In the world of the Speed kings of the car world, the names that we are often used to hearing are Bugatti and Koenigsegg the legitimate ones, there are fakes one’s too if you know you know….
But there are always some cars and car brands that have made some fantastic cars but failed to get recognition, SSC was one of those manufacturers before they did the Tuatara Scam and I was one of their biggest fans because of the Ultimate Aero TT but there is yet another American manufacturer that according to me went under Radar despite having a car worth million dollars.
And that car brand is Saleen and the car I am talking about is the Saleen s7 twin turbo. I remember having cutouts of the Ultimate Aero TT and the S7 Twin-turbo in my scratch book and I didn’t even realize that those were two of the fastest cars in the world.
Saleen is a Sportscar manufacturer but is more known as an established Automotive Manufacturer of high-performance parts.
The Saleen S7 Twin-turbo was a Performance version of the original Saleen s7 sportscar that was manufactured by Saleen in 2000, it featured a mid-engine layout in a sportscar package. But I won’t call the S7 a sportscar, you know why? Because the Windsor Naturally Aspirated V8 engine produced about 550 Horsepower which even in 2021 is supercar level of horsepower and the size of the engine humongous, it was a 7.0-liter engine.
But the engine is just the cake, the cherry on the top is the 6-speed manual transmission and the weight which is just about 1300 Kgs!
The Saleen S7 is a perfect old-school car that I would definitely put up amongst legends like the Mclaren F1 and the Bugatti EB110 because the S7 has been engineered in that Old school Raw way which you don’t find in performance cars in 2021.
It may be one of the most efficient cars in terms of using engine power and to a naturally aspirated one. The Saleen S7 can accelerate from 0 to 100 kmph in just 2.8 seconds and has a top speed of 386 Kmph! That’s just 5kmph less than what the Mclaren F1 achieved 2 years ago in 1998!
Now if the Naturally aspirated version of the S7 is so crazy, just imagine how wild would it be if you added twin turbos to it!
Well, Saleen did just that in 2005 when they launched the S7 twin-turbo with 200 horsepower more and pushing the torque levels to 950nm.
Not just the spec numbers but the performance numbers improved, the Car was now able to accelerate from 0 to 100kmph in just 2.7 seconds and could achieve a top speed of 399Kmph in 2005, yes, you read that right, if it were launched just before the Veyron made the world record, it might have been the world’s fastest road car for a few weeks.
Both these beauties were made in very limited numbers and a few lucky folks around the world would be enjoying these old school jewels.
Isn’t it astonishing how it topped out at just 1kmph before touching the magical 400kmph mark, but is what it is, it can’t be changed but one thing that the S7 and the S7 twin-turbo have established themselves is two legendary pieces of engineering marvels that might not have got the recognition they deserved but left an everlasting impact in the world and in the minds of each petrolhead out there!
So, everyone, that will be all for this time, I trust you liked this one, if you did then do share it with your friends and do consider subscribing to Motordrift for more such content in the future.
Till then
Ciao
