Roding Roadster 23 unveiled

Clearly, the limited edition (that’s 23 only, as the name suggests) Roding Roadster doesn’t conform to the uniformity of contemporary sports car styling, but rather, is a mid-engine sports car with a carbon-fibre chassis and a BMW in-line 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbocharged engine, developing 235kW of power at 5800rpm and 450Nm of torque from 1300 - 4500rpm.

While they’re not exactly supercar numbers, it all makes sense when you factor in the car’s 950-kilogram weight.

CarAdvice has obtained performance figures from a Roding insider that states the car will sprint from 0-100km/h in 3.9 seconds and has a top speed of 285km/h. Even in fifth gear, the car will accelerate from 80-120km/h in 4.0 seconds, signifying significant elasticity when it comes to performance.

It’s not only fast in a straight line, but lateral acceleration is off the clock with the car pulling 1.4g at 115km/h.

Power is transferred to the rear wheels via a six-speed manual transmission, with a limited slip differential and a 40 per cent lock-up effect using a TORSEN system.

Tyres are split sizes with 225/40 series up front and 255/35 series at the rear, riding on lightweight 18-inch alloy wheels. Roding Automobile GmbH also offers owners the option of Toyo Proxes R888 semi-slick tyres for specific track use.

The Roding Roadster uses an exotic fully independent suspension set up incorporating double A-arms (CNC milled), dampers with premium valve technology whereby rebound and compression rates can be adjusted by the driver, as can be the ground clearance, toe and camber and front and rear anti-roll bars.

Brakes are 4-pots up front on 328mm floating and grooved discs, while the rears are 2-pot on the same 328mm discs.

Standard kit onboard the roadster includes a two colour exterior in red and carbonfibre look for chassis, front and rear hood, doors and roof, two shell RODING roof system, two colour leather interior 9black and beige), lightweight Recaro racing seat with 4-point safety belt. Alpine multi-media system with 6.1-inch touch screen, race mode: sporty throttle pedal characteristics, off-throttle exhaust noise, GPS recorder with lap timer and stopwatch.

Despite its supercar performance the lightweight Roding Roadster has a combined fuel consumption of just 8.2L/100km.

The handmade Roding Roadster is an interesting package and one that’s been five years in the making. With only 23 examples of this car to ever be built, the bespoke car maker should have no problem finding homes for such a limited number.

However, there is talk of an electric version in development that will run a Siemens battery pack in conjunction with a petrol engine that produces a combined 238kW and science fiction-like 2497 Newton-metres of torque.