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Peak Oil: Bugatti Makes a Car for the Ages | Product Reviews | Wired.com
by noteworthy at 8:58 pm EST, Mar 7, 2011 |
Joe Brown: The first Veyron is an engineering marvel. It required the intellectual might of one of the largest and arguably smartest car companies in the world to birth a car that was not only faster than anything on the road, but easy enough to pilot that anyone could drive it. To make the Grand Sport, Bugatti's engineers had to do the same thing, only with a giant hole in the middle. It was like designing a picture frame to break rocks. They had to bolster the floor, doors and B pillars (where the back edges of the windows rest) with acres of carbon fiber. They had to turn the topside air scoops into structural supports for protection during a rollover. Then they had to sacrifice 100 virgins and have the production facility in Molsheim, France, blessed by druids. The result is the most structurally rigid convertible in the world, which, miraculously, weighs no more and goes no slower than the coupe on which it is based. With the transparent roof removed, air resistance limits the Grand Sport to 217 mph, but you'd want that roof on for a top-speed run anyway; the wind could rip your face off at around 245.
You can spend $600 on a steering wheel and pedal set to drive your Veyron in Gran Turismo 5, and that will buy you a lot of realism, but one thing it won't do is rip your face off. |
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RE: Peak Oil: Bugatti Makes a Car for the Ages | Product Reviews | Wired.com
by Decius at 10:41 pm EST, Mar 7, 2011 |
noteworthy wrote:
You can spend $600 on a steering wheel and pedal set to drive your Veyron in Gran Turismo 5, and that will buy you a lot of realism, but one thing it won't do is rip your face off.
I think the opportunity cost of the $2.1 million you spent on it is an essential part of the experience. |
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Peak Oil: Bugatti Makes a Car for the Ages | Product Reviews | Wired.com
by janelane at 12:45 pm EST, Mar 2, 2011 |
They had to bolster the floor, doors and B pillars (where the back edges of the windows rest) with acres of carbon fiber. They had to turn the topside air scoops into structural supports for protection during a rollover. Then they had to sacrifice 100 virgins and have the production facility in Molsheim, France, blessed by druids.
I am crying at work I'm laughing so hard reading this review.-janelane |
Peak Oil: Bugatti Makes a Car for the Ages | Product Reviews | Wired.com
by Decius at 1:24 pm EST, Mar 7, 2011 |
That same cash-filled briefcase could buy seven Ferrari 599s or every single 2009 model Mercedes. You could snap up a top-shelf Maybach and employ a chauffeur until well past the apocalypse. Hell, in this economy, $2.1 million is probably enough to make you a one-man special-interest group with some serious Washington clout. But don’t. Buy a Grand Sport. Even if there were another 253-mph drop-top with more luxury appointments than a Bond villain’s boudoir, you wouldn’t want it. You’d want this exact car, because more than being a blast to drive, it is the greatest gasoline-powered vehicle that has ever been, or will ever be, built. Seriously.
This is, in fact, hillarious. |
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