T.33 could be a last-blast application for a brand-new V12.

CHANCE to have a McLaren F1 in your driveway is basically long gone, but that’s okay – that car’s designer, Gordon Murray, is about to show off a new generation successor.

Actually, make that ‘another’ new-gen successor.

Murray’s radical V12-powered T.50 supercar revealed to the world last year has already been heralded as an F1 for the modern age. It’s sold out, BTW.

However, the South African-born designer is now set to deliver a second performance model, expected to have the same Cosworth-developed powerplant as the T.50, but in a less expensive setting. 

The new arrival, named T.33 and also referred to as ‘project two’, is described as “the world's finest supercar GT”, suggesting it will place more of a focus on refinement than the T.50, which prioritises high-speed thrills.

There are other differences, too. The T.33 won’t continue with the T.50’s three-seater layout and its complex ground-effect fan; instead it’s a more orthodox two-seater.

Price? Murray (above) has declined to share that information, beyond confirming that it will be more ‘affordable’ than the T.50 – which starts at, ahem, $4.7 million.

“If you’re only doing a hundred cars, they’re not going to be £150,000,” he told Brtiain’s AutoExpress. “But I promise T.50 will be our halo car; it’s a very expensive car, and Project Two won’t be at that level.”

How much you might be expected to pay could be made clear when the T.33 is fully revealed on January 27 at its build site, the Gordon Murray Group's (GMG) new headquarters in Windlesham, a village in Surrey, England.

 The new $150 million facility will house GMG's design, development, sales, servicing and heritage departments. The car is expected to be mostly developed on site, where the company aims to have a fully functioning test track by the end of 2022.

It’s expected to be produced in small numbers, in line with GMA’s ethos of only ever producing up to 100 examples of any of its models.

 It could also be the swansong application for the V12; Murray has conceded the days of normally-aspirated engines are numbered and agrees the next engine being a hybrid is a logical step.

“We’ve looked very long and hard at future regulations, and we can get in one more normally aspirated model.

“The money it cost us to build the V12 and transmission from scratch, we’ve got to try to get a little bit back,” the former McLaren designer has told British motoring outlets.

“The powertrain is what feeds back into Project Two. It’s a brand-new platform for that car; we’re starting again on that. The T.50 was a unique monocoque, because of the fan and the central driving position, so it would be difficult to take that and adapt it to a two-seater.”

Murray said he is confident that both the car and the company's new HQ will be “game-changers in the automotive industry”.