No doors. No roof. No compromise!

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Ariel’s probably not a motor company you’ve ever heard of, so if anyone tells you they make one of the greatest cars of the market, you’d look at them is suspicion. Then they’d tell you that the company only has 7 employees. What a laugh. But what do they build?

Ariels flagship car is the Ariel Atom. It’s latest version is the Atom 500, that started selling in 2008, but that model is to be upgraded with a V8 engine soon. to give the Atom 500 V8. measuring 3,41 m long (134 in) and 1,8 m wide (72 in), it’s not exactly the car you’d drive your children to school with.

How can a small car like that perform? Well, the solution is simple: bare minimum. The car has no doors, no windshield, no roof, no power steering, no electronic stability or anything else for that matter. The Ariel Atom keeps it to a bare minimum, and that includes the frame itself. The whole car weighs 456 kg (1,005 lb) in total. Talk about light!

Personally, I find that it’s not an ugly car. I even think that its frame is rather beautiful, in a strange manner. Its lines speak personality and power, and there’s some motorcycle influence in all these visible mechanics. But where it really gets beautiful is in its performance. It’s acceleration from 0 to 60 mph (97 km/h) is within the 2.7 seconds time-frame (or so the manufacturer claims). The Atom’s top speed is 225 km/h (140 mph), or 249 km/h (155 mph) “supercharged”.

Here’s what Top Gear has to say:

Want to buy it? The price ranges from £20,000 to £45,000 (the “supercharged” version) in the UK. And if you tried it out, please, give us feedback: is it that good?