New Zealand-based car design, building and testing firm Rodin Cars has unveiled its new-look facilities on the other side of the world, based at Donington Park in the UK.
The high-end facility features a 500 square meter showroom and a client networking facility. It’s predominantly been designed for buyers of Rodin’s incredible FZED track car and the brand’s future projects in the pipeline. FZED testing will still predominantly take place at the firm’s Kiwi facility near Kaikoura.
“While we are an New Zealand-based company, our plan has always been to establish an additional UK base,” says David Dicker, founder and CEO of Rodin Cars.
“We have big plans for the new space, with a desire to showcase not just our supercars, but also the state-of-the-art technology and engineering that is going into their manufacturing.”
The news comes a day after Liam Lawson’s Formula 2 challenger was unveiled, sporting a split livery between Red Bull and Rodin Cars. The paint-scheme is part of a heightened push in Europe for the brand, although it has also backed Lawson for several years.
The Rodin FZED boasts a 3.8-litre V8 sourced from Cosworth, developing 503kW of power and 490Nm of torque — peak power notably coming at a screaming 9600rpm. With the car tipping the scales at just 589kg, it sports a stunning power-to-weight ratio of 854kW per tonne.
As a result of all this, the FZED is capable of sprinting to 160km/h in just five seconds, on its way to a 300km/h top speed. Rodin Cars claims the kicker to its package is reliability; each car good for 5000km before requiring an engine tear-down.
While Rodin Cars notes testing will continue to be based in New Zealand, it still intends to take its FZED on track at Donington Park. In its release, it notes that the Donington lap record is still currently held by the late Ayrton Senna; a 1:18.029 set in 1993.
“One suspects that the Rodin FZED has a real chance to break that record,” the release says.