Bruce McLaren’s championship winning car.T

This is the original team car that Bruce McLaren drove to the 1967 Can-Am championship.

In April, Robin Herd, an engineer from the sircraft industry, set out to build McLaren’s first monocoque Group 7 racer with draughtsman Gordon Coppuck. Using the same monocoque chassis technology as the M5A F1 car, they created the M6A, of wich only three were built. The M6A was formed from bonded and riveted magnesium and aluminum alloy paneling box structures, welded to square section steel tubes. Fuel was carried in threerubber pods, one at eitherside of the driver and one under his knees. The pods were linked by a series of one-way valves that allowed the fuel to flow around the system under acceleration. The 6 litre engine came from Chevrolet, which, with modification and the addition of fuel injection could produce 525 bhp at 7000 rpm. The front suspension is formed by outboard coil/damper units with lateral links top and bottom, located by trailing radius rods. In the rear the suspension is upper and lower wishbones with a twin radius rod system. The body is made of fiberglass paneling and the weight is distributed 40% front, 60% rear. Team McLaren had by now, started to produce their own wheels and teh M6A ran on 15 inch diameter cast magnesium wheels, 8.5 inch wide at the fornt and 13.5 inch wide at the back. Team McLaren had magnificently fulfilled their their brief, the car they created was simple and uncomplicated, proving easy to maintain and run.

During the designing stage, special attention was paid to the cars aerodynamocs, a pretty new concept at the time. To increase downforce, the M6A was wedge shaped at the front and testing was carried out in a full size wind tunnel to perfect design. To balance the front end downforce many aerodynamic attachments were tested on the tail, but none seemed to help with the lap times so the only addition was a small molded-in rear spoiler. The most famous and most conspicuous change from any previous McLaren was the orange paint which would become the McLaren trademark color.

Most importantly, the first car, the M6A-1 was ready for testing at Goodwood on June 19, 1967, more than two and a half months before the start of the season. The car went from paper to prototype in eleven weeks; this led to an on track development program which enabled the cars to be finally tuned. The plan was to do at least 2,000 practice miles before the start of the season in order to highlight any faults. All the practice and fine tuning paid off and the M6A is one of the finest handling cars and hsa the best success rate in the history of Can-Am. With the car that is now in the Mathews Collection, Bruce McLaren had finally gotten the championship winner he wanted.

The M6A in the Mathews Collection is one of the most historic and important McLaren cars ever. It gave Bruce his first ever Can-Am Championship and began Team McLaren’s almost complete domination of Can-Am for the next five years. Harry drives his M6A once a year at the Can-Am reunion at Road America.

In 2000, the M6A featured alongside the Mathews’ M1A at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, the premiere historic and vintage event of the year in the world. The Mathews Colection was honored to be invited to take two McLarens to the festival to honor Bruce’s achievements before his death on the course, thirty years previous. All the spectators loved seeing Harry at the wheel of the M6A driving at a place that was so close to the heart of Bruce McLaren.