On the morning of January 9, 2024, Scuderia Glickenhaus CEO Jesse Glickenhaus drove a SCG 004CS from Connecticut to Montreal. Jesse left Connecticut at 3:30AM in the morning and drove the 330 miles straight through to the PMG labs outside of Montreal. Doing this in the middle of winter, in a prototype, is a great demonstration of confidence in the car SCG is building. The 004CS was dropped off at PMG for its final set of non-destructive Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards Tests. This is a huge milestone in the SCG 004's development as it signals that they are just about ready to begin production of the first customer (Founders) cars.

Background

Following a similar philosophy to Ferrari in the early days, Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus is a racing team that both designs and builds their own race cars. SCG then adapts these race cars for the road and sells them to customers to help fund its racing activities. In only its 2nd try, in June 2022, the SCG 007 finished on the podium at Le Mans. In 2023, in a much larger and more highly competitive Hypercar class, the SCG 007 came in 6th & 7th (ahead of both Peugeot and Porsche). To say this is an impressive achievement is a huge understatement. In late 2023, Glickenhaus announced they would not be returning to the World Endurance Championship/Le Mans in 2024. The decision was based on the fact that having established their racing credentials, it no longer made sense for SCG to compete in WEC as the priority for the company was now shifting to focus on making road-going vehicles, including the 004 sportscar based on its Nurburgring 24 Hours racer.

Development Update

In terms of the SCG 004, they have developed two versions for the road, the base 004S (004S Test Drive Report) and the more track oriented 004CS. The SCG 004 has now passed all the most challenging US Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards required including front, rear, side, and roof crush tests, as well as fuel roll over tests. It is is the first modern car to pass some of these mandated FMVSS crash tests such as the side movable deformable barrier test without airbags, which speaks volumes in terms of the design, engineering, and quality of the carbon fiber tub. The SCG 004S will be the first 3 seater, central driving position, fully homologated, supercar sold in the US market.

With SCG's focus now on building the SCG 004 road cars, there has been a plethora of activity in the last several months. SCG is now working with Roush in Detroit for this validation program, leveraging Roush's experience running validation for major manufacturers. There are now three prototypes undergoing various validation tests including a recently completed track durability test in Texas along with heat & fuel testing in Arizona. An SCG 004S is also undergoing road load data testing in Michigan where it has been spotted numerous times running about on special data collection hubs. Once the load data collection process is complete, this prototype will go on the shake rig where it will be subjected to 100k miles of driving forces. SCG is taking lessons learned during this validation to further improve the engineering. During a 24 hour hot wind tunnel test SCG ran the car through repeated wide open throttle (WOT) events, as well as city driving cycles with ambient temperatures ranging from 100-110 degrees F. SCG is using the data and lessons from this test to improve the cooling in the engine bay, and will conduct two additional wind tunnel tests in February and March to confirm the increased cooling solves these worst case scenario driving condition concerns. During the Arizona hot weather refueling there were certain conditions and gas stations where the fuel tank did not want to fill at full speed. SCG is working with Roush on modifications to the fuel system lines and internal tank to solve this problem. After 6 weeks of engineering improvements, SCG and Roush will re-test the fuel tank design to make sure it is safer and fills better than the current design. Other recent developments include upgrades to the interior with a focus on delivering "old school" elegance. SCG switched from a high quality Italian leather supplier to the Italian supplier for most of the world's most elegant luxurious cars.

As SCG finishes up the remaining FMVSS testing (ie windshield wiper testing, windshield defrosting), it is going through the process of answering the question, "When are we ready to begin production for customer vehicles." The process of answering this question will be the subject of an upcoming next Question & Answer session with the Glickenhaus Team.

Once SCG answers this question, it will be moving into production for the Founders cars, with an eye to continue additional production of the SCG 004s in 2025.