SYDNEY: It was less than a year ago when I asked AMG’s CEO Tobias Moers point-blank if his team was cooking up a response to the Porsche 918, McLaren P1, and/or Ferrari LaFerrari . His laconic answer: “No.” Times change, it would seem. At this past week’s Detroit auto show I once again sat down with Herr Moers and posed the same question. His answer this time wasn’t his patented short, sharp no. Instead he said, “We want to be seen by the public on the same level as the other sports car maker in Germany.”
You don’t have to even read between the lines to grok that one — you can gleam the meaning from the space between the letters.
Tobias dropped a few other clues that I think, taken as a whole, point even more clearly to a future badass, gas-electric, world-on-fire AMG megacar. When discussing the purpose of AMG in light of parent company Daimler’s decision to dust off the ultra-lux Maybach nameplate, his brand’s mission now is to “Make race car technology street-legal.” Seems as if the return of Maybach is relieving pressure from AMG, freeing Affalterbach’s finest to favor sport over luxury, like it used to.
Since Tobias all but mentioned the 918 Spyder by name, I asked about AWD. If you forgot, the 918 is not only AWD (electric propulsion in the front, flat-plane V-8 fury driving the rear wheels) but also is the quickest car we’ve ever tested to 60 mph, accomplishing the deed in a breathtaking 2.4 seconds. Presumably, AMG would at least be exploring such a solution, if not working on something similar.
But when asked about an AWD GT, Moers said, “We have a little disadvantage with our layout.” Meaning that it’s difficult to make a front-engine car with a transaxle AWD. Not impossible, as the Nissan GT-R manages to do so. Of course Godzilla was engineered to have drive shafts flying in multiple directions from day one. Not so with the GT.
Raw speculation here, but for packaging reasons a future AMG hyper-hybrid would need to be mid-engine. Of course, Mercedes’ head of design, Gordon Wagner, has gone on record claiming they don’t do mid-engine cars. Still, AMG isn’t precisely Mercedes-Benz these days.
There’s one final piece of the puzzle. Months ago I got a top-secret ride and drive in a heavily camouflaged AMG GT-S with Tobias. (That sucker’s rock-solid at 190 mph if you’re wondering.)
He explained to me that in order to get the GT past Daimler’s board, there was much chassis commonality with the deceased SLS Gullwing. Aside from width, the door openings are actually the same size.
Moers also told me that “the AMG GT story is just beginning” and that we can expect to see a proliferation of models not dissimilar to the iconic, multifaceted Porsche 911. Stewing on that info for the past half-year, I asked Tobias if in fact there wouldn’t be a gullwing version of the GT — a pinnacle, halo model. He said, “No Gullwing out of the GT.
That’s for sure.” Sad news for a moment, but then he continued that he was “protecting the Gullwing for the future.” If you’re going to go above the rim of the eventual top dog AMG GT, you’re standing firmly on Mount Hypercar.
Time frame for such a beast? None, of course, but I’d guess we’ll see a heavily camoed mule on the Nurburgring within a few years. Aside from gullwing doors I’ll wager you’ll see a mid-mounted, stratospheric output version of the new 4.0-liter, twin-turbo V-8. Six hundred and fifty to 700 horsepower seems reasonable, especially since the 2.0-liter AMG I-4 is capable of 355 hp, and Tobias said there’s a “close relationship” between the 2.0-liter and the 4.0-liter AMG engines.
Also remember that AMG learned a great deal about electric sports cars with the 740 hp SLS Electric drive. That car featured 4 wheel motors. Assume that two such motors on the front wheels of a new Gullwing would be good for 370 hp, and add that to another 700 gas hp driving the rear wheels and you’re easily in the 4-digit horsepower realm. A very nice place to be. Time, of course, will tell.
