Features
Deceived by flight
Great seats too - thickly padded, surprisingly supportive, borderline armchairs really. The wind tunnel may have had a less beneficent hand in the cabin layout. Perhaps Bristol's people left all the switchgear in a large box by one of the gull-wing doors, turned on the big fan, then hired Heath Robinson as a consultant.
The major dials are legible enough, and there's plenty of them (including an amusing 'engine hours' meter), but it has all the visual appeal of an electricity sub-station.
Again, there's an aviation theme, with some minor controls arranged in a binnacle above your head in the real estate between the gull-wing doors. Bits of the switchgear are Jurassic-era Ford Granada, and there are exposed screw heads on the centre console.
Apparently the aluminium ventilation knobs are military-spec and cost £60 a pop, but they look a bit rum too. The heater unit is bespoke, and so compact that it allowed the car to be three inches narrower. This is a very Bristol fact.
'It feels good, but only a fool would take liberties with anything as powerful as this'
Completed customers' cars - chassis number 41 is currently under construction at Bristol's Filton factory, with full build taking four months - are apparently much better finished than the rather weary-looking car we drove, but the Fighter still falls some way short of being a British Pagani Zonda.
It starts on a key (for once, a starter button would have been appropriate, but never mind). The V10 settles immediately into an almost subterranean idle; blip the aluminium throttle pedal, and savour the torque reversal as all that grunt - 350lb ft at tick-over - has the Fighter shimmying on its springs.
It feels good, but only a fool would take liberties with anything as powerful as this. Never mind that the Fighter's hand-made provenance and cost is promoting an extra degree of circumspection. In other words, I've got the collywobbles. For the first time in years, I'm in charge of a genuinely unknown quantity. Actually, there is one known quantity - 550bhp.
Somewhat surprisingly, it turns out to be a doddle. Anyone who's been reared on a diet of Impreza or Lancer Evo or even hot Clio will feel as though they've fallen through a hole in the space-time continuum, but in a good way. There are no airbags or anti-lock brakes, and the steering wheel - similar in design to older Bristols', though with modish carbon-fibre inserts - has something of a ship's tiller about it.
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