A Rare Supercar Killer: The Brooke Cosworth Double R Supercharged 400

This is the only alloy-bodied Brooke Cosworth Double R Supercharged 400 in the world. While that name may be a bit of a mouthful it does tell you something important – this featherweight two-seater is powered by a supercharged Cosworth engine producing 400 bhp.

400 bhp is vastly more than most cars produce, even most modern sports cars, and it’s within sight of the 471 bhp produced by the Ferrari F40 and the 444 bhp produced by the Porsche 959. The key difference being weight – the Brooke Cosworth weighs in at just 510 kgs (1,124 lbs).

Fast Facts – The Brooke Cosworth Double R

• The Brooke Cosworth Double R Supercharged 400 was introduced in Britain in 2006 and it quickly received glowing reviews from British motoring media.
• The car is an all-new design based on the earlier Brooke Kensington ME190 designed to compete with the Caterham CSR 260. Unlike the Caterham, the Brooke has a mid-engined layout.
• Just 15 examples of the Double R were ever made and the car you see here is the only one with a full alloy body – a £15,000 ($20,300 USD) factory option.
• The non-supercharged version of the Brooke Cosworth Double R has a tubular steel spaceframe chassis, a longitudinally mid-mounted 2.3 liter 260 bhp Cosworth inline four-cylinder engine, a 5-speed gearbox, independent suspension and disc brakes at all four corners, and either a fiberglass or alloy body.

Brooke Cars And The Cosworth Double R

When the Brooke Cosworth Double R and its sibling, the Brooke Cosworth Double R Supercharged 400 were released in 2006 it’s likely that the folks over at Caterham sat up and took notice.

Based on the design of the earlier Brooke Kensington ME190, the Brooke Cosworth Double R was a re-engineered vehicle with no interchangeable parts with its forebear. It has a lot in common with the cars from Caterham with the exception of one thing – the engine is behind the driver rather than in front of them.

Brooke Kensington was originally founded in the mid-1990s as a kit car company, one of many in the UK, producing their unusual two-seater that seemed to take equal parts of influence from the Light Car Company’s Rocket and the Caterham 7.

Brooke Cosworth Double R Specifications

The company was taken over in the early 2000s by James Booker, with James Rose (ex-MG Rover) as the primary technical development engineer. They developed two key versions of the car, the non-supercharged Brooke Cosworth Double R, and the supercharged variant with 400 bhp, the appropriately named Brooke Cosworth Double R Supercharged 400.

Both cars are powered by the 2.3 liter 260 bhp Cosworth inline four-cylinder engine, essentially the same engine used by the Caterham CSR 260. Each of these engines was built by hand by Cosworth in the same facility where they were making the engines for the Williams Formula 1 Team.

The naturally aspirated version of this engine produced 260 bhp, with the supercharged version making 400 bhp.

In a car that weighs just 510 kgs (1,124 lbs) the 260 bhp engine option was already more than ample, but with the 400 bhp engine the Brooke became a legitimate supercar killer –  accelerating from 0 – 60 mph in ~2.9 seconds, and on to 100 mph in 6.5 seconds.

Though obviously the top speed of your average supercar will be higher, this only has a limited impact on a race track where the acceleration, braking, and cornering abilities of the Brooke would potentially give it an edge – depending on the specific track of course.

Thanks to its stiff, lightweight tubular steel spaceframe chassis, its lightweight fiberglass (or alloy) body, race-tuned independent suspension on all four corners and four wheel disc brakes, the Brooke Cosworth Double R was one of the quickest cars in its £31,995 ($43,350 USD) price range.

The End Of The Road

At some point between 2006 and 2014 Brooke Cars ceased trading, information about it is scarce but the cars the company built during their brief few years of operation are now much sought after by those looking for an interesting alternative to a Caterham 7.

Operating a low-volume car company is a difficult business, the majority that try it tend to fail, however thanks to those that try we have ended up with a number of fascinating cars throughout history – vehicles like the Tucker 48, Bricklin SV-1, DeLorean DMC-12, Vector W8, and the car you see here, the Brooke Cosworth Double R.

The Brooke Cosworth Double R Supercharged 400 Shown Here

This is actually the second time we’ve featured this car on Silodrome, it was last sold in 2021 and since this time it’s accumulated very little mileage.

This car is one of just 15 that were built and it’s the only one with a full aluminum alloy body, originally a £15,000 ($20,300 USD) factory option.

The first owner of this car kept it in an air tight storage bubble for the first 12 years of its life. The second owner drove it a little more frequently but the mileage stayed very low, just 1,369 at the time of cataloguing.

In January of 2022 this Brooke was given a servicing by Bell Sport and Classic, and it’s now ready for its new owner – whether they should wish to drive it or store it as an investment.

If you’d like to read more about this car or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing on Silverstone Auctions.

Images courtesy of Silverstone Auctions