Feel the wind in your moustache with the 608bhp V12 GMA T.33 Spider

Think ‘convertibles’ and Gordon Murray is hardly going to be the first name that pops into your head. Convertibles tend to be heavier, less rigid and worse off aerodynamically than a hard-top car. And if you know anything about the sorts of cars that Gordon Murray designs, those aren’t just trifling niggles. They’re hate crimes. 

And yet, here it is. The first Gordon Murray Automotive roadster: the new T.33 Spider. Anyone for a 608bhp Cosworth V12 and no pesky ceiling muffling the 11,100rpm engine note?

Thought so. The roof, since you ask, is a two-piece jigsaw which can be stowed in the nose. The panels weigh about as much as a coaster and because there’s no folding mechanism to package, the Spider only weighs 18kg more than the coupe, at 1,108kg. Gordon says the difference is so minimal the company isn’t even going to retune the suspension set-up like most cabrios do. So, the Spider should drive exactly as the hard-top does. 

Only, you’ll be going gloriously deaf. There are one or two concessions to supercar sense of occasion: the rear window can be lowered electrically to let V12 noise pour into the cockpit, and apparently there’s a palette of paintwork colours inspired by Gordon’s love of tropical shirts. We’re not making this up.

Where the car does come over all serious is the new rear bodywork. No window to view that shrieking V12 through seems a pity, right? Murray says this was done to save weight, and for heat management. But you can still point out the ram-air intake snorkel fixed directly to the powerplant for a party trick: it’ll shudder when the throttle is blipped.

The T.33 Spider is of course the second T.33 model announced after the hard-top coupe back in 2021, so lots of the stats and facts are familiar. The bespoke naturally aspirated 3.9-litre drives the rear wheels. Only 100 examples will be built. There are two seats inside (choose either left- or right-hand drive) and thanks to a luggage compartment in the nose and two lockers ahead of the rear wheels concealed by beautiful rear-hinged blades, there’s a total of 295 litres of luggage capacity. That’s about a third more than you get from, say, a Ferrari 296 Spider. But you’d expect that, given this costs about six times as much…

But not everything mechanical is a carryover. You might remember that for the more everyday useable T.33, Gordon announced the company would offer a paddleshift gearbox as an option. And of the 100 people who got to buy a T.33, would you like to guess how many didn’t spec the six-speed manual? Erm, four. 

As a result the sequential flappy-paddle auto has been shelved, and all T.33s – coupe or Spider – will now have the six-speed, three-pedal set-up with an optional overdrive sixth gear which increases maximum fuel range from 400 to 440 miles. 

Brakes are carbon ceramic – Gordon says if anything they’re overkill for the car’s low weight, but the smallest ones the supplier offers. The T.33's clever active aerodynamics have been reworked (most of the air management happens underneath but there’s an active spoiler at the back). And yes, there’s Apple CarPlay and Android Auto built into the digital infotainment cluster, but not a touchscreen in sight.

Gordon tells TopGear.com he’s had the idea for the T.33 in his head for over a quarter of a century, but it’ll wait a little while longer until the customer cars arrives. The Spider’s in the GMA build queue, which is currently constructing the first customer T.50 fancars after some supply chain delays. 

Once those are finished attention switches to the T.50S track car, while the company is also hard at work on a new Surrey-based production and R&D facility, which is where the T.33 models will come to life. Get ready to enjoy the feeling of the wind rushing through your moustache.