When you push the start button, the 3.8-liter twin-turbo roars to life, ready to
dispense its 592 hp and 443 lb-ft of torque.
When you see the MP4-12C in all its carbon-fiber, composite glory, it looks
even nicer than it does in photographs.
The pump that drives the McLaren MP4-12C's hydraulic suspension system powers
up a little too loudly for a few seconds every time you come to a stop.
That's the only thing wrong with this car. At least, that was our initial
impression.
Here are our perhaps overly gushing notes, scribbled down immediately after
our first of several short drives in a long day of hauling buns: “Best and
greatest supercar ever! So easy and fun to drive. Easy and very progressive
oversteer when you hammer the throttle or lift off a little sideways into a
turn. Not much understeer, unless you really push it. Superb! Fun!”
We know, too many exclamation points. A little while later, after some
contemplation, we could debate the styling, maybe the steering (though not
really) and a few other points, but you'd be hard-pressed to find any big,
obvious areas that need improvement on the McLaren MP4-12C. Unless you owned a
458, because the Ferrari 458 is really the only thing that comes close to the
McLaren MP4-12C.
This is almost exactly the same car that we drove a year ago (“Slide-Rule
Sexy,” Autoweek, March 7, 2011), but McLarens have been on sale since December,
and anyone with $231,400 can go into any of the 34 dealers in 18 countries and
buy one.
When you see the MP4-12C in all its carbon-fiber, composite glory, it looks
even nicer than it does in photographs. However, it doesn't look as nice as,
say, a 458. That's because the 12C's exterior was shaped almost entirely by
function. Designer Frank Stephenson said he was allowed to work “wherever the
air doesn't touch it, which is pretty much everywhere.” So we don't see the same
taut lines that appear on his earlier work, the Maserati MC12 and Quattroporte
or the Ferrari F430.
Inside, there were no aerodynamic considerations. The climate controls are on
the door, for instance, and everything else is on the center console. You see
the tops of the front fenders very clearly, which hide the tops of the front
Pirellis. (“Great visibility is better than another 100 hp,” Stephenson said.)
Ahead of that, the road or the track spills out in front of you.
Buttons select forward or reverse, and the paddles—which we're told give “the
exact same feel Lewis Hamilton gets when he shifts”—direct the dual-clutch
seven-speed transmission.
When you push the start button, the 3.8-liter twin-turbo roars to life, ready
to dispense its 592 hp and 443 lb-ft of torque. It is a sound that is not
unpleasant. “It's very purposeful but not obnoxious,” Stephenson said.
“The rumble of an elephant,” said McLaren managing director Anthony Sheriff.
Make that a 205-mph carbon-fiber elephant capable of 0 to 60 mph in 3.2
seconds.
Select the normal mode for the suspension, click into gear, and you're off.
The first thing you notice is that this car is very easy to drive. We could
imagine driving it every day. It is easy to sit in, handles low-speed traffic
slogging gracefully and doesn't wear you out. The dual-clutch transmission
doesn't hesitate or clunk around town between traffic lights. A manual
transmission was never really considered for two reasons. “Nobody'd want it,”
said Sheriff. “And the car is tightly packaged around two pedals.”
Once we got a little more room to maneuver, we stepped on the right one,
which instantly returned sonorous music and blinding speed in equal measure. We
didn't clock our 0-to-60-mph time to see whether it matched McLaren's claimed
3.2 seconds, but it certainly felt that fast. There aren't many cars that will
give you a 3.2, and fewer still can do it with so little work. A separate launch
control does most of the complicated stuff for you. All you have to do is set
it, launch, and keep steering.
Next, we moved the suspension to sport and headed up into the mountains on a
four-lane twisting thoroughfare. The ProActive Chassis Control immediately went
to work keeping the car flat in turns to maximize grip. McLaren's take on
automatic suspension allows for a more livable amount of feedback to the driver
than the Porsche system, which seems to filter out too much. With a little bit
of traffic in the hills, we didn't push it very hard. At half throttle, it was
still a joy to drive.
We did push it on the track, though. Driving on the road course inside the
Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif., requires not much more than a series of
double-lane-change maneuvers that lack any artistry or rhythm. Nonetheless, the
McLaren made the most of it. The Pirelli P Zeros—235/35 front and 305/30 rear,
wrapped around 19-inch wheels in front and 20s in the rear—gave way easily and
predictably. For more serious drivers, Pirelli Corsa rubber is available (which
McLaren says improves 0-to-60-mph time to 3.0 seconds). As it was, we enjoyed
sliding around a little in the turns. This would make a terrific drift car, we
thought; just don't hit anything.
The difference between sport and track modes was less noticeable than between
normal and sport, but it kept the car going and going fast. The short straights
on the road course got us up into fourth gear and called for some heavy braking
at each end. When you step on the brake at speed, the rear wing flips up to 90
degrees in a quarter of a second, not to slow the car but to stabilize it,
moving the center of aerodynamic pressure rearward, like deploying feathers on
an arrow.
Does any of this help you make the choice between the 458 and the 12C? Or the
Lexus LF-A or even the Nissan GT-R? Maybe not. The 458 has slightly better
steering, sending just a little more feedback to the wheel. And it's
better-looking, making concessions to style over efficiency. The McLaren is
highly efficient, easy and fun to drive, even if it lacks the cachet of a
Ferrari. The LFA is stable, fast and fun. The GT-R costs a lot less.
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