestingly, most of the GTRs once retired were converted to street use by adding mufflers and removing air-restrictors.

And we could ramble on all day long. The F1 was one of the first production cars to make use of downforce as a performance aid. The engine produces so much heat that gold foil from the Space Shuttle is used to shield the engine compartment. It generates over 1.3 Gs of lateral acceleration. The driver sits in the middle while his wife and mistress are seated behind him on either side. Nearly a decade and a half after it debuted, the F1 is the fourth fastest car in the world. It's got flippin' matched luggage that fits smartly into hidden side compartments. But all you really need to know before voting yes or no is that the McLaren F1 held the undisputed title of fastest production car in the world for twelve years. That's longer than any other car ever has. Oh snap! One more thing, the F1 had a real gearbox complete with a clutch. No stinkin' flappy paddles. Happy voting.

Tiff Needell Comparing the McLaren F1 to the Ferrari Enzo

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