Czinger may have only been around for a short time, having shown its tandem-seat hypercar for the first time in 2020, but what it lacks in longevity it makes up for with pretty much everything else. Founders and father-and-son team Kevin and Lukas Czinger set out with the ambition to break every performance record going, and smashed the Laguna Seca lap time for road-going cars by two seconds to make the point. It lapped the California circuit in 1 minute 27.62 seconds, toppling the McLaren Senna in the process.
The Czinger 21C just got even faster
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Now the original 21C has been joined by the 21C V Max, a smoothed off and elongated version of the car that sets out to for high top speed rather than out and out lap times. If anything, the deletion of diveplanes and other aerodynamic additions makes the unconventional styling all the more dramatic, the fighter plane-like cockpit and long butterfly wing doors coming to the fore.
The full production run of 21Cs will still be limited to 80 cars in total, with customers choosing between the two variants. The top speed rises from the original car’s 205mph to 253mph. The 0-62mph sprint takes less than two seconds in either variant.
Behind the inline occupants is situated a 2.9-litre twin-turbocharged V8 engine that was developed in-house by Czinger. It revs to a stratospheric 11,000rpm and produces 949PS (698kW), making it the most power dense road-going engine of all time. It supplemented by two electric motors that contribute 300PS (220kW), bringing the total to 1,249PS (918kW). Thanks to the 21C’s aluminium and carbon-fibre construction, it tips the scales at just 1,250kg.
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While the 21C’s performance credentials speak for themselves, the Los Angeles maker is actually using it to showcase new design and manufacturing processes. Many of the components that make up the 21C are 3D printed, using technology created by Divergent 3D, the company Kevin Czinger set up in 2015 (and which owns 70 per cent of the car maker). In fact, it was Divergent that released the tandem-seat Blade, effectively the 21C’s predecessor.
The manufacturing software architecture is created in-house and the process collapses the supply chain and eradicates material wastage. What’s more, alterations to the product design don’t necessitate changes to manufacturing hardware. If Czinger has its way, this is how all cars will be made in the future.
The 21C, then, is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the innovation and technology that has gone into its creation. As calling cards go, it’s a pretty memorable one.
Photography by Joe Harding.
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