Lewis Hamilton plotting 'LH Series' AMG

Three-time world champion Lewis Hamilton has dominated Formula 1 racing and now he wants to dominate the road, with a plan to develop his own hard-charging Mercedes-Benz sports car.

Hamilton told motoring.com.au at the weekend's Goodwood Festival of Speed that he wants to create "a limited-edition LH Series" model for Mercedes-AMG's.

Relaxed and affable during an interview at the global premiere of the wildest and most advanced road-legal Mercedes-AMG sports car yet, the twin-turbo V8-powered GT R, the F1 champ said he plans to build an even wilder vehicle in future.

"They told me they were doing this project and they'd love me to get involved. They showed me the car and when I first saw it they'd already designed it. I had all these ideas but they couldn't be added to this [GT R] model.

"It's already pretty awesome," grinned the world's most famous race driver, "but I said to them hopefully in future I can do something where I could do my own spec."

He wouldn't be the first F1 driver to have his name emblazoned on a production car, nor help develop it, as former Red Bull Racing F1 star Sebastian Vettel helped create a high-performance 300kW V8-powered Infiniti SUV in 2012.

Hamilton, a 31-year-old multi-millionaire, didn't go into detail about what he's planning, but said talks are already underway with Mercedes-Benz.

"So we've spoken about doing a limited-edition, an LH Series, at some stage. Whether it's this car [AMG GT] or another one, I will be very, very hands on.

"I've been with Mercedes since I was 13 so it’s a perfect place for me to be able to start and do something in the future, using their expertise. There's no better company to work with."

It's understood that the strategy to offer an LH Series Mercedes-AMG is some ways off, but Hamilton's passion for road cars is just as strong as it is for race cars.

Having raced for McLaren and Mercedes F1 teams since 2007, he asserted that his experience behind the wheel of countless F1 cars gives him a unique ability to craft something very special with the German car-maker.

"The fact I race an F1 car, I know the best performance of any car there is. So to be able to extract from that and help develop a car and set it up to a way people have never experienced is something I want to be able to do.

"There's no one that can set the car up like I can set it up," said Hamilton.

"I'm biased, but to be able to take that 23 years' experience and put that into a road production car I think would be awesome."

The impeccably-dressed British F1 maestro said allowing Mercedes-AMG customers "to feel as close as possible to what I feel [in an F1 car]," is the objective.

With that in mind, an LH Series sports car would need to deliver extreme levels of downforce and grip, and the active aerodynamics of the Mercedes-AMG GT R, which comprises an active underbody and adaptive front grille louvres, would no doubt provide the perfect starting point.

It would need more power too.

Although AMG assures us that its biturbo 4.0-litre V8 is capable of belting out more mumbo than the upcoming GT R's 430kW/700Nm – and has also confirmed Black and GT4 versions of the GT to come — Hamilton said if he had his way it would be a 12-cylinder machine.

"V12 is my favourite engine. One day I want to do a car with a V12 engine."