Who says Chrysler can't make a sports car? This car is a prototype for a POTENTIAL 2006 model. It would sell for around $450,000. It has a 5.9-liter, 850-hp, 850-lb-ft V12, rwd, and a seven-speed manual. Weighs 2860 lbs, and goes from 0-60 in 2.9 seconds! :shock:

 

13:40:30 Jan. 04, 2004
Now It Can Be Told: The inside story behind the stunning Chrysler supercar

By KEVIN A. WILSON

ONLY A HANDFUL OF people knew. Most of the folks working up Chrysler�fs crop of new show cars for 2004 weren�ft let in on it. Most of the press didn�ft catch wind of it until it drove onto the stage at the end of the company�fs Jan. 4 press conference revealing those �gordinary�h concept cars. Surprise was the point. After hijacking attention at the 2003 Detroit show with the Viper-powered Dodge Tomahawk motorbike, the top guns at Chrysler wanted to do something even bigger this year in a bid to upstage the arrivals of the expected stars from across town, the 2005 Ford Mustang and Chevy Corvette.

�gTomahawk was somewhat tongue in cheek, a design statement more than an engineering statement. We wanted to do something really credible, and we wanted something nobody would expect from Chrysler,�h says Chrysler COO Wolfgang Bernhard, explaining the origins of the project that became the Chrysler ME412. It�fs a mid-engine, quad-turbo V12-powered supercar boasting 850 hp, 850 lb-ft and with ambitions no lower than to out-Enzo Ferrari. That�fs no mere surprise, it�fs an ambush.

What could be more unexpected than a mid-engine supercar from Chrysler? How about this statement from none other than division president and CEO Dieter Zetsche: �gIt�fs not just a concept. It�fs a prototype.�h

Calm down, he�fs not promising to build it for sale. Not yet, anyway. He is saying that it�fs fully engineered�on computers, though the car itself wasn�ft finished being built at Metalcrafters until Dec. 29�and the company intends to run it this spring to prove it can meet the ambitious performance targets. If a business case exists, Chrysler says it could start building such a machine in about a year.

A business case? Well, yes, they didn�ft take time to build one before they built the car. No one really knows if the customers who can front up the money for a Ferrari Enzo or Porsche Carrera GT would splash similarly extravagant funds on a car that wears the same badge on its nose as the Town & Country minivan in the next garage bay. The ME412 is being built to supercar standards of material and craftsmanship, however, so it would have to command a similar price. Are there enough customers to warrant the effort?

Well, let�fs show �fem what they�fd get. When the project began, it was a notion shared by Bernhard, Zetsche and design chief Trevor Creed, who came up with it in a meeting after last year�fs Detroit show. This year�fs crop of concept cars had already been assigned back in December 2002. The project started out a month late, then. So the development of the thing in only 11 months, coordinating parts suppliers from seven nations and linking them all via computer, was as big a challenge as engineering the car itself. Bernhard�who had ridden the Tomahawk onto the show stage and drove the ME412 this year�had a head start, though. Before joining Chrysler, he was managing director of Mercedes-AMG, where he had acted as the engine supplier for the then-new Pagani Zonda and had personal insight into the development of a supercar, and a few contacts to help get things started. He wasn�ft the first to wonder what would happen if a major automaker turned its engineering and acquisition resources to the development of a supercar (the Cadillac Cien was a similar exercise), but he was in a position to make things happen. And the key here was to really and truly engineer the car to achieve performance targets that exceed the world�fs best in production.
It was Chrysler�fs own Lou Rhodes who got the call to act as chief engineer on the project. After laying out the basic parameters to get the target performance specifications�aerodynamics, weight distribution, power, torque, etc.�Chrysler contacted AMG directly and asked that it develop an appropriate engine. This couldn�ft be minor. To have a clear performance margin over the competition, it had to propel the car to 60 mph in less than 3.0 seconds, to 100 mph in less than 6.5, hit the quarter-mile in 11.0 seconds or better, and carry it to a 240-mph (400-km/h) top speed.

�gWe told AMG we needed 800 hp and it should weigh 500 pounds,�h says Bernhard. This engine did not exist until the Chrysler project demanded it�it�fs not a version of a Mercedes engine, though AMG is obviously influenced by the association in the way it approaches its work. It�fs an AMG-engineered powerplant that, like the parts from other suppliers, was developed to the manufacturer�fs specifications. �gWhat they came up with was 850 hp, but it weighs 525 pounds. We said we could work with that,�h said Rhodes.

The all-alloy engine is a 365-cid/5980-cc dry-sump V12 with four turbochargers and dual-core intercoolers, a 6800-rpm redline and makes 142 hp/liter. �gWe started with the engine and built the car around it,�h said Bernhard, �gwhere some others start with the car and adapt an engine into it.�h

The car they designed around it is a carbon fiber and aluminum honeycomb monocoque with an alloy rear subframe to support the drivetrain and to help toward making the car reparable if crashed from behind (the Enzo and Zonda have alloy subframes, the Carrera GT doesn�ft). The front end has a carefully designed composite structure to meet crash standards. That seven-speed transaxle is a double-clutch Ricardo unit with paddle-shift selectors, the brakes are carbon-ceramic matrix with six-piston aluminum calipers, the front wheels are 19x10 inches, the rear 20x12.5, and they wear Michelin tires developed specifically for this project in 265/35ZR-19 and 335/30ZR-20 dimensions. Power-assisted rack-and-pinion steering, with a 16:1 overall ratio, 2.4 turns lock-to-lock and a 36-foot turning circle, keeps the driver in charge of direction, but not without an assist from electronics. ABS and traction control are integrated with the powertrain management system in an advance stability management program offering up a driver-selectable range of at least three racetrack modes, one highway and one street mode, so the driver can more or less specify the amount of slip he wants to allow. All-independent pushrod suspension at both ends with a long travel (155 mm in back, where the class average is between 70 mm and 90 mm) uses electronically adjustable shocks in a unique active suspension system that draws on a reservoir of fluid stored in the back.

If that sounds a lot like your standard supercar specification of the early 21st century, well, Creed notes that this past year has been something like the year of the supercar, with magazines road testing such exotics as the Zonda, Koenigsegg CC, Enzo, Carrera GT and so on. �gEvery time we read one of these things, I�fd find some
criticism and call Bernhard up and say, �eOur car isn�ft going to do that, is it?�f�h laughs Creed. �g[Magazine testers] really wrote our spec book.�h

As long as Creed has the floor, let�fs look at the design. Tom Tremont, vp for advanced product design strategy, oversaw the project. With concept cars already in the works for this year�fs show, and that desire to keep the lid down on the project, choosing a designer had to be done judiciously. The studios were charged with an �gexercise�h that was presented as a loosening-up program, just to flex the designers a bit by asking them to sketch a supercar concept for Chrysler.

�gAt first mention, this challenge was met with a blank stare,�h admits Creed. �gWe don�ft have anything in our history to draw on for this. It was a real challenge.�h

 

Here's a link to the full AutoWeek story that Mighty posted most of above.

I love how they tied this car to the Crossfire with the lines on the hood. Chrysler just keeps doing things right. First the 1999 Dodge Charger concept, then the Crossfire, and now the ME412. Who would have ever predicted this from the company that gave us the K-car and invented the minivan?

Cheers,

Greg

 

It does look pretty sweet, but does anyone else see a similarity between it and the porsche carrera gt and the audi supercar? The back looks like the GT, and the cabin looks like the audi. Sorry, but it's just my opinion.

 

Check out the similarities in the rear.

 

I definitely think it looks a lot like the Porsche. I think what Chrysler did was look at what everyone else was doing, and improve upon it. I predict the Chrysler is a better performer than the Carrera GT, as I am sure that is one of the cars they had in their sights.

 

Here you can see the "heritage" with the audi.

 

or not