Auto Car | 2010 Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport in Napa Valley | The Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport is a violent, taunting, confounding and punctiliously engineered maelstrom. It is a handmade wonder built in a castle, and yet resembles a slightly squashed jelly bean. It has a $30,000 stereo, but it’s too much work to actually listen to it. The 16-cylinder, quad-turbocharged engine with 1,001 horsepower and 922 lb-ft of torque is programmed not to let you damage it, but in just one afternoon, the leather-trimmed coachwork on the doors will be a mess of shoe marks. The car’s brake rotors are chaperoned by 28 brake pistons, but using them forcefully is like begging someone to plow into the aforementioned engine. The car will cost you €1.6 million (roughly $2.24M USD), for which you get, as a soft top, an umbrella. That’s right, an umbrella. Own it and you’ll be master of the quickest accelerating production car in the world, and yet you’ll probably never remember what that acceleration is like.
When we drove the Veyron coupe, we admitted to not being carried away by its looks, but we found a greater appreciation for the lines of this car. Excising a portion of the roof doesn’t change our minds, but that isn’t to say that the design doesn’t look good. More importantly, that isn’t to say that the Bugatti doesn’t have a certain… something… that will impress itself upon you even after just one meeting. From the side, although the car’s surfaces are austere, how they intersect in three dimensions is rather lively. Our favorite line is from the rear three-quarter, the fender edge that forms the shoulder of the door then appears to turnabout in a varying-radius 180, back to the front wheel, and delineates the top edge of sill.
That, however, is actually a trick of the eye. From the side and especially the front, follow the line of the door and it’s as if the car came in two pieces, with the narrower front slotting into a much more commodious rear component. It isn’t usually a compliment to say “You have an ample hiney,” but we can say that about the Veyron Grand Sport with no ill intent. It is serious business. Especially after being beguiled by that low, rolled-back front end, to happen upon the swelling, blunt force trauma of the stern is like discovering that the dainty girl you’re on a first date with is actually built like Vladimir Klitschko underneath her dress.
In this car’s case, those two personalities make sense, and the lines chosen to adorn them fit and flow with quiet sense. Yet return to that innocent front end, and it doesn’t quite look the same anymore because you know what’s hiding in that indecent rear: a plasma reactor.
We can admit that even though we’ve driven the coupe, we had no idea what the Bugatti Veyron really was. We didn’t understand it – sure, we had a great time and the car is distortingly fast and stupendously powerful and really expensive and simple to drive and Volkswagen supposedly loses money on every one them and blah blah blah. Frankly, that could be a lot of cars. After spending an evening and the following day with an engineer and finding out what’s really going on inside the car, we get it. We get why the car is so expensive and still loses money. You simply couldn’t start an entire car company, create this as your first and only offering, and make money. The car is stupendously engineered.
The engineering of the Bug can be barely compared to other cars – it’s more like an F-16. It cannot be driven without its computers, and there are 27 ECUs and computer-based controllers throughout – and that doesn’t account for all of the car’s computers. The four drivetrain ECUs for the engine, transmission, ABS and stabilizing system, and Haldex clutch are always in contact and must be in working condition, or else the car won’t operate. But just in case there’s a problem, each ECU has an emergency program so the car won’t stop in the middle of whatever you’re doing – all you’ll see is a dashboard light and experience reduced power when the car enters safe mode. The rearbugattigrandsportfd 07 opt 300x199 Test Drive: Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport everything a man wants wing serves braking, aero, and cooling purposes. When raised at 110 mph during braking, it jumps up to a 60-degree angle and withstands 800 kg (1,760 pounds) of pressure. Fully extended for emergency braking, it raises the car’s coefficient of drag from .39 to .68. Hydraulics able to handle the pressure at top speed couldn’t be fitted with obstruction detectors, so the tail lowers slowly, in stages, to give everyone and everything time to get out of the way of it and its housing in the rear panel. Conveniently, the car detects automatically if you’re running on snow or ice.
The Bugatti’s engine wants to live, and will protect itself any time it detects impending damage. It won’t shut off, it will simply detune itself to the point where no damage will be caused and respectfully ask to be taken to the shop. If the oil pressure goes down too low, the engine will lower the allowable RPMs. If you can’t get 98 octane fuel, the engine will automatically retune itself to the octane you can get, even 91.
To turn the coupe into an adequate targa, the tub was reinforced and the door material was switched from aluminum to carbon fiber. The B-pillars get carbon fiber hoops and the intake faces get their own carbon fiber hoops as well. The transmission tunnel underneath the car, formerly open, is closed off with a stiffening carbon plate.
Source : www.car-addicts.com
When we drove the Veyron coupe, we admitted to not being carried away by its looks, but we found a greater appreciation for the lines of this car. Excising a portion of the roof doesn’t change our minds, but that isn’t to say that the design doesn’t look good. More importantly, that isn’t to say that the Bugatti doesn’t have a certain… something… that will impress itself upon you even after just one meeting. From the side, although the car’s surfaces are austere, how they intersect in three dimensions is rather lively. Our favorite line is from the rear three-quarter, the fender edge that forms the shoulder of the door then appears to turnabout in a varying-radius 180, back to the front wheel, and delineates the top edge of sill.
That, however, is actually a trick of the eye. From the side and especially the front, follow the line of the door and it’s as if the car came in two pieces, with the narrower front slotting into a much more commodious rear component. It isn’t usually a compliment to say “You have an ample hiney,” but we can say that about the Veyron Grand Sport with no ill intent. It is serious business. Especially after being beguiled by that low, rolled-back front end, to happen upon the swelling, blunt force trauma of the stern is like discovering that the dainty girl you’re on a first date with is actually built like Vladimir Klitschko underneath her dress.
In this car’s case, those two personalities make sense, and the lines chosen to adorn them fit and flow with quiet sense. Yet return to that innocent front end, and it doesn’t quite look the same anymore because you know what’s hiding in that indecent rear: a plasma reactor.
We can admit that even though we’ve driven the coupe, we had no idea what the Bugatti Veyron really was. We didn’t understand it – sure, we had a great time and the car is distortingly fast and stupendously powerful and really expensive and simple to drive and Volkswagen supposedly loses money on every one them and blah blah blah. Frankly, that could be a lot of cars. After spending an evening and the following day with an engineer and finding out what’s really going on inside the car, we get it. We get why the car is so expensive and still loses money. You simply couldn’t start an entire car company, create this as your first and only offering, and make money. The car is stupendously engineered.
The engineering of the Bug can be barely compared to other cars – it’s more like an F-16. It cannot be driven without its computers, and there are 27 ECUs and computer-based controllers throughout – and that doesn’t account for all of the car’s computers. The four drivetrain ECUs for the engine, transmission, ABS and stabilizing system, and Haldex clutch are always in contact and must be in working condition, or else the car won’t operate. But just in case there’s a problem, each ECU has an emergency program so the car won’t stop in the middle of whatever you’re doing – all you’ll see is a dashboard light and experience reduced power when the car enters safe mode. The rearbugattigrandsportfd 07 opt 300x199 Test Drive: Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport everything a man wants wing serves braking, aero, and cooling purposes. When raised at 110 mph during braking, it jumps up to a 60-degree angle and withstands 800 kg (1,760 pounds) of pressure. Fully extended for emergency braking, it raises the car’s coefficient of drag from .39 to .68. Hydraulics able to handle the pressure at top speed couldn’t be fitted with obstruction detectors, so the tail lowers slowly, in stages, to give everyone and everything time to get out of the way of it and its housing in the rear panel. Conveniently, the car detects automatically if you’re running on snow or ice.
The Bugatti’s engine wants to live, and will protect itself any time it detects impending damage. It won’t shut off, it will simply detune itself to the point where no damage will be caused and respectfully ask to be taken to the shop. If the oil pressure goes down too low, the engine will lower the allowable RPMs. If you can’t get 98 octane fuel, the engine will automatically retune itself to the octane you can get, even 91.
To turn the coupe into an adequate targa, the tub was reinforced and the door material was switched from aluminum to carbon fiber. The B-pillars get carbon fiber hoops and the intake faces get their own carbon fiber hoops as well. The transmission tunnel underneath the car, formerly open, is closed off with a stiffening carbon plate.
Source : www.car-addicts.com
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