Renault's Amazing 1.5lt. 300hp F1 Coupe!
by Alex Michalas
he  If you have to come up with one name that really left its mark in Formula 1 racing in the 90s then this name has to be Renault. The French company's V10 engines powered Williams and
Benetton teams to 6 consecutive manufacturers' championships till 1997 when, in a surprise move, Renault decided to call it a day for F1 racing.
They just could not stay away from F1 though!
After buying the Benetton team a few months ago, Renault is set to make a comeback to the F1 racetrack in 2002. The comeback is expected to be really
big as they are reportedly preparing a revolutionary new V10, setting the engine's angle at 110 degrees which is a big difference from McLaren's 75 degrees and Ferrari's 90 degrees and can give them
serious competitive advantage. We will have to wait until then to see whether this new engine lives up to the expectations but we will
only have to wait till next March for the 2001 Geneva Motorshow where, as FantasyCars.com has just learned, Renault will unveil an absolutely ground-breaking Coupe concept car.
This Coupe concept (a sketch of which is shown in the photo) is set to herald Renault's comeback to F1 and should see production in late 2002 if everything goes according to plan.
But what is it that makes us think that this new Renault is something really interesting? Apart from the rather nice styling it's the engine: The Coupe will be powered by a 1.5 lt. (yes only!!) 5-cylinder engine
that will be directly derived from the 3.0lt V10 that will be powering the F1 car (our suspicion is that it will most probably be something like "half" of the F1 car's V10). And well, the expected output of the
engine is in excess of 300hp! This of course means an engine producing in excess of 200hp/lt. ! We can't wait to see Renault's wild new concept at Geneva in a few months and we really hope it will
eventually make it to production. We think it can be one of the most radical cars ever – from a company that has positively surprised us many times lately!
So what is your opinion? How does a 1.5lt 300hp engine sound like? Will this car ever make it into production? Click here and discuss all these in the FantasyCars.com Message Board! |
