There are some people who like cars, and then there are some people who like cars and also have millions of dollars to throw around like toilet paper. James Glickenhaus is of the latter type.
The man made his fortune directing and producing B-level action and horror flicks throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s. If you’ve ever seen The Protector starring a very young Jackie Chan, or the 1991 classic McBain—which was inspired by a long-running gag on The Simpsons—then you’ve seen Glickenhaus’s handiwork.
Apparently, there’s a lot of money to be had in making bad action films since James struck it rich and then used his vast wealth to add to his burgeoning car collection. His garage contains such priceless artifacts as a 1967 Ferrari Dino Competizione, a 1967 Ford Mark IV J6, and a 1988 Ferrari 208 GTB Turbo.
But eventually, merely buying classic cars just wasn’t enough. Anyone can buy a car, no matter how old or expensive. But what if you could make a car?
First, Glickenhaus contacted Italian design house Pininfarina to design a one-off supercar and then got Ferrari to actually build it. That was called the Ferrari P4/5, and while the 660 hp, $4 million car would certainly be enough for some, it still wasn’t enough for Glickenhaus.
0 to 60: 2.9 seconds
Horsepower: 750 hp
Range: Unknown
Top Speed: 217+ mph
Quarter mile: Unknown
Braking 60 mph to 0: Unknown
So he founded his own company and tasked it with making the world’s greatest hypercar. The company was called Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus LLC. The car was called the SCG 003.
The first 003 was the C, or "Competizione" variant. Unveiled in 2015, it was meant to dominate the track. And it was very good at it. The SCG003C won the 24 Hours of Nürburgring endurance race the very same year it debuted.
While the SCG003C was certainly fast, it was not road-legal. It also was limited to WEC rules and regulations limiting its potential. Glickenhaus wanted an unlimited hypercar, one that was the ultimate expression of speed and power. For that, he built the SCG003S.
S, in this case, stands for “Stradale”, which is Italian for “road going”. Not exactly an imaginative title, but it’s certainly descriptive.
At its heart is a BMW-sourced 4.4-L reverse flow twin-turbo V8 taken from the M6 racing car. The SCG003S was originally supposed to have a 5.0-L V8 developed in-house, but that proved to be taking too long to develop. Glickenhaus is 68, so you can forgive his impatience.
Power is rated at 750 hp and 590 lb-ft of torque shunted to the rear wheels through a 7-speed sequential gearbox (the dual-clutch was considered a little too heavy). Zero to sixty is done in less than three seconds on its way to a top speed of 217 mph.
Those are certainly good numbers, but there are faster cars. Where the SCG003S really shines is in the corners. The car can pull 2 full lateral g’s in a turn, which is something very few cars are capable of.
That extreme performance is due to some incredible lightness and incredible downforce. The entire car weighs only 2,866 lbs thanks to a carbon fiber chassis, body, and most everything else. All the insane vents and grooves down the bodywork help direct air around the car and provide incredible downforce: 1,543 lbs at only 155 mph.
Bilstein adjustable dampers combine with Brembo carbon ceramic brakes as well as front and rear double wishbone suspension to give the car racing-level performance but luxury car-levels of comfort.
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Although there is no trunk, the SCG003S isn’t entirely without practicality in mind. On the roof are a pair of portholes so that the driver can easily peer up at traffic lights. There’s a skid plate beneath the front carbon fiber spoiler that’s made of a special resin-infused wood. If the car bottoms out it will hit the cheap wooden plate instead of the expensive carbon fiber, helping to reduce wear and tear.
The exhaust is made entirely out of titanium not just for lightness but to prevent expansion of the metals. There is also a titanium plate where the exhausts dump hot gasses onto the wing because the Scuderia engineers found the spot would otherwise melt during sustained driving.
Hypercars can usually have an interior that goes one of two ways: either it’s entirely spartan, or garishly luxurious. The SCG003S manages to strike a fine balance between the two. The central dash and console is made out of carbon fiber but upholstered with leather. The instrument cluster is a 12-inch LCD panel with two smaller panels on either side. There are a number of cameras strewn about the car that will display various views on these side panels.
Although the car has side mirrors, they’re mostly to ensure the SCG003S is road-legal. They do more to assist the aerodynamics of the car than actually show what’s behind or to the side of you. For that, you’d use the racing-style camera system.
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On the center console are a series of knobs that are designed to mimic what you’d find in an LMP1 race car. They control the air conditioning and not oil temperature, but they’re a nice touch. You’re not going to get true climate-control, but a performance-focused hypercar that has air conditioning at all is a luxurious find indeed.
We don’t know how many SCG003S will be made, but we know the company has been approved by the NHTSA to make up to 325 of them per year if they so choose. Full production is set to begin in 2019. Sticker price is $2.2 million, which sounds like a lot, but considering it’s competing against $2.5 million Koenigseggs and $2.8 million Bugattis, the SCG003S is practically a steal.
The only problem with the SCG003S is that we haven’t seen it in action. It’s been on display at almost every car show in the country, but we have yet to see it do a lap at the Virginia Raceway or even see it perform a burnout in a parking lot. Until we see how the SCG003S truly stacks up, it’s hard to recommend.
But if you’re like Glickenhaus and you’ve got $2.2 million burning a while in your pocket, the SCG003S might give you your hypercar fix. At least for a little while, anyway.
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