Cachuma Lake: Santa Ynez, CA. Road Trip!

Saleen Autosport Factory Tour

Thanks to Laura's dads connections in the automotive business, we had the opportunity to tour the Saleen Autosport facility. For those not familiar with them, they are most famous for their 'zooped up' Mustang conversions. They also have a new 'super car', the S7. It was cool and rainy up in SB, so we thought it would be fun to check them out. We got an early start for the 2 hour trip from SB down to Irvine where they are located.


Here is the entrance into the shop. The 'Speed Lab', how cool is that? The amazing thing was, the place was so clean, you could eat off the floors. Let's take a look at what's behind the door.







Here is the 'tear down' area. Complete, fresh from the factory Mustang GT's are stripped of their engines, drivetrains, suspension, seats and lower body panels.







Now the cars get Saleen 750 hp supercharged engines, new transmission, custom wheels and rubber, Saleen suspension, new lower body panels, racing seats and other customizations!

Finally, the cars are cleaned up, numbered and gone over with a fine tooth comb by a geeky engineer (no offense to engineers, but this guy in the photo fits the stereotype!) They are road tested, checked again then delivered to the customer. Look at the shine on that floor!

Now, lets move on the S7 Supercar. They only build 2 of these things per month. Here is what the finished product looks like. The car is built completely by hand from the frame up. You can get it in a 750hp street legal model; or if that's not enough you can get an 850hp or 1,000 hp (how in hell do you push 1,000 hp out of an 8 cyl engine?) twin turbo, supercharged beast.










The engine, frame and body are all fabricated in seperate rooms. Here is the frame in the jig. It's made from 4130 chrome moly. The body, thats pure carbon fiber folks, sweet! The engine is just a beast. They didn't want me taking any pics in the engine room where they were doing the assembly, some propietary things going on in there!















Here are a couple of s7's in process. A very cool metallic yellow one, just finished, awaits its turn on the test track for its shakedown run (I'll volunteer for that!)

Ah, fits like a glove!

me: So, this is how much?

Marketing guy: (totally straight face) $600,000 plus options.

me: Sounds good, I think we'll make it his and hers, write em' up!

OK, so that's not really how the dialogue went. I think when the marketing guy saw the look on my face, he knew he wasn't selling an S7 today. I guess that made a test drive out of the question?!?!?!



They also do most of the Ford GT in Troy, MI; Then they ship them over to the Wixom Ford plant for engines and drivetrains. They also have this new sooper dooper f-150 they just started doing.

Overall, not a bad way the spend the day.

-Rich-