A few weeks ago, The Road Rat magazine managed to persuade six new GMA T50 owners to bring their cars to the Bicester Scramble. A bit of a dull October day so the colours didn't really zing, but it was a chance to eventually see this extraordinary technical exercise after its launch at the Goodwood Revival, 2021. I was interested to see how it had come out.
What most surprised me was the truly awful panel gaps and the failure of many panels to line up. The engine cover glass to the roof glass differed on all the cars. Most of the opening panels had gaps that allowed you to see way inside the car, there was no evidence of the standard industry practice of joggling the fixed panel to prevent this, an example of how it should be done is shown here. I felt that for £2.8 million an owner deserves a better standard of fit and finish than this.
Lexus always aimed for, and achieved, even and parallel 6mm panel gaps throughout the car. When working with Subaru I asked the senior engineer why there was no way of adjusting the door fit. He said, 'Why would we need that, we build the car to the design drawings'.
I was puzzled why no one else seemed to be troubled by these misalignments. Was it just me who was troubled. At that point one of the owners started his T50 and the large crowd of disciples were entranced. As the old rockstar blipped the engine it went, ‘zee-yip pah-pah-bub-buba-bub', 'zee-yip pah-pah-bub-buba-bub'. Everyone seemed to think that this was part of the theatre, not knowing that the ECU has a system that stops the owner from revving the engine before it is properly warmed up. Clearly theatre is the thing!
I began thinking that the appreciation of beautiful details and careful assembly are no longer relevant, the immediate hit and the little flaming clicks on social media are ten second moments of attention, in place of lengthy appreciation of a job well done. Could this be the reason for so much 'shock and awe' in current designs, does the industry believe that it only has ten seconds to grab the attention of a potential customer. A very tidy yellow, late model, Lotus Elan at Bicester reminded me that good panel fits don't need to cost big money.
DRAMA ALERT
Even the fender vents have little gurneys on them.
