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McLarens & Reliability – Nov 2019 Update

McLarens & Reliability – Nov 2019 Update

McLarens & Reliability – Nov 2019 Update

As we have finished the service cycle for our McLaren’s this year, I thought it would be a good time to update the article on reliability. This year, more so than any in the past, we really put the cars to the test. On top of its duties as my daily driver, the McLaren 650S Spider also got to stretch its legs on a 2,000 mile road trip from Dallas to Boston. The 675LT Spider spent several months being run hard in the mountains and then was called to duty for a 2,750 mile road trip from Montana to California. The Senna arrived in June and has seen plenty of road time lately. As the Senna and I continue to bond, I can only see this growing once the season of snow, salt, and ice passes. Of our four McLaren’s the only one that has had a quiet year is the 720S for reasons that will be explained in an upcoming article.

The updates on the service history and issues of our four current McLarens are:

McLaren #5 – 2015 650S Spider: This car has been my daily driver for the last 4 ½ years now. No issues and only time it has been back to the dealership is for its yearly service. There have been a couple of minor recalls, all of which have been handled as part of the annual service. This year we also replaced all four tires and did a full wheel alignment. Four years of driving around the lunar surface like roads of Dallas had not be kind to either. The only other very minor tantrum the 650S Spider has thrown was over a dislike for 64GB Scandisk USB drives. When I tried to use one with the IRIS infotainment system it repeatedly crashed. Once I swapped the 64GB USB drive for the 32GB drive I had been using prior, IRIS immediately returned to life.

McLaren #6 – 2016 675LT Spider: This car has done multiple 1000+ miles road trips and been driven hard in the mountains its entire life. The 675LT Spider has never had a single issue and it’s only has seen the inside of the workshop for its annual services. Like the 650S Spider, a few minor recalls have been taken care of during the annual visits to the McLaren service center. To date the largest cost has been this year’s windshield replacement. The damage was caused by a rock that flew off the back of a large dump truck in Pennsylvania. It sounded like a gun shot when it hit the windshield.

McLaren #7 – 2018 720S: Never had a single problem and it just had its second completely routine annual service.

McLaren #8 – 2019 Senna: The Senna just arrived in June. So far, it’s had one recall item that was prompt taken care of.

In summary, we have now owned 8 McLarens, including 4 currently, over the past 8 years. Two have been used as daily drivers over the last six years. None of the McLarens have ever left us stranded and they have been by far the most reliable cars we have owned over the past couple of decades.

Original Article from February 2019:

Recently I have had quite a few people reach out and ask me about McLaren’s reliability.  I thought this was a bit odd so I checked to see what might be driving this sudden onslaught of queries. Apparently, a few vloggers have recently posted videos on YouTube bashing McLaren and complaining of major reliability issues.  To be honest, I haven’t watched any of the videos as I don’t spend any time on YouTube. Hence I really don’t have any idea what the issues being pontificated upon are.  What I do know is what our experience has been across 7 different McLarens in both the UK & US in the last 7 years ( https://karenable.com/my-mclaren-history/).  Of the 7 McLarens we have owned, 3 are still in our stewardship, and we have put close to 80,000 miles on this collective group.  In terms of issues and servicing, our history is:

McLaren #1 – 2013 RHD 12C Spider: This is the only McLaren we have owned that had steel brakes. I made the mistake of washing it once and putting it away with the brake discs still wet. The right rear caliper froze on the disc and we had to flatbed it to the service center to get it released. Also upgraded the infotainment system from IRIS v1 to v2 as the v1 was pretty useless. Only other time this 12C saw the service center was for its annual service.

McLaren #2 – 2012 LHD 12C Coupe: The only issue I ever had with the 12C Coupe was a faulty left front tire sensor. I had to take the car in twice before it was finally rectified. For most of my ownership, this 12C lived in Germany and spent many high-speed hours on the autobahn.

McLaren #3 – 2014 LHD 12C Spider: The only issue we ever had with our final 12C Spider was a temperature sensor that needed replacing. The car was out of service for a day. Other than that, it only saw the dealership for its annual checkup. This 12C Spider was my daily driver for a bit over a year.

McLaren #4 – 2015 P1: We had two issues with the P1, a loose rear side turn signal light and the IRIS Infotainment System failed and needed to be replaced. Other than that, it was just routine annual service.

McLaren #5 – 2015 650S Spider: This car has been my daily driver for the last 3 ½ years. No issues and only time it has been back to the dealership is for its yearly service.

McLaren #6 – 2016 675LT Spider: This car has done a few 1,500 miles road trips and been driven hard up in the mountains. Never had a single issue and it only has seen the inside of the workshop for its annual services.

McLaren #7 – 2018 720S: Never had a single problem and it just had its first completely routine annual service.

In summary, we did have a few minor issues with the early McLarens. None of these I would consider even remotely concerning, serious, or out of the ordinary. The later McLarens have all been poster children for reliability. I also have never had to add a single drop of oil or coolant to any of the McLarens that we have owned. When I compare this list to a similar one for other manufacturers, McLaren’s build quality and reliability has certainly been best in class in my experience.

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Hypercar & Supercar Market Saturation

Too Much of a Good Thing

Hypercar & Supercar Market Saturation

Never before have so many different manufacturers announced cars in the $1 million plus category. If competition is supposed to raise everyone’s game, then the cars we should be seeing on the road (or more likely mostly stashed in private collections) in the next few years should be extraordinary. However, I’m concerned that this isn’t quite how things work in the hypercar market. The delicate balance between supply and demand that has been established and carefully nurtured by the major supercar manufacturers over the past few decades appears to about to get tipped in the wrong direction. Throw in rapidly increasing price points, a slowing global economy, Brexit, and the on-going trade wars and it looks like history might just repeat itself, and not in a good way.

The 90s

The funny thing is, in many ways we have been here before. The supercar/hypercar market in the early to mid 90s had a lot of similar characteristics. A number of new players entered the market either via reviving a dead brand (Bugatti Automobili S.p.A) or as completely new entrants (Cizeta, Vector, Venturi, McLaren), and existing car manufacturers deciding to enter the hypercar segment (Jaguar). To make things even more interesting, you had Ferrari dropping about 1000 more F40s than originally announced into a huge market bubble that then went bang. The resulting carnage of oversupply, a market headed into a recession, and over hyped speculation was impressive. The first reincarnation of Bugatti went bankrupt after producing only 139 EB110s. Jaguar ended up well short of the 350 planned production run on the XJ220s and still had unsold units sitting in showrooms 3 years after production ceased. While the McLaren F1 is considered by many to be the greatest modern supercar today, back in the 90’s, McLaren struggled to sell F1s. Of the original planned production run of 300 units, only 106 units left the production line (despite asking politely and offering to pay full list price, McLaren has refused several times to allow me to place an order for one of the remaining 194 F1 chassis numbers). Cizeta, Vector, and Venturi have all long since disappeared into the dust of history.

2020+

Today we sit in a not to dissimilar situation. We have a global economy that is slowing with a huge amount of uncertainty being generated by both Brexit and the Trump trade wars with predictions that a recession is around the corner increasing by the day. There are a large number of brands that have recently reemerged from the grave and announced new limited-edition supercars including De Tomaso, Apollo, Pininfarina, and ATS. After being out of the hypercar game for nearly a decade following the lukewarm reception of the One-77, Aston Martin is back with a vengeance with two cars coming in the next three years. Both Mercedes & Lotus have $2 million plus projects well underway and SCG has announced that they will build 25 road legal versions of their Le Mans LMP1 Hypercar. You also have the track only Brabham BT62 and yet to be named just announced Lamborghini. Then just to make things a bit more interesting, Gordon Murray has jumped back into the game and announced that he will be building a spiritual successor to the McLaren F1, the T.50, of which 100 examples will be built with a price tag of $3 million each.

While all of the above are new entrants to the limited-edition/hypercar segment, the two biggest established manufacturers have also vastly accelerated their normal model launch cadence and broadened the number of different market segments they are developing models against. Ferrari has launched the new limited edition Icona line starting with the Monza SP1 & SP2, both built off the 812 platform. Ferrari has also added the SF90 Stradale to its regular production portfolio with the SF90 sitting in-between the supercar and hypercar categories. McLaren, which waited 20 years between the F1 and P1, closed the gap to 4 years between the P1 and Senna and now has two more hypercars, the Speedtail and Speedster, in the pipeline for delivery in the next two years. All of this is on top of Bugatti, Koenigsegg, and Pagani’s plans and doesn’t even take into account the P1, LaFerrari, and 918 successors which will probably arrive in the next 5-6 years.

Buyers

While all of the above is not a comprehensive list, it still represents a huge increase in the supply of cars over the next several years in the limited edition/hypercar market segment. While the volume of cars certainly is increasing exponentially, I’m really not sure the number of potential customers is expanding as rapidly. In fact, if anything I can see an emerging wave of concern among many who have been buying these sorts of cars for a long time. In general, I believe there are 3 groups of hypercar/limited edition buyers:

  • The immensely wealth for whom retained value is inconsequential and having the new new thing is what matters most. Their behavior is likely to remain unchanged.
  • Speculators will vanish overnight at the first signs of a change in the historic model of rapidly increasing values for the “new new thing”
  • The very well-off enthusiasts who is both buying a car to enjoy and an asset that he/she expects to retain value.  This group is going to become increasingly selective, and in some cases, if the downside risk looks to great, will depart the limited edition/hypercar market all together.

Added to the uneasiness on the demand side you also have the continued threat of US tariffs on European cars which could add 25% to the invoice price and crack downs on displays of wealth in China.

Winners & Losers

My guess is there will be a few clear winners and losers. The winners will be cars that have a purity of vision and age well. Technology showcases that are outdated quickly will struggle over the long term. While the Pininfaria Battista is a beautiful work of art, I just can’t imagine an electric car, even a $2.5 million one, aging well and ever achieving classic status. Same holds for the Lotus Evija, given Lotus’ challenges in getting its base portfolio updated, the Evija seems like a massive unneeded distraction. The ATS GT looks like a rebodied McLaren 12C and my guess is ATS will quickly revert to its former comatose state. Apollo & De Tomaso share an owner and from what I understand the De Tomaso P72 is based off the Apollo Intensa Emozione. While the P72 has certainly gather lots of interest on Instagram, I doubt that interest will turn into the number of deposits needed to give this latest iteration of De Tomaso long term viability. The Gordon Murray T.50 sits right at the high end of this group at $3 million each. Gordon’s name gives the car instant credibility and the fact that Murray is only building 100 T.50s certainly tics the exclusivity box which bodes well for the T.50 having the potential to be a long-term winner in this group. For this to happen though, the T.50 can’t just be a one-off unicorn and a long-term service support network needs to be established. It’s too bad that the T.50 isn’t being developed as a joint project with McLaren. If it was, I believe it would be the one “must have” car out of this whole group.

Of the large established manufacturers, the Aston Martin-Red Bull Valkyrie looks like a sure winner, but the Valhalla is a tougher call. The partnership with Adrian Newey and Red Bull adds a huge amount of credibility to the cars but Aston Martin’s recent financial performance is very concerning. If money gets very tight, it could impact development for the Valhalla which is still in early stages. Aston will also need to resist the urge to spin multiple variants off the Vahalla if it is going to hold value long term.

The Ferrari Icona line seems like the antithesis of everything Ferrari has ever stood for. Ferrari has always been a forward leaning organization where the next car was a leap forward on the last. While the SF90 tics all the right boxes, the Monza SP1 & SP2 seem like a shameless tactical exploitation of their back catalog. While I am sure Ferrari will sell every unit they produce, I do wonder how many would actually be spoken for if you didn’t have to raise your hand to avoid losing your place in line for the next Enzo/LaFerrari.

McLaren has probably been the most aggressive of the established manufacturers in the Hypercar segment with multiple models all launching in a very short time frame. While each is clearly positioned against a different market segment it is still a large number of $1 million plus cars chasing the same pool of buyers. Long term I can see the Senna doing well as similar to the F40, is has a purity of focus and is not encumbered by an overly complex hybrid system (full disclosure, I do have a Senna). The Speedtails will always be collectable given the low build numbers and uniqueness of the center driver’s seat concept. The recently announced McLaren Speedster is a tougher call as details on the car are still very high level.

Last but not least, the Mercedes-AMG One seems to be well behind schedule. How the “One” stacks up against the Valkyrie on both road and track will determine if it is a success or an overly complex misfire.

Summary

While almost all of the above hypercars are highly desirable in their own right, the laws of supply and demand don’t change. Almost all of these cars are chasing the same group of buyers. Even if you take affordability out of the equation, how many of these buyers will want to be adding multiple $1-3 million cars to their collections every year? The answer to that question along with how many buyers are still comfortable buying a $1 million plus a car that might not hold value, will determine just how this market plays out. If history is a guide, it could get ugly.

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McLaren 650S Spider: 4 Years as my Daily Driver

McLaren 650S Spider

McLaren 650S Spider: 4 Years as my Daily Driver

It has now been over four years since the McLaren 650S Spider became my daily driver. It gets used every day regardless of the weather. It’s spent plenty of time in the boiling Texas summer sun, been driven through light snow, handled ice, and survived plenty of thunderstorms without ever putting a foot wrong. For the majority of its life it’s been subject to short drives, lots of traffic and some pretty crappy roads. It’s really only this year that the 650S Spider had a chance to really stretch its legs on some longer drives, including the recent trip from Texas to Massachusetts.

There is a perception in some corners that supercars are fragile machines that need special pampering constantly to stay in good condition.  This is anything but the case with the 650S Spider.  In our four plus years together, it gets valeted once a year, washed on a semi regular basis, and the interior is vacuumed out about every 6-8 weeks.  This is no different from how the Porsche Cayenne S or Mercedes ML550 get treated. Despite the lack of being wrapped in cashmere every night after being feather dusted daily, the interior looks as good as it did the day I picked up the car at McLaren Dallas.  The paint work has also held up extremely well and a close inspection found only two very small stone chips on the front nose.  We opted not to have paint protection film applied when we purchased the 650S Spider and in this case, on a cost vs. benefit basis, I’m glad we didn’t.  The only other battle scar the 650S Spider has picked up is one lightly curbed wheel thanks to the lunar surface like roads of Dallas.  It was about $200 to repair.

In terms of my expectations for any daily driver; reliability is job #1. Here the McLaren 650S Spider has been perfect. It has never left me stranded and has been devoid of random warning lights that excel at driving blood pressure up unnecessarily. The only times it has seen the McLaren service center is for its four annual services. I’ve never had to add either oil or coolant between services but do check the levels on a semi regular basis. The wheels hold air pressure well and only need a small top up once a quarter. There have been a couple of recalls but all have been performed when the car was in for its annual service and none where for items I ever noticed. The only quirk I have run across is related to Iris, the infotainment system. It seems to have a massive distaste for large capacity Scandisk USB drives. If you insert a 64GB or large drive it crashes. Replace the USB drive with a smaller capacity one and Iris reverts to normal.

In terms of living with the 650S Spider on a day in day out basis, getting in and out of the car is a learned skill and easy once you have mastered it. The magical McLaren suspension soaks up imperfections in the road surface better than anything else in its class. Boot space is decent with room for at least a couple of duffle bags or a week’s worth of groceries.

The 650S Spider continues to show just how far supercars have come in terms of both reliability and usability. In the searing mid-summer Texas heat, the temperature gauge has never risen above normal. During the recent cross-country road trip we ran into a major traffic jam five hours into the drive. Despite going from hours of running at high speed to suddenly zero, the 650S Spider sat for over an hour far more calmly than the driver. The one surprising negative though has been the discovery on what happens when the car is left parked in the scorching sun for an extended period. The glue under the dash headliner vaporizes and leaves a nasty, very difficult to remove, film on the windscreen.
Overall though, the McLaren 650S Spider continues to be the best daily driver, and not just best supercar daily driver, I have ever had. The currently plan is to at least continue using it in this capacity for at least the next several years. In terms of both comfort and reliability, it has been outstanding.

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Supercar Market Update – Q3 2019

viewonthecarmarket

Supercar Market Update – Q3 2019

Following up on the article on the car market in Q2 (Car Market Q2), I’ve continued to follow the Ferrari F355, Ferrari 365GTB/4 Daytona, and the Porsche Carrera GT, as I believe they are good bellwethers for the market in general.  I also tend to take a look on occasion at Koenigseggs and the Special Series Ferraris out of personal curiosity.  It’s wasn’t too long ago the F355 Spiders were regularly selling in the $90-100k range and market experts were predicting Daytona would be $1 mil cars shortly.  The one car that hasn’t retreated in value is the Carrera GT.  CGTs have been rock solid at $700k for the past year.  A car is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it and certainly if you look at the results of the multiple auctions in Monterey, all but the rarest and best are retreating back to reality.

A few recent results of interest are:

82k- Mile 1972 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona, Not Sold at High Bid $461k

53k- Mile 1972 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona, Not Sold at High Bid $530k

NA- Mile 1970 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona, Sold $533k

78k- Mile 1971 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona, Not Sold at High Bid $430k

5k- Mile  2005 Porsche Carrera GT, Sold $720k

4k- Mile  2005 Porsche Carrera GT, Sold $758k

18k-Mile 1996 Ferrari          F355 Spider 6-Speed, Sold $63k 

42k-Mile 1997 Ferrari F355 Spider 6-Speed, Sold $56,000

1k – KM  2015 Koenigsegg One:1, Sold $4,641k

1k – KM 2015 Ferrari LaFerrari Sold $2,204k

500 Mile 2014 Ferrari LaFerrari, Not Sold at a High Bid $2,400k

I believe the market is in a place where the speculators are now all long gone, and a generational shift is starting to really impact values.  The bloom is now definitely now off the last generation of limited edition hypercars (No Longer the New New Thing) .  The days of the $ 4 million LaFerrari and $2 McLaren P1 are long gone.  The people buying the cars today are collectors and enthusiasts.  The collectors only want the best examples and the enthusiasts want cars they can actually use, enjoy, and afford to keep on the road.  For this second group maintenance and running costs do matter.  A $8-10k cambelt change on a Ferrari Testorossa is a significant expense and has a real impact on values.  Time is also playing a role as many of the buyers today are younger.  Anyone can drive a Ferrari Enzo but the number who can drive a F40 without putting it backwards through a hedge, is significantly less.  These are the forces which are driving the market now.

When looking at the each of these cars, I do believe different factors are driving the values in each case.  Not too long ago a lot of speculators scooped up Daytona’s expecting them to be the next $ 1million Ferrari.  When that didn’t happen, a lot of these cars started reappearing on the market.  Sellers outnumbered buyers and prices started dropping.  The number of Daytona “no sales” at auctions over the last several years is exceptional high.  For today’s coming of age enthusiast, the Daytona was your grandfather’s Ferrari and hence has little appeal.  Throw in the fact that they are not easy cars to drive ( Driving a Daytona ), expensive to maintain, were produced in relatively high numbers and the future looks even dimmer than the present in-terms of values.  About two years ago I expected Daytonas to retreat back from $700k cars to $500k, now it looks like a $400k or less Daytona is not too far off in the future.  In the case of the Daytona, if you do yearn for one, it has, and will still, pay to wait.

Much to my chagrin as the Carrera GT has been high on my bucket list for several years now (Garage Goals), Carrera GT values are holding steady.  Many of the same factors that have been driving Daytona prices south, have been supporting Carrera GT values.  CGTs are the cars that the new generation of buyers grew up with on their wall.  In addition, new tire technology has made CGTs significantly more drivable.  CGTs are still quick by today’s standards and with new Michelin Pilot Super Sport tires, a track outing is now far less likely to be a terminal experience.  Owners do use there CGTs and they are a common sight at any major car show.  In many ways if the Daytona was the cool icon of the 60’s in the 80’s & 90’s the CGT fills that same role today. 

I believe the Ferrari F355 is today’s “starter” Ferrari (SSO’s Ferrari History ). With prices now holding very steady in the $50-60k range, the F355 is affordable (by Ferrari standards) and its modern enough so the learning curve is short.  For the generation that grew up not knowing what that strange third pedal next to the brake is, this was also the first regular production Ferrari to come with a paddle shift gear box as an option.  The F355 is an infinitely usable car with enough luggage room for a multiday trip which certainly aids in its appeal.  It doesn’t hurt that the F355 is one of the prettiest Ferraris to ever emerge from Pininfarina’s pen.  Ferrari build three different versions of the F355, a coupe (GTB), targa, (GTS), and Spider.  I personally think the Spider is the best looking of the three, but the roof mechanism is fairly demonic.  Given Ferrari built over 10,000 F355s there are always plenty for sale and a strong support community of owners.  F355 prices will always be held down by very high maintenance costs.  The every four year cambelt change is an engine out exercise, and the F355 has a host of known issues that are not inexpensive to address.  My guess is F355s are now well priced and will hold at current values.

Koenigseggs have operated in a very different value universe for multiple years now.  In less than a decade Koenigseggs have gone from little known to quite famous.  Prices on their new cars have risen astronomically and they have developed quite a following.  I’ve seen a number of used Koenigseggs move from dealer to dealer with ever inflating prices so what they are really worth to a buyer who actually is interested in owning and driving one, is hard to tell.  Two Koenigseggs have come up for auction this year, a CCX was a no sale at $875k, and a One:1 just sold for $4.6 million at a Bonhams auction in Switzerland.  What’s really interesting on the Koenigsegg One:1 was the fuss around the original estimate of $1.8-2.4 million.  When Koenigsegg found out about the estimate they had a small conniption (Koenigsegg Blog Post on Bonhams Estimates).  Auction houses get paid on a percentage of the hammer price so grossly undervaluing a car is just not in their interest.  What was clearly of keen interest though was for Koenigesgg to make sure the car sold for a significantly higher number, otherwise its whole pricing strategy would be at risk.  Not surprising, this is exactly what happened.  It would be very interesting to see where this car turns up in about 6 months.  

In summary, the Porsche Carrera GT has held very steady over the last 3 years and will likely continue to do so.  Both the Ferrari 365 GTB/4 “Daytona” and the F355 rode the market up in 2013-2016 and while the F355 has settled, the Daytona will likely still fall further.  Koenigseggs prices remain as opaque as ever and that’s not likely to change soon.

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