From the May 1989 issue of Car and Driver.
We can toss out three bagsfull of reasons to go stark raving euphoric over this automobile:
- You can be the first on your block—hell, in your whole state—to cruise the scene in a genuine MVS Venturi. As we write this, the U.S. importer is so new it has yet to sign the first dealer.
- Bystanders will stare gape-jawed as you pass, because that’s what they do in the presence of a Ferrariesque mid-engine sports car.
- You’ll happily wave back to them, because you’ll be in a fine mood: this is the first Ferrariesque mid-engine sports car that doesn’t hurt when you wear it.
Even more heartwarming, if you’re a business maven, is the story of manufacturing efficiency behind this car: The maker in France employs only 35 people.
“Okay, great, but what’s an MVS Venturi?” you ask. It’s a mid-engine two-seater about the size of a Fiero, powered by a turbocharged 2.5-liter Peugeot-Renault-Volvo V-6 positioned lengthwise ahead of the rear wheels. Performance is a bit shy of a Mustang V-8’s, fit and finish are Tiffany-grade, a U.S. price of $68,900 each has been announced, and the factory has built 172 cars since production started in May of 1987.
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Are we going too fast for you? One tends to talk fast about this car, because you feel like you’ll get behind if you so much as stop for a breath.
The history of MVS goes something like this: Engineer Claude Poiraud and stylist Gérard Godfroy, both burning to build a French sports car, got together around the beginning of 1984 and created a full-size mockup on VW GTI mechanicals, which they then presented at the 1984 Paris Auto Show. The response was favorable enough to attract some seed money. By mid-1985, an alliance had been struck with French racecar builder Jean Rondeau for further development. The first prototype was finished by the end of that year, substantially revised (including a new front suspension and a new engine), and presented at the 1986 Paris show. By the end of 1986, the car had been homologated with the French government, and work commenced on a manufacturing plant. The first production car was completed in the spring of 1987, and now MVS Venturis are on sale in France, Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, England, and—by the time you read this—probably Japan and the U.S., if everything has gone according to plan.
This is a company that never seems to set a foot wrong. From our point of view, an ocean away, MVS possesses two very rare qualities. First, the company is blessed with excellent car sense: the basic layout and structural design of the Venturi avoids the hardships usually inherent in mid-engine sports cars. And second, the company’s lean organization of apparently talented people enables it to execute ideas quickly.
MVS has a shrewd way of building cars. Instead of trying to be GM or Honda and build the bulk of the parts itself, it contracts other firms for parts and subassemblies. MVS does the design and development in the beginning, and then the final assembly at the end. Obviously, this method works—your typical homebuilding contractor operates this way, and so do most defense contractors. Low-volume car builders, on the other hand, usually try to be parts-makers, too. And that’s probably their big mistake. Car-building is easier than it looks if you go about it right.
There are plenty of car parts out in the world that would work just fine if properly incorporated into the design of an exotic car. These are parts with proven durability that can be had for the price of the part itself, because somebody else has already paid for the tooling. The MVS uses the turbocharged version of the aluminum 2.5-liter PRV V-6 that was developed by Renault for its R25 Turbo and Alpine GTA. The mating transaxle is a front-drive unit from a Renault. All four brakes are alike, also from a Renault. The taillights are BMW. The beautifully made single-arm windshield wiper is obviously from some production car, too: no one could afford such complicated tooling for volume in the MVS range. These off-the-shelf parts and countless others go faithfully about their jobs without drawing much attention to themselves—if the basic car is right.
The basic Venturi seems very right. By design. We know of no other mid-engine exotic that’s so hospitable to the human form. The sills are notably low, and the door cut is high on top, making entry and exit easy; a Corvette is torture by comparison. The front wheel housing doesn’t intrude into the driver’s footroom and force the pedals toward the center of the car, as in the Porsche 911; the Venturi driving position is quite normal. Cockpit space is generous; even our 6-foot-4-inch, 215-pound technical editor has room enough to drive and smile simultaneously. And, amazingly, the driver can easily check traffic behind and to the rear quarters, because the MVS has no significant blind spots. These are impressive design achievements.
And they are all the more impressive because they were accomplished while maintaining a notably stiff structure. The low sills mean that the tunnel must take over much of the structural work. Yet the tunnel is modest in size compared with the monstrosity between the seats of a Lotus Esprit. It does the job despite its modest height and breadth. The Venturi we tested showed just over 2000 miles on the odometer—enough to wear the new off, if it is easily worn off—yet the car was virtually free of rattles and creaks.
These virtues of comfort and solidness suggest that MVS comes to the exotic-car market from a different direction than Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Lotus. These other makers put sport first, and their cars are noisy, harsh-riding, uncomfortable machines (well, they are—with the possible exception of the Testarossa—never mind what their partisans say) with spirited mechanicals and questionable appointments. Although the MVS has the same generic mid-engine look on the outside, on the inside it puts hospitality and appointments first. The car is very comfortable. The interior is trimmed beautifully in leather and wood burl. The seams are straight. The coverings don’t pucker. The wood looks good.
Moreover, the mechanicals don’t assault your senses. There is too much turbo snorting and gulping audible from the air intake behind the driver’s left ear, and apparently there is some component of the sound that produces high readings on our sound-level meter. But our ears say the MVS is refined and unstressful in a way that the other famous-maker brands are not. You don’t have to be a sports-car guy to like this car.
Yet sports-car guys will not be disappointed by the performance. Acceleration is reasonable, with a 0-to-60-mph time of 6.7 seconds (aided enormously by a rear weight bias and sticky Michelins). Braking is fine at 177 feet from 70 mph. Handling is friendly, with generous warnings of the approaching limit. And the controls are all reasonably cooperative, particularly the clutch. This car is conspicuously turbocharged in the way it drives. It gathers itself up at its own turbo-lagged pace when you dip into the power. At cruising revs, you must wait a bit after depressing the pedal for the thrust, which then comes on with a polite rush. But the turbo enables a relatively small and calm engine to produce respectable power outputs, and we find the mild manners of the powerplant to be in keeping with the overall character of this car.
Still, as you would expect of car critics, we have a short list of details we dislike. The turbo-generated snorting and gasping from the air intake is inappropriately rude. The shifter is generally fine for shifting (except for the high-effort fourth-to-fifth shift), but finding neutral in the narrow pattern is something of a puzzle. Straight-ahead steering stability is borderline weavy at the legal limit, and it gets worse fast as you approach three-digit numbers. And the air conditioning will be marginal, we think, on hot American days.
Nonetheless, what we have here is an intriguing machine—an exotic sports car that’s practically painless. That’s a new combo for the menu. And, logically, the market demand should be bigger than it is for sports cars that hurt.
But logic has nothing to do with sports cars. This is a fashion business, and MVS is a “huh?” label. The rich guys are lined up none deep to buy this car. They’re thinking Ferrari, and the 328GTB, at $77,900, lists for only $9000 more. North American MVS, the Miami-based importer, hopes to sell 300 Venturis in the first year—an ambitious schedule for an unproven car with no heritage.
Still, the car—at least the pre-introduction sample we drove—is an uncommonly agreeable piece. The question is, is that enough?
Specifications
Specifications
1990 MVS Venturi
Vehicle Type: mid-engine, rear-wheel-drive, 2-passenger, 2-door coupe
PRICE
Base/As Tested: $69,400/$69,400
ENGINE
turbocharged and intercooled SOHC V-6, aluminum block and heads, port fuel injection
Displacement: 150 in3, 2458 cm3
Power: 182 hp @ 5500 rpm
Torque: 214 lb-ft @ 2250 rpm
TRANSMISSION
5-speed manual
CHASSIS
Suspension, F/R: control arms/multilink
Brakes, F/R: 11.0-in vented disc/11.0-in vented disc
Tires: Michelin MXX
F: 205/55ZR-16
R: 245/45ZR-16
DIMENSIONS
Wheelbase: 94.5 in
Length: 161.0 in
Width: 66.9 in
Height: 46.1 in
Passenger Volume, F: 54 ft3
Cargo Volume: 12 ft3
Curb Weight (mfr’s estimate): 2760 lb
C/D TEST RESULTS
60 mph: 6.7 sec
1/4-Mile: 14.9 sec @ 93 mph
100 mph: 17.7 sec
Top Gear, 30–50 mph: 9.8 sec
Top Gear, 50–70 mph: 7.2 sec
Top Speed (mfr claim): 152 mph
Braking, 70–0 mph: 177 ft
Interior Sound
Idle: 54 dBA
Full Throttle: 82 dBA
70-mph Cruising: 76 dBA
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