RML SHORT WHEELBASE
TESTED 15.3.22, BEDFORDSHIRE ON SALE LATE 2022
Biggest car company you’ve never heard of pays tribute to an iconic 1960s Ferrari
TESTER’S NOTE
The SWB’s nose is much shorter than that of the Ferrari 550 Maranello donor car, so the airboxes that sit at the front of the engine bay have migrated further back, almost under the scuttle. RL
Unlike a modern supercar, the SWB allows itself some healthy lean
Cabin is beautiful fusion of old and new; hydraulic steering could do with a little more road feel
Some cars are so esoteric that it’s hard to know where to start, so I’ll just spit it out. The RML Short Wheelbase (SWB) is a V12-engined berlinetta heavily redolent of the 1961 Ferrari 250 GT SWB and built on the bones of a Ferrari 550Maranello, mostly using composites.
So it’s not really a restomod, like the Alfaholics GTA-R, because no 250-series Ferrari is involved. But neither is the carbonfibre bauble before you an entirely clean-sheet affair, like the Porsche 964-f lavoured Ruf SCR. RML’s work instead blends 1990s hardware (the driveline and suspension layout) with cuttingedge manufacturing techniques (the Wellingborough-based company’s raison d’être) to capture, in the words of CEO Michael Mallock, the “look, sound and tactility of an epic GT car from the golden age of motoring”.