GOODBYE: McLaren 650S
With the imminent arrival of the McLaren 720S, we consider six things we will remember fondly (and a couple we won’t) about the 650S
1. the view out
Imagine sitting in the front row of a cinema, right in the middle. Then imagine the moment after the adverts when the curtains pull back an extra 30 percent to reveal the full width of the screen. That’s what the view out always felt like when you got into a 650S after driving something else. In the same way that being at the top of a tall building can give you a wholly fresh perspective on a world that you thought you knew from street level, the McLaren 650S had me looking at roads with what felt like new eyes.
For a start, sitting low, slightly reclined, with the steering wheel perfectly placed in front of my chest, the 650S always felt wonderfully ergonomically tailored. Low hip point, knees and arms bent, perfect pistol grips on the steering wheel at quarter to three, it just felt right. Then as you looked out of the windscreen for the first time there were the reference points, the front arches giving you perfect visual markers for the wheels. Before you even pressed the starter button, you always felt confident about wielding a 650S.
Once on the move, placement of the car on the road was supremely easy. The A-pillars never seemed to be in the way, so instead of just flicking your eyes left and right in their sockets, there was real benefit to turning your head and making use of the extra visual width available. I always felt like my line of sight was lower but wider than in other cars, somehow matching the sensations of a low and wide supercar.
The only car I’ve driven that could clearly beat it for vision? Its ancestor, the F1.
2. Doing the time warp
The relentless way that the 12C and then the 650S got down a road felt utterly crazy. There was a touch more lag than you might expect, but as soon as the turbos were spinning it gave you a feeling of horizontal free-fall like little else. I think some of it was to do with the slightly detached nature of the suspension, the way that it would squat and lift its nose a little, leaving you with a sensation of low flight.
3. Stalking
Not the sort that will get you a restraining order or the pastime that most deer could do without, but indicating, washing the windscreen, trying to operate the nose lift or anything that required fondling the beautiful stalks behind the 650S’s steering wheel. They look like very avant guard spoons or shoe horns for incredibly narrow feet. Both of those descriptions make them sound infinitely less appealing and less beautifully sculptural than they are.
4. Usability
Some might say that they want usability from a tumble dryer but not a supercar. But why shouldn’t a smallish mid-engined 641bhp supercar have the ease of use of a front loading 8kg condenser with woollens setting? The 650S was a car that you really didn’t mind doing more mundane or motorway miles in. Whether it was going to Aldi or the Alps, the McLaren 650S was somehow an easier proposition than the equivalent Ferrari. And a supercar that you want to use more often is a good supercar, because once behind the wheel you never know where you might accidentally detour via…
5. The air brake
The 650S always felt, fundamentally, a little unstable under hard braking. Perhaps in the same way that the squat accentuated the acceleration, so the dive unsettled the rear a bit more under heavy decelerations. Whatever, you certainly noticed when the airbrake deployed. You could feel it settle everything, but your rear view mirror would also suddenly become colour-matched to the bonnet in front of you.
6. The fact the Spider was as good as the Coupe
Because the car’s structural rigidity came from its carbonfibre MonoCell chassis and not its roof, it didn’t suffer when they lopped the top off. It looked terrific in Spider form as well with those prominent buttresses. It will be interesting to see if the 720S manages to pull off the same trick – initial impressions are that it will be tricky as the new MonoCage II appears to have a structurally important T-bar running along the centre of the Coupe’s roof.
Two things we won’t miss (and which look like they’ve been fixed for the 720S)
1. Iris never working
McLaren’s first stab at an infotainment system wasn’t very entertaining. The screen was orientated like an smart phone in portrait mode, which was a bit weird and navigating around it (let alone navigating with it) just never felt very intuitive. Thankfully we've already seen the new system in a static 720S and while the screen is still in portrait (but then so is a Tesla's) it is much larger and the software already looks much slicker. We'll be happy to try the nav's abilities by typing in, say, Dignes-les-Bains or Grossglockner...
2. Cheap switchgear
Activating the Sport or Track modes was about as tactile as turning up the heat on a child’s toy My First Microwave. How the plastic switches came out of the same team that gave the car the gorgeous indicator stalks is plain bemusing. Thankfully, again, the switchgear in the new car is now metal rather than plastic and the Drive, Neutral, Reverse buttons are rather better and more attractively placed.
In conclusion...
So there we go. The 650S certainly wasn't perfect but it was deeply impressive in lots of ways and, as McLaren Automotive grows in the years to come, I think it will be looked back upon rather fondly. From everything we've heard and seen, the 720S sounds like a major step on in a lot of areas (including outright pace, which is slightly mind-boggling) but the thing I'm particularly excited about is seeing how that already incredible view out has been improved upon. The new retractable dash should enhance the forward lines of sight even further, while the thin B- and C-pillars should massively benefit all-around vision. Hopefully we should get to drive the 720S in the next few months, so we'll be sure to let you know...
You can see our in-depth preview of the new 720S below…
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Comments (1)
It's has had a short life as a production car it is being killed as a teenager