McLaren pushes for the UK to lead the car industry "weight race"

THE BRITISH supercar maker McLaren has urged the UK government and car industry to make further progress developing weight-saving technologies and measures.

Speaking at a recent industry summit, McLaren CEO Mike Flewitt called for car makers to ditch the obsession with increasing power and complexity, in favour of measures that reduce weight and increase efficiency.

According to Flewitt: “We now have a fantastic opportunity for the UK to be at the very forefront of a new automotive ‘weight race’ that can help achieve increasingly tough environmental targets.”

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He added: “It is clear to us that to be successful in lightweighting, industry and Government need to continue to work closely to ensure we all capitalise on the benefits for the sector”.

Though McLaren’s product portfolio contrasts somewhat with the desire to ditch the emphasis on big power numbers, it does also balance that out through an emphasis on lightweight materials.

For example, though the 789bhp McLaren Senna has the most powerful combustion engine installed in a McLaren road car to date, the extreme hypercar is also extensively fashioned from carbon fibre, to the point where its doors weigh less than 10kg each.

While not perhaps as long running as McLaren’s dedication to carbon fibre, other car manufacturers in the UK are making headway in reducing the weight of their cars.

Weight-trimming methods are expected to emerge from Aston Martin’s partnership with Red Bull Advanced Technologies, and car makers such as Rolls-Royce, Jaguar, Land Rover and Bentley have all made further use of materials such as aluminium in their more recent offerings.

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