Premium British vehicle manufacturer Gordon Murray Automotive (GMA) has announced a strategic move of its T.50 supercar production to the company’s newly-built Group headquarters at Highams Park, Surrey. The new site has already taken over manufacturing of the GMA T.50 supercar from its previous production facility at Dunsfold Park. This decision will see T.50 manufacturing benefit from a wealth of efficiencies, while enabling the business to streamline carbon fiber monocoque production for T.33 prototypes and future models at Dunsfold Park. Used for development, testing and homologation-related crash testing, the monocoques will now be produced on-site, accelerating the supercar’s pre-production processes.
Highlights
- GMA advances T.50 production to new Highams Park HQ to streamline future model manufacturing
- Move sees the continuation of T.50 customer car production at new multi-million-pound facility
- Decision enables dedicated T.33 prototype monocoque production at GMA’s Dunsfold Park site
- Highams Park will continue to build the T.50, ahead of producing the T.50s, T.33, and T.33 Spider
State of the art
Building the new Gordon Murray Group HQ at Highams Park near the village of Windlesham saw investment of more than £50 million, and the creation of a broad range of specialized job roles to support full scale production. The new campus will be the Group’s global headquarters – home to a purpose-built 4,300 square meter Vehicle Production Centre, and the Gordon Murray Heritage collection. The site also features a specially-designed Vehicle Dynamics Test Road, used for final validation and pre-delivery checks of new GMA supercars – all set in 54 acres of beautiful English parkland. For customers opting to take delivery of their cars from Highams Park, the new HQ offers the ideal setting at its dedicated Driving Perfection Customer Centre, where owners can specify, set-up, and take delivery of their GMA supercar.
Following the move to Highams Park, where all future GMA models will be produced, the company is on course to complete all 100 exclusive T.50 customer cars in 2024. The build of the 25 track-only T.50s Niki Lauda models will follow the completion of the T.50 run. Next, the production team will transfer to building the T.33 coupe, before that supercar’s open-top sibling – the T.33 Spider – enters the Highams Park Vehicle Production Centre.
The move to the new HQ will bring significant manufacturing efficiencies. The purpose-built site consolidates logistics, parts supply, and testing, while supercar production teams benefit from the latest technologies and optimized production layout, boosting efficiency, cross-team collaboration, and production quality.
Executive comments
Phillip Lee, Gordon Murray Group CEO: “The new Gordon Murray Automotive HQ at Highams Park represents a significant investment for the business and is a statement of intent for the company’s future. It is extremely satisfying that we’re able to continue T.50 manufacturing at the new site, while also streamlining production of T.33 development prototypes.”
Mofid Elkemiri, Gordon Murray Automotive CEO: “Moving production of our T.33 experimental prototype monocoques into the vacated Dunsfold Park facility accelerates the program and boosts efficiencies significantly. We are already making excellent progress with T.33 development with our first three mule cars undergoing intensive early testing. The move means we’ll soon be at the stage to share details about the prototype with customers and fans around the world.”
Testing and Homologation
In total, GMA will build more than 27 prototype versions of the timelessly-styled T.33 coupe and Spider for a combination of pre-production testing and development activities including chassis dynamics, aerodynamics, durability, performance, emissions, crash testing, and certification. The car will be fully homologated for all major markets including Europe and the United States. As part of the development, the team will perform more than 30 different crash tests with prototype vehicles.
Weighing just 1,090 kg, the six-speed manual T.33 will deliver the brand’s characteristic ‘Driving Perfection’ through obsessive attention to detail, exquisite design, and the 617 PS 3.9 liter Cosworth GMA.2 V12 engine that revs past 11,000 rpm. The model will follow the production of the T.50s at Highams Park with just 100 coupe and 100 Spider models destined for owners around the world.
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