Official images of upcoming GT sports car released

Mercedes-Benz’s effort to tease its upcoming GT sports car into public consciousness has begun. AMG today released official images of the GT’s interior, accompanied by a scant press release on the V8-powered 911 hunter, which will launch at the Paris Motor Show in October.

Built off the remains of the aluminium SLS architecture, but pitched around 25 per cent below the outgoing supercar, the GT will be on sale in April 2015.

While much of the GT’s switchgear seems to be taken directly from the C-Class (a car itself praised for taking Mercedes on a great leap forward in interior design), there are plenty of independent pieces there for AMG.

Whatever Benz does with the interior, the GT is really all about the engine. Code-named C190, the rear-wheel drive sports car will use a new generation twin-turbocharged, direct injection V8 with variable valve timing and lift to punch out around 550 horsepower.

The engine, dubbed M177, is essentially two of AMG’s cracking 2.0-litre, turbocharged four-cylinder motors (as fitted to the CLA 45 and the A 45) crammed together in a vee. It will also find a home in the next C 63 AMG.

While that will be about 30kW less than the SLS’s 6.2-litre atmo V8, its layout means it will deliver far more torque at lower rpm to boost the GT’s everyday drivability without losing linearity at higher rpm. It will also have demonstrably more torque than the linear SLS V8, but may miss out on some of its earth-shattering sound.