Marcos                 

Frank Costin was the founder of this car and others.

Frank Costin applied the skills gained in the field of aviation to create a lightweight wood laminate monocoque body and chassis unit. It was this remarkable chassis combined with excellent streamlining that delivered such incredible performance in its day.

The Marcos marque secured its credibility in the racing world when driven to victory by renowned drivers such as Jackie Stewart, Derek Bell, Jackie Oliver, Jonathon Palmer and, of course, Jem Marsh.

In 1961 the Adams brothers, Dennis and Peter, undertook the task of furthering the brilliant design of Costin. In order to simplify the building processes the brothers designed, purely as a temporary solution, the Marcos 1800. This elegant wooden chassis car was wonderfully received at the Motor show in 1961 and remains to this day the inspiration for the modern Marcos. Following this piece of inspired engineering by the Adams’ the tremendously successful fibre glass bodied Mini Marcos was unveiled in 1966, being the only British car to complete the Le Mans 24-hour race in the same year. The track success of Marcos was confirmed.

With all the build of all models relying on the time intensive wooden chassis, in 1969 the Adams brothers were commissioned to design a steel alternative. Their design was essentially a square section tubular space frame that cut 15 hours from the manufacturing times of all the cars. Both the Ford and Volvo powered Marcos’ were resounding successes with the press. More recently a transition was made to the classic Rover V8 engine, which was utilised by the Mantula Spyder in 1986.

The Marcos Mantara, which was launched in 1993, fuelled further growth in the steadily expanding Marcos company. The Mantara, whilst retaining some of the traditional lines of the earlier Marcos cars, was designed to take advantage of the changes in UK type approval legislation, which permitted low volume production and sales through selected dealers.

Marcos returned to the racing circuit at the top, both initially with the LM500 and the following year with the LM600. Powered by a 6-litre Chevy small block V8 the latter of these was triumphant in the British GT series in 1995. It was this success that proved the incentive for Marcos to return to Le Mans after a break of over 30 years. The LM600 is today at the forefront of Worldwide premier GT racing.

The Mantis, incorporating a new Quad-cam V8 engine, was first shown at the 1996 International Motorshow. The staggeringly quick car was immediately seen to be an excellent ‘One Make’ Series racer and in 1998 the first ever Marcos mono-marque challenge was born. The unbounded success of this event in the UK has meant that we are now assessing other countries to host a similar Marcos challenge.

Marcos’ latest innovation the Mantaray, has been widely heralded as the most beautiful car ever produced by Marcos. It offers the rare combination of performance, reliability and refinement, a car truly borne from this heritage.

For 40 years Marcos cars have been built around the principals of excellence and exclusivity. These individual hand built cars are designed and manufactured to the highest standards and with the utmost care to ensure unrivalled quality and reliability.