McLaren M12
The McLaren M12 was a sports car prototype developed by Bruce McLaren Motor Racing in 1969 .
Development history and technology
The Canadian-American Challenge Cup , introduced in 1966 according to the technical regulations of Group 7, was an area of activity for Bruce McLaren and his racing team from the start . After the overall victory of John Surtees in the Lola T70 Spyder in the opening season, the two McLaren drivers Denis Hulme and Bruce McLaren won the final ratings in 1967 and 1968 . The current vehicle in 1968 was the M8 , which the factory drivers also drove in 1969 .
The M12 was conceived as a customer vehicle and designed by Robin Herd and Gordon Coppuck . Since they only had eleven weeks to produce a testable racing car, they largely fell back on the tried and tested. Many technical components were based on the M6 . The dimensions and shape of the body made of aluminum and magnesium came from the M8. The rear room so there was modified V8 engine from Chevrolet could be installed. Since McLaren's involvement in Formula 1 and the Can-Am series meant that there was no longer any free production capacity, the production of the cars was outsourced to Trojan Limited , who built a total of 15 chassis. Some owners fitted their vehicles with larger rear wings, and McLaren delivered two cars to Toyota , which converted the chassis to accommodate Toyota V8 engines.
The McLaren M12 GT with a coupé body was a special form .
Racing history
The US racing driver Lothar Motschenbacher , who sold McLaren racing cars in North America through his racing team , received the first M12 . George Eaton bought a chassis and Jim Hall bought a car for Chaparral Cars . Its driver John Surtees was so dissatisfied with the handling characteristics of the new Chaparral 2H that he persuaded Hall to buy him an M12. In the season opening race, the 500-mile race in Mosport , John Surtees in the Chaparral M12 placed third behind Bruce McLaren and Denny Hulme in the factory M8 in third place overall. George Eaton finished ninth, while Motschenbacher retired with a damaged clutch. So in 1969 there was no M12 win in the Can-Am series, and neither was there in the following years. From 1970, McLaren also sold the M8 to private teams, which meant that the top teams did without the M12.
In Europe, among others, David Prophet and Leo Kinnunen drove M12 in the 1970 Interserie . Prophet finished fourth in Croft's 50-mile race and eighth in Thruxton's 60-mile race .
Overall victories with the M12 were in the Japanese Fuji Grand Champion Series . Tadashi Sakai won the 500-km race at Fuji in 1971 and the 200-mile race in 1971 and the 300-km race in 1972 on the Fuji Speedway .
