Are you suffering from luxury sports car fatigue? Do you find yourself unenthused by the likes of the McLaren Artura and giving up on keeping track of all eleventeen billion variants of Porsche 911? Do you find yourself pining for something a little more soulful with more of a human touch? Good news, the sort of car you’re looking for has arrived. This is the Morgan Supersport 400, and it’s shaping up to be an absolute weapon.
If you’re familiar with Morgan, you’ll know that the Malvern-based marque is renowned and revered for building sports cars the old-fashioned way. Small-batch, by hand, with great care. While the days of ladder frames are gone, aluminum panels are still beaten by master craftspeople, and Morgan’s actually skipped steel monocoques in favor of bonded aluminum chassis construction. Given how light and stiff the latest architecture promises to be, it was only a matter of time before Morgan turned up the wick on its hottest model.
Like the regular Morgan Supersport, the 400 makes use of BMW’s excellent three-liter turbocharged B58 straight-six. It’s a smooth, torquey motor with plenty of juice still to squeeze beyond its baseline rating of 335 horsepower. As you’ve probably guessed, the “400” in the name of this model signifies the 402 horsepower Morgan’s squeezed out of this sweet engine while still remaining emissions compliant. There’s something pleasing about slightly overdelivering.
While the only gearbox on offer is a ZF 8HP eight-speed automatic, it’s important to keep in mind that the Morgan Supersport 400 weighs just 2,579 pounds. That’s properly light for anything with a long straight-six up front, and the combination of the power, weight, and gearbox result in a claimed zero-to-62 mph time of 3.6 seconds. Spicy stuff.
Of course, more power requires more control, so adjustable Nitron dampers come standard on every Supersport 400. If you aren’t familiar with Nitron, you’re going to want them on your project car after this. It’s one of Britain’s leading motorsports damper manufacturers that also happens to develop, tune and manufacture taut yet compliant setups for road cars. Fully serviceable with huge attention paid to corrosion resistance, they’re exactly the sort of dampers you’d want on a 402-horsepower sports car. Revised suspension geometry complements the dampers, you can option a limited-slip differential, and the whole thing rolls on Michelin Pilot Sport 5 tires.
Of equal importance, the Morgan Supersport 400 just looks so cool. The five-spoke wheels are restomod-perfect, the Caerbont dials seem rather purposeful, and I love the rectangular accents on the valences. Morgan’s also tweaked the venting and the lower bodywork, and it all just works together.
Of course, the Morgan Supersport 400 doesn’t come cheap. It’s priced from £112,965, which is about $152,600 at current conversion rates. At the same time, it isn’t bad value when compared to a Porsche 911 Carrera S, and it’s certainly more of a conversation-starter than your typical entry-level supercars. If you live in a market that’s getting it and want one, best get your orders in soon. Production kicks off in May, which means some lucky owners might be able to take delivery before summer.
Top graphic image: Morgan
Is that the real gear selector in the photo? How did Morgan – with their very limited funding – change the gear selector from BMW’s to a unique one even though Morgan using the BMW drivetrain? Ineos couldn’t change the gear selector and Ineos has deep pockets. Remember, there’s a lot of the computer controls and the manual lockout for the ZF transmission inside the BMW gear selector.
The ZF 8HP is an amazing transmission. It does its thing well no matter if it’s slushing through traffic or banging off redline shifts. ZF and BMW nailed it. It’s going to lead an easy life even with 400 hp on tap. That Morgan doesn’t weigh two tons like most vehicles the 8HP is used in. With that transmission handling shifting duties, my attention can be on proper hooliganism while keeping an eye out for the rozzers.
This one’s better than most, but the retro-contemporary design thing always looks kinda cartoonish to me. Literally, like it’s a car you’d see in an animated adventure show. It seems very hard to get it right.
Thinking about it, I hate to say it, but the PT Cruiser is perhaps one of the best examples of how to actually pull it off well.
This is incredibly stupid and I have the utmost respect for anyone who spends their $150,000 on one. I’m sure Morgan ownership is an absolute nightmare, and you’re going to draw a crowd everywhere you go in one of these…but I’ll be damned if it isn’t a whole hell of a lot more interesting than another grayscale 911
That’s not how it works in the Mustang world.
I love that color, and this interests me as a fun car that as you say truly will get looked at, but I don’t love the 3/4 view with that back window for some reason. It looks bulgy to me and reminds me of a Beetle but not in a good way. I’m going to go look at other pictures to see if it looks that way just in that photo.
I’m with you Thomas, I really dig the way they dialed this car back to more simpler surfacing. I’d love to see a version that does away with the “running board” element. I know that’s not quite in the Morgan form vocabulary, but I think it would look pretty cool.
I’m not a fan of the “edgy” modern touches Morgan seems to feel compelled to do these days – no bumper, gaping hole instead of a grille, the headlights that look like a kid tried to upgrade a hand-me-down ’85 Ranger with the cheapest LEDs at AutoZone
By making it look like something from 1938? Who desires that?
I DO like the colour though, reminds me of this one I had as a kid
Right? I’d love to afford a hand-built, powerful, blast-to-drive sports coupe but why make it look like this Dump Truck-assed pastiche of Cruella De Vil’s car?
I agree in part. This looks like any other Morgan, and while I understand that it may appeal to some, it is not my cup of tea.
Still desirable because it is different. Or better: eccentric.
But I would buy a Morgan, that would be a 3 wheeler. After they moved the engine inside the body it looks even better.
Yes, I’d love to test drive a Super 3 but my suspicion is: want!