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BMW's senior executive in charge of its sports car division has slapped down reports in the UK that it will team up with McLaren to build a mid-engined, V8 supercar.
M Division boss Frank van Meel last week said the story, published in Car magazine, was pure fantasy and that there had been no contact with McLaren from anybody at either BMW or M.
"I haven't had a phone call, [BMW chief executive] Harald Kreuger hasn't had a phone call and [BMW research and development director] Klaus Fröhlich hasn't had a phone call," he said. All three men were cited in the story.
“We haven’t made one, either,” van Meel added, “and we don’t have plans to.”
The report suggested the pro car was due to be shown at the Frankfurt Motor Show in 2017, running on a development of McLaren’s ubiquitous carbon-fibre T16 tub and using a 4.0-litre, biturbo V8, before being built in late 2018.
“We admire McLaren and we have obviously worked with them in the past, but there is nothing on the agenda,” van Meel said.
“The halo car of the entire BMW brand is the i8, and a lot of money and engineering has been invested in it. It will remain the only halo for its lifecycle.
“It would make no sense for us to put a car above the i8, or even priced near it, that would have the same sort of layout but more power.”
That hasn’t stopped plenty of people hoping for a V8 conversion for the i8’s carbon-fibre tub, replacing the in-line, three-cylinder motor. That motor is mounted laterally, and reworking the architecture to accept a longitudinal V8 would demand a lot more than just losing the back seats.
“I don’t understand why we would need to work with McLaren for a supercar anyway,” van Meel said. “All of the technologies the story suggested are technologies that are core competences here at BMW and at M.
“Nobody in the world is more advanced with carbon- fibre than we are. We have shown how strong we are with electric boosting for performance and efficiency, plus we still have a great V8 engine here. What would we need McLaren to do for us?”