Brooke ‘Double R’ - supercharged and superlight

Brooke Cars will be launching a new flagship model dubbed the ‘Double R’ in Birmingham in the next couple of days. Don’t feel bad if you haven’t heard of Brooke before, as they’re a small-scale manufacturer specializing in superlight cars in a similar vein to Caterhams and Ariels.

The car is expected to weigh in at around 500 kilos and features a supercharged engine putting out around 300hp to give it a power to weight ration of 580bhp/tonne and a 0-60mph time of around three seconds. Maximum speed is around 165mph according to Brooke Cars. The engine is a custom built Ford Duratec, exclusively developed by Noble Motorsport for Brooke Cars.

The 2008 Brooke Double R also features a tubular spaceframe chassis made entirely from round tube. It comes fitted with roll bars as standard which are welded into the chassis, and also a foam filled fuel tank fitted with a rollover valve.

Recently a non-supercharged Brooke came second at Autocar’s 0-100-0 test, and managed to top the field in braking going from 100mph to 0 in just 3.98 seconds. A supercharged model is expected to perform even better in future tests.

The Double R will cost around £40,000 pounds but there are plans for entry level models featuring non-supercharged 2.0L engines for around £23,000 pounds, putting it smack into the territory of the established superlights such as Caterham.