Mercedes-AMG Project One: Formula 1 power in a road car

Welcome to the Mercedes stand. She's not a stand, is it. It's a massive building. We're on the third story up here. And behind me is the star of the Frankfurt Motor Show 2017, the AMG Project One. The numbers are extraordinary. A thousand break horsepower. Naught to a hundred and twenty four miles an hour in under six seconds. Four electric motors. This is the first time we've seen the car in all its glory, so let's go and have a closer look. The first thing we need to discuss are the looks really, and the reaction has been mixed I suppose. I think, well, it's not as extreme looking as the Aston Martin Valkyrie, which is obviously all about [UNKNOWN] and has extreme cutaways This I like this I have to say. And it looks more like a road car than perhaps I was expecting and I like that because it instantly makes me think yes. I can actually imagine driving this to North Wales or the South of France. It looks more useable than I was expecting. Now I think the extraordinary thing is that we said when they first said. It's F1 for the road, the F1 powertrain is gonna be in this car. Wheel to wheel, yes, there will be the changes, inevitably. It won't really be the F1 car's powertrain, but more and more it seems like it actually is. It's going to rev to 11,000 RPMs, so that's just down from the 13,500 RPMs that Lewis's car revs to, but not wildly so. The next question is, of course, well, how'd you make it reliable? Now this care, they're saying, is gonna last 50,000 kilometers before you have to take the engine out and the gearbox and sort of check it all, which is pretty extraordinary. But because the [INAUDIBLE] all these things actually help it become more reliable. As a road car. The exhaust down there as you notice, the big one exhaust like you get on the F1 car with only two little ones for the waste gates. We should say that obviously on the front axle there are two 120 kiloWatt motors allowing not only torque vectoring but because of the larger batteries than you get in the F1 car it's going to have a 25 Kilometer range, purely on electric. So we know it's gonna be blindingly fast. We know it's got the F1 engine. We know that potentially it's gonna be reliable and usable on the road. But what's the chassis gonna be like? Well, to find out more about that we went and spoke to the head of AMG, Tobias Moers. We know a lot about the fact that it has the F1 engine in the car. But Do you think it is going to be [INAUDIBLE] development car to create something with that much power, for the driver to make it go almost as fast, I suppose. I think and this is what I personally believe too, that it is always a package. We have got to a GPR and we are going to the fuel, or whatever As well for that car, if power output is inline with the capabilities of a chassis then I'm absolutely happy with that. If you are overpowered, okay it's nice because going to go sideways, if you're underpowered it's boring so getting that car on track, the chassis is capable for For half thousands something horsepower. It's all about drivability. It's all about how the power up is and that engine. The jump answer of the torque when you hit the throttle is 70. So it's in milliseconds. The throttle response of that engine with electro turbo charge is better than every Engine I ever saw. So it's just calibration to handle the power up. So it should be linear as well on the track. And this is top sure, so it should be predictable when you drive it. We have to feel. I think you drove a GTR. Yes. You can't feel it in a GTR, what the car is doing. And what it is doing next. It is predictable, you can work with the car, you get the feeling of the car. This should help with the project as well, that is part of the game. Thank you very much. So there we are, the Project One, the star of the Frankfurt Motorshow 2017. They are going to produce just 275 of these, although that's more than most people expected. And each one is going to cost over 2 million Euros. Which is a lot but it is a pretty extraordinary thing. And I feel in the next 18 months or so of development before the first customers get their car. It's only gonna get more extraordinary. I can't wait to follow its progress. [BLANK_AUDIO]