The Brabham BT62 won’t just be built in Adelaide, it will be based at Tailem Bend

ADELAIDE has emerged from the car manufacturing graveyard as the home base of a global name in motorsport niche manufacturing.

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THE production run is tiny and the showroom price a whopping $1.8 million, but South Australian car manufacturing was reborn at a glittering launch tonight in the CBD.

And the name Brabham, combined with The Bend Motorsport Park, has already garnered global industry media attention to make the BT62 the new supercar on the block for the rich and famous.

Fresh from final testing of the supercar at The Bend circuit, son of Australian motorsport royalty Sir Jack Brabham, David, launched the car at Electra House.

The Shahin family’s The Bend has won the right to be home to the 522kW (700 BHP) machine ahead of Victoria’s Philip Island circuit where it had also tested earlier this year.

The Brabham BT62 at The Bend. Picture: Supplied

Designed mainly in the UK, The Bend deal means Brabham Automotive will test and build the car in South Australia when it establishes a plant at Edinburgh Parks based on a chassis factory formerly producing Holden parts.

The first cars should be delivered to eager buyers by the end of the year.

“The Bend is a world-class circuit and a testament to the passion and hard work of Dr Sam Shahin and his team,’’ David Brabham said.

“The track gives the car and the driver a great work out and we look forward to working with The Bend team as our testing program continues.”

Also at the launch were backers of the car; Director of hi-tech engineering firm Fusion Capital and Brabham Automotive’s Commercial Director, Dan Marks, and owner of Precision Components Mat Finch.

The BT62 super car ,arriving at the Electra House bar. Picture: Tait Schmaal

The name Brabham is a globally recognised brand in motorsport, particularly because the patriarch of the Australian family Sir Jack Brabham remains, and possibly always will be, the only person to have designed and built his own Formula 1 championship-winning car in 1966.

The BT62 has direct lineage to the 1966 championship winner, the BT19, and yesterday completed its first laps of the $160 million Bend circuit at Tailem Bend in its new white and green racing livery.

Speaking at the launch last night owner and managing director of The Bend Motorsport Park, Dr Sam Shahin said the BT62 would be the ‘jewel in the crown’ of the facility which had already attracted a second of two V8 Supercars events to SA to add to the annual Adelaide 500.

“We are proud to partner with Brabham Automotive on its testing program for the BT62

in Australia, and to see The Bend become part of the ongoing success of one of motorsport’s most revered and iconic names,” he said.

The BT62 is a track-only racing car, with an initial production run of seventy cars limiting it to race teams in the GT category and wealthy car enthusiasts.