Jaguar XJR-15 (1989)

Just 30-odd units were built at a price of 500,000 pounds. In spite of the high price, all cars were sold since TWR organised a one-make racing series for the buyers, chasing the 1 million pounds prize. XJR-15 never acquired much attention from the majority fans of Jaguar, mostly because it was not a real Jaguar in any sense.

Lamborghini LM002 (1984)

If you know Ferruccio Lamborghini made his wealth in tractor business before establishing his supercar company, you won't be surprised to see the Lamborghini super off-roader. Like AM General's Hummer, Lamborghini LM002 was designed with military function very much in mind, especially in the Middle East market. The 3-ton body seated 4 people in the cabin and optionally another 4 in the open cargo area. Power came from Countach's 48-valve 5.2-litre V12, with 455 hp and 369 lbft to make it the fastest off-roader in the world.

Commercially, LM002 was quite successful. The Saudi Arabian army ordered 300 cars, the first 143 had the Countach engine and the rest were delivered with the Diablo engine (5.7 litres, 485 hp, 428 lbft). Many other private customers bought it just for fun.

Rocket (1992)

The part-time sports car specialist was founded by former racing driver Chris Craft just in the early 90s, and the Rocket was his first project. By his name, you'll know he is a good craftmen rather than a good car designer, so he hired the famous Gordon Murray to design the car. If you don't know him, listen: Murray is a top Formula One chief designer whose cars won five world championships. After retiring from motor racing, he created the McLaren F1 road car.

Interestingly, the philosophy of Rocket was even more loyal to Formula One than McLaren F1. Not only looked like a Formula racing car - with narrow body, exposed wheels and suspension linkages, open cockpit, no windscreen - its structure was also pure Formula racer-inspired. The engine was used as stressed structure to support the rear suspensions like Formula One, the narrow, cigar-shaped chassis was made of nickel-bronze and constructed as space frame, covered with light alloy inner panels and glass-fiber outer panels.

Power came from a motorcycle engine - Yamaha FZR1000's 1002c.c. straight 4, with 5 valves per cylinder. Like the superbike, maximum power of 143 hp occurred at sky-high 10,500 rpm, and 77 lbft torque at 8,500 rpm. The engine was mated to 5-speed sequential Yamaha gearbox, and then to a special final drive which incorporated limited slip differential (LSD) as well as a reverse gear, since the motorcycle gearbox had no reverse.

As you might predicted, Rocket was extremely light - only 400 kg. This gave it a very good power-to-weight ratio but most important was that the ultra-lightweight optimized handling and braking. As commented by Autocar magazine, Rocket rewrote any experience of driving a sports car with its extremely agile handling. The unassisted steering was ultra-quick and felt very communicative. The double wishbones suspensions provided stability yet good ride. It was very quick in corner while being so easy to handle. Excluding formula racing cars, nothing could compare with it, not even a Caterham Seven.

Part of the handling excellence was contributed by the brakes. You won't predict such a flyweight to use such high-specification brakes - front ventilated and cross-drilled discs with 4-piston Brembo calipers, rear cross-drilled discs with 2-piston calipers, also from Brembo. As described by Gordon Murray, "It is the only car I know that you can thrash round a circuit all day without so much as a wisp of smoke from the brakes, and then jump in and drive it home".

Rocket is still for sale to special order, although the price is very high (about a Lotus Esprit GT3), although it is virtually impractical in any sense (no weather protection, no boot, no equipment, the 1+1 seating plan is no use for adult passenger), it is still a worthy experience to car enthusiasts. It is never a vehicle for transportation purpose, it is purely driven for fun.

Lister Storm (1993)

However, just a powerful engine was not enough. Lister, for the first time, created its own chassis - aluminium space frame structure, which was claimed to provide better crumple in crash than carbon fiber monocoque (but they did not mention the inferior rigidity / weight ratio). Gearbox was Getrag's 6-speeder. All these were covered by a body consisted of aluminium and carbon fiber panels.

The aerodynamics was not too impressive - Cd. 0.35, the styling was also odd, especially was the large mound on the front engine lid that accommodate the huge V12. However, its strongest aspect was the interior - sufficient space as a 2+2, which was rarely seen in this class of cars. Leather and wood surrounded everywhere accompanied with other luxury items made it more like a Ferrari 456GT than other 200 mph supercars.

At the beginning of the project, Lister planned to build it just according to special orders. As all the components were easily available from suppliers, and not much development cost involved, the project could make money by just selling 3 or 4 cars. And it did.