During 1993 the McLaren team built a modified version of the MP4/8, dubbed the MP4/8B, to be used as a test car for the Lamborghini V12 engine that had been in Formula One since . After a handshake deal between Ron Dennis and Bob Lutz of Chrysler (who at the time owned Lamborghini) at a motor show in Munich, the modified car carried the V12 engine (dubbed the Lamborghini 3512) that was also supplied at the time to the Larrousse team and had previously been used by both Lotus and Ligier with little success. Lutz explained that after four years in Formula One, Chrysler wanted to test whether the V12 had the potential to be a winner in F1. After running with lower ranked teams since its introduction to F1 in (which by Lamborghini's own admission was because they did not feel the new engine could do justice to one of the leading teams), it was decided that a top team was needed to test that potential and a set of V12 engines were supplied to McLaren for testing.