All I know about the M12, I learned from GT2, but I like it enough to have this picture in my screen saver.
Quote:
from Polyphony Digital's game Gran Turismo 2: M12
After a history that would make a good movie plot, by the mid-1990s Vector was based in Florida and owned by an Indonesian company that also owned Lamborghini. How convenient - Vector's latest car, the M12, needed an engine. And so it ended up with a 5.7-liter Lamborghini V12 in its midships engine bay. The V12's 492 hp at 6800 rpm and 428 lb-ft of torque at 5200 rpm certainly qualified the M12 for high-performance exotic status, and its looksmade just about everything else on the road seem tame. With a plethora of vents and scoops, angular, extreme cab-forward styling, and a huge rear wing, it had the appearance of a stealth fighter for the street. But, on the road, with its looks, the M12 was anything but stealthy. It was undeniably fast, with a zero-to-sixty around 4.5 seconds, still in first gear. Its top speed appproached 190 mph.
The M12 was largely handmade. Body work was fiberglass and carbon-fiber, and covered a semi-monocoque chassis with independent double A-arm suspention. The military-spec rivets and adhesives used in the previous W8 were not used in the M12. It was welded together in normal automotive fashion. Because of the Vector's interior layout, the forward-mounted Lamborghini gearbox could not be used. The engine was turned around, back-to-front, and a more conventional transaxle was employed. Because of this, a special exhaust system was fabricated. The Vector M12 was an elemental supercar, furiously fast and only marginally civilized.
the first time i drove a vector was when i was my freshman year of college and my freind who is a playmate was dating a guy who owned 2 of them and he let me drive it around the streets of tampa if only he let me take it back to campus for an hour...
the secnd time i drove a vector was when i drove the the first one ever made the american edition for about 3 miles when i went down to ft. lauderdale, i spoke to the guy as if i lived in a 9 million dollar house on the new river in lauderdale and that was my parents summer house i also pulled up the first day to look at it in my ffreinds dads porsche 911 turbo, and came back the second day when they took it out of the showroom for me to drive in my freinds (same guy who's dad hass the 911 turbo) 1996 355 spider,
Vector had a sordid career in the 90s. From what I recall, sales were miserable, and if my95cobra isn't bullshitting, he's driven about 20% of all the M12's. Maybe I'm getting my models mixed up, but sales went 8....3....1, and they decided to call it quits.
Some older models, I think, used Chevy V8s, but I could very well be wrong. Just do a search on the net if you really want more info. Good luck.
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The first production Vector model, the W8, had a Donovan-built, Chevy 350 based, engine. The 6.0L (366cid) OHV V8 had two turbochargers and produced between 625-650hp. It was said to be quite quick and advertised top speeds (up to 237) were never proven and probably couldn't have been achieved due to the car's sad aerodynamics. Seventeen production cars were built between 1990 and 1993.
The Vector Avtech WX3 prototypes were advertised as having engines up to 7.0L (DOHC V8s) and producing up to 1,000hp. None to that spec were ever built. Only two prototypes were ever shown.
The company was reorganized and the WX3 became the Vector SC and then the Vector M12. Fourteen M12s were built for customers (plus one race car and a few test prototypes). It was powered by a stock Lamborghini 5.7L DOHC V12 but mounted to a new transaxle (reverse of the setup from the Diablo). Production ended and the company's doors closed shortly after displaying their SVR8 prototype in the summer of 2000.
dson: What type of transmission did they use (number of gears, if it was good, etc)
I once went to Prestige Imports in Miami, but I'm young and my parents and brother looked stupid and (relatively) poor. Too bad. They had an F40 LM for $800 000.
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It used a 5-speed gearbox. I haven't heard if the transmission was good or bad...but the racing version of the car never completed any of the races it was entered in. It actually only completed a few laps in three races.
I think each race had a different problem. I believe one race it was a transmission failure, but I'm not sure. Vectors ran in the Professional Race Car series in 1998.
I remember seeing a Vector get auctioned at one of the Barrett-Jackson auctions (on TV). I was about 83% sure it was an M12, but if there were only 17 built, now I don't know.
The company that owned Lamborghini and Vector was Indonesia, not Malaysian. They had plenty of money because the company's founder was the (arguably favorite) son of the Indonesian president. Each of the president's children had a hand in atleast one of the country's monopolies. This particular son's company was granted "national car" status so that the company would have no competition selling basic transportation. How would you like to have such a monopoly that you could sell a $20,000 Kia Sephia in a market that previously purchased similar cars for twice that amount?
There were 14 (not including prototypes) M12s built and 22 W8s (including prototypes). There were only 17 sold to the public.
M12
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