Ariel’s skeletonized version of a mid-engine two-seater—no roof, no doors, helmet optional—delivers the awesome sensation of flying at zero altitude, says Dan Neil.
WHAT URGE MAKES middle-aged men want to slip the surly bonds of inertia in ever more minimalist machinery? I’m asking for a friend. The Ariel Atom 4—a skeletonized version of a mid-engine two-seater ($87,910, as tested)—belongs to a class of barely-there G-force generators that also includes sailplanes, parasails, ultra-lights, hang-gliders and hot-air balloons. You can’t tell me that’s not symbolic.
Why just men? No one can say. When I asked Mark Swain, president of TMI AutoTech, which builds the Ariel in Virginia under license from the UK-based founders, he only noted the clientele were “almost entirely male,” which made me giggle, but I took his point. The shop in Virginia is tooled up to make 50-70 Ariel Atom 4s per year, said Mr. Swain.
The machinery seems to vanish, leaving just the unscrolling of the road.
Introduced in 2000, the Atom became famous in a 2004 episode of Top Gear in which host Jeremy Clarkson’s face flaps in the wind like Air Force Colonel John Stapp’s on the rocket sled. Now that was good television. It also nicely illustrated the Atom’s unique transparency to the elements at speed.
No top, ever. There are two frameless windshields available, small and smaller. The reinforced-plastic seat is bolted to the floor. Looking over the Alcantara-wrapped steering wheel, the TFT display, and the cockpit switches, the driver sees, well, almost nothing—or everything, depending on one’s phenomenological status.
Pilot Lights | The driver’s environment centers on a multi-function thin-film-transistor instrument display. The turn-signal toggle switch is not self-canceling.
Holding up the car’s slender nose, the pushrod/inboard-coilover suspension and double wishbones do their kinematic thing practically at arm’s reach. Dancing at their ends are the hubs, wheels and wide tires, wearing small skull caps of fiberglass: The fenders.
These sight lines are fundamental to the Ariel’s magic. At times the machinery seems to vanish below the experiential horizon, leaving just the driver, the sound, and moment-by-moment unscrolling of the road. This is the view of an angel flying at zero altitude just before he gets thrown in jail in Virginia.
The Ariel’s other secret is no secret. Anyone who has driven an open-wheel car knows how awesome, how empowering, how liberating it is to be able to see through the corners, over the squirming and squawking tires. It’s just science.
Outside of the Ariel, about the only way to scratch that itch is a single-seat race car, like Formula Ford. But that means hanging around in the paddock with people half your weight and a third your age. Besides, no other car has that gorgeous trellis of tubular steel through which the rushing tarmac and terrain can be seen, like, right there.
Another of the Ariel’s talking points is that—unlike motorcycles or even three-wheelers such as the Polaris Slingshot—it is exempt from state laws requiring helmets. That’s huge in terms of owners’ convenience, although it won’t do much for their hearing.
Business End | The air scoop leads to a Honda-built turbo-four (up to 350 hp) that exhausts through the dual-port “silencer.” The Ariel is not equipped with a catalytic converter.
Speaking of helmets: Only a fraction of Ariel owners ever drive their cars on a racetrack, according to Mr. Swain. That’s surprising. With respect, why would anyone buy this ass-hammering mosquito and not track it, like, every weekend?
Last week, as part of its media day, the company belted me into the re-engineered Atom 4 to drive a few laps around Virginia International Raceway’s 1.1-mile Patriot Course. It was special. It might have been more special if I hadn’t had a 200-pound factory representative in the right seat, or if the car’s optional three-stage engine mapping (turbo boost) and seven-stage traction control had not both been set to “Assisted Living.”
I didn’t take it personally. Even a dialed-back and ballasted Atom 4 demands respect. Mounted just ahead of the rear axle and seemingly bolted to one’s vertebrae, the exquisite 2.0-liter Honda turbo-four puts out up to 350 hp at 7,000 rpm and 310 lb-ft, channeled through a six-speed manual gearbox. These ponies are pitted against a mass of only 1,350 pounds, giving the Atom 4 roughly the power-to-weight ratio of a McLaren F1.
Point this little erector set straight, unload the clutch pedal in 2nd gear, and hang on. The Atom 4 will clap you between the shoulders, swirl your eyeballs and smother your reason with the shrill shimmer of turbosuck and a bypass valve that sounds like your right ear is being blown out of an airlock—bu-WHISHHH!
Under ideal conditions, and with adroit shifting, the Atom 4 can hyperventilate its way to 100 mph in 6.8 seconds on its way to a top speed of 162 mph.
Some glad morning, if I win the lotto, I’ll fly away.
-Dan Neil, Wall Street Journal, Automotive Editor