Farbio GTS 400 in Sunday Times Top Gear

The Farbio is finally unveiled, and its civilised air hides a devilishly fast side. It’s the best news in British motoring for ages.

By Andrew Frankel

Look hard enough and amid all the doom and despondency in the car industry at present, there are still some small pockets of good news. To find this one you’ll need to go to some farm buildings between the M4 and Bath. There you will find a band of dedicated craftsmen hand-assembling an extraordinary new British sports car. TVR may no longer be British, Marcos may be dead and Noble may be on hold, but into the breach now comes the Farbio GTS400, which, as we shall shortly see, is one of the best cars this country has ever produced.

The name may already be familiar to some readers. At the end of last year I tested the first Farbio prototype and reported back on a car with huge potential but without the firepower to realise it. This, then, is the all-guns-blazing, full-fat version, packing the same 3 litre V6 motor, but instead of producing 262bhp, it’s supercharged all the way to 410bhp. That’s just 10bhp less than a new 4.7 litre Aston Martin V8 Vantage, a figure whose true significance emerges only when you realise it’s fitted into a car weighing less than the lightest Ford Fiesta. There is, therefore, no point comparing its performance with that of the Vantage or, indeed, any other Aston Martin made today. Nor is there a Ferrari on sale whose power-to-weight ratio can match that of the GTS400. Farbio’s data sheet says it needs 3.7sec to hit 60mph, but in truth it feels faster even than that.

How does the Farbio manage to weigh so little despite the standard fitment of heavy items such as air-conditioning, electric windows, power steering and central locking? Simple. It’s built like a Formula One car. The entire body is made of carbon fibre, the same excruciatingly expensive material from which Lewis Hamilton and co’s cars are exactingly built. Even the wheels are carbon fibre, the first I’ve seen on a road car. At 15lb apiece, they weigh less than half as much as those made of conventional aluminium alloy. Know this and you start to see some justification in its £94,000 list price.

In the main, it is a beautifully constructed car. It looks like the result of a romantic liaison between a Lotus Exige and a McLaren F1 and is none the worse for that. It’s understated, with no big wings or spoilers to pollute its upper surfaces, because all the aerodynamic aids needed to keep the Farbio on the ground at up to 185mph are positioned out of sight under the car.

The door handles are cleverly concealed in a small scoop, and when the door is pulled open it reveals an equally spare, minimalist cabin. There’s more legroom in here than in any other road car of my experience, so even the freakishly long in leg will have no problem getting comfortable, while the steering column adjusts for reach and rake, so the perfect driving position is always achievable. A good job too, given the GTS400’s astonishing turn of speed.

What you notice next is the paucity of buttons. Everything from the sat nav and air-conditioning to the radio and Bluetooth controls are operated from a touchscreen on the centre console. The system is so easy to understand and operate, it’s a wonder it has not been snapped up by luxury car manufacturers looking for an intuitive control system as well as an uncluttered look to their cabins.

The engine starts with a well-mannered bark, offering little indication of its exceptional potential. Indeed, if you just ambled around, you could even be a trifle disappointed by the GTS400. The ride is supple, the brakes a touch too light, there’s little wind, engine or road noise and, as long as you keep the revs below 4000rpm, performance is no more than pleasantly brisk.

If you slam the throttle to the floor and venture above this mark, it feels as though someone has reached through the back of your seat and wrapped their hands around your spine and is trying to wrench you back out of the car. With a yelp from the huge 20in tyres, the Farbio’s nose sniffs the air for an instant before exploding up the road. By the time you have registered what has happened, whatever straight you were on is now behind you. Because it is supercharged rather than turbocharged, there is no delay between application of throttle and arrival of power: above 4000rpm it’s all there, all of the time, at the instant your foot squeezes the accelerator.

So it is just as well the chassis has been designed to take more power even than this. Chris Marsh, Farbio’s managing director, is a former Le Mans competitor, and in the precision of its steering, the tune of its elegant double-wishbone suspension and the bite of its huge AP Racing disc brakes lie the hallmarks of a track-honed thoroughbred. Its shock absorbers are fully adjustable, so you can waft your way in comfort to the circuit, then stiffen the whole car up to go tearing round the track.

There are a few aspects that are not yet right with the Farbio. In right-hand-drive versions, there’s no rest for your left foot when it is not on the clutch, and some small items of interior trim would have looked out of place on a car costing a fraction of the Farbio’s asking price. The gearlever needs to be longer, too.

It’s not much of a list for one of the most exciting British sports cars to be built in years. While TVRs were best when travelling in a straight line, and Nobles brilliantly able but clearly track-oriented machines, the Farbio offers the best of both worlds: a great look, sufficient civility to be used every day and a turn of speed to frighten the wits out of the most determined boy racers.

All that remains is that price, which makes the Farbio more expensive than the aforementioned Aston Martin Vantage and only a fraction less so than a Porsche 911 Turbo. Then again, Marsh knows the market for such a car is limited, and if he sells only 50 around the world next year, he’ll be a happy man. On this evidence, he deserves to.

Hot Wheels specs

ENGINE2968cc, six cylinders

POWER410bhp @ 6600rpm

TORQUE 345 lb ft @ 6000rpm

TRANSMISSION Six-speed manual

FUEL/CO2 n/a

ACCELERATION 0-60mph: 3.7sec

TOP SPEED 185mph

PRICE £94,000

TAX BAND G (£400 a year)

VERDICT A great British sports car is born

RELEASE DATE On sale now, Contact 01992 500038

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