I dont know what is more crazy… That I have been doing Project Car articles for 15 years or this is my second McLaren Project Car. Either way this is one bad ass machine and we have some cool plans for it. So why the McLaren 570S you ask? Well the McLaren 12C we built was amazing, fun, and got so much attention. Overall, the 12C was a great first supercar but lacked the infotainment technology that we learned to love in cars like the 991 Turbo and GTR. When the 12C was sold and off to its new owner in Connecticut, we were ready to hang up our high end car keys and go for the truck life. However that lasted only about 3 weeks and the shopping commenced. Finding a used 650S was in the range of $260,000 and that number is hard to swallow! A GT3RS which is another insane car is well above that price range too. But the McLaren was so much fun, we stuck with it and searched out the 570S. A perfect competitor to the 991 Turbo S, it might not have the same volume of sales, but definitely rounds out the stable stories. Being only a year old max, these cars ranged in price from $185,000 to $230,000 depending on the options and mileage.
So how do we search for cars at Vivid? Need a good deal like anyone as we don’t want to take a bath either. Fair mileage… We tend to go to a lot of events and do drives so we want to put on the bulk of miles, not buy a vehicle with a ton of miles and than barely drive it. Finally, good options that will make the build come to life. The McLaren 570S we wanted had to have the factory nose lift and carbon fiber. In fact, ALL THE CARBON FIBERS! McLaren offers 2 carbon fiber packages for the 570s, named very simply, Carbon Fiber Package 1 and Carbon Fiber Package 2. One is for the carbon fiber on the interior which is a must have. This trimming really makes you feel like you are in a supercar when the interior is laced with carbon. The second package is for the exterior. A carbon fiber diffuser, front end splitters, and side skirt extensions look much better than the factory painted gray ones. With past Porsche vehicles, the brake option of steel or carbon ceramics was one to consider. The good news is that all McLaren’s come with ceramic brakes now so we did not have to worry about that.
So in addition to these options is the color. I really wanted green. Why, I don’t know but a green and black setup would look mean as hell. However you are limited with wheel color choices. Another option was red but most of these had tan/brown interiors, not my cup of tea. Yellow could be cool too, but none were available with the carbon fiber I so desired. So finally I came across this white one with only 1500 miles from Morries Luxury Auto in Minnesota. It had all the carbon fiber, beautiful white stitching and 2 tone white/black leather interior, and just screamed buy me! So we did! Morries Luxury Auto was great to deal with and our friends at Desert Eagle Transportation did a great job getting me the car fast. When you pay for something like this, you dont want to wait 2-3 weeks.
So now its mod time… Most people say, “how can you mod a car like this as it is perfection.” I reply with, “shut your piehole, you are not the boss of me”. Since that does not always work, the real answer is like any Project Car. We want to make something look better, sound more incredible, and be an expression of Vivid Racing. Will we sell a mint of McLaren parts? Nope, but we will sure have fun showing it off and driving it around. We plan on doing things like the exhaust system, ecu tune, wheels, and some aero parts. With all cars, step one is to see what it can do on the dyno. Stay tuned for this next article on our Project Car Section Here.
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