Rolls-Royce are set to reveal their new Ghost at the Frankfurt motor show
in September, and there’s no question at all that this is definitely one finely made car. According to Rolls-Royce Motor Cars’ press release the Ghost will pass ‘through 60 pairs of hands, the production process involves more than 2,000 individual operations and takes at least 20 days to complete’.
In keeping with their tradition, the new Rolls-Royce will be classically simplistic on the interior, but they have some very cool gadgets to keep it bang up to date too. Some that are featured are voice control (for the audio menus and phone etc) and all-round cameras including a night vision camera placed in the front grille which has Pedestrian Recognition inbuilt. This means that the front camera reads the road up to 300 metres away, which then sends infra-red signal of the pedestrians heat signature to the cars computer, which in turn works out the speed and direction the car is travelling in and if necessary, issues a warning to the driver of any imminent danger. Now that’s modern technology.
Some other cool features are a H.U.D (heads up display) for the driver and Lane Departure Warning-this is, of course useful, in case you drift off to sleep, nestled deep within the warm leather seat with no road or engine noise to intrude on your lovely nap. High Beam Assistance means that your lights automatically dip on approach to another oncoming car, which saves you all that hard effort of reaching the huge chasm up the button to switch it off yourself. Strangely enough, Cadillac’s Series 62, built in 1959, had this feature on it, which worked brilliantly well, so how come more cars don’t have it on now?
Something very useful though, is the Active Cruise Control with Stop and Go. I say it’s useful because it bally well is. If you’re on cruise control going down the road and a car in front is going slower than yourself, the Ghost will slow the car down to the same speed as them. Once they move out of your way, dammit, the car will automatically take you back up to your original set speed again.
Out to the exterior of the Ghost and it does look very elegant. The doors, as on the Phantom, are rear-hinged or ’suicide’ style and seem to finish the classy look off very well. It doesn’t quite have that ‘out of my way peasants’ look as the Phantom does and is almost half a metre shorter, but still definitely commands attention on the road. From the front and rear it is unmistakably a Rolls-Royce, the front being adorned with the large grille and long, long bonnet, the rear having a ‘this is a hugely expensive car’ look to it. From the side you notice immediately that the car has no design lines running down it and it is beautifully smooth, almost like a yacht.
The Ghost’s engine is a twin-turbo 6.6 litre V12 and, even though the car weights nearly 3 tons laden, will accelerate from 0-60 mph (0-96 kph) in just 4.8 seconds and go on to a top speed of 155 mph (249 kph), though we don’t know whether that is limited or not yet. The Ghost’s 8 speed automatic power plant produces a hefty amount of torque to the tune of 575 ft/lbs at just 1,500 rpm. That’s some serious power from that amount of revs and put in this way, is nearly 175 ft/lbs more than a Lamborghini Gallardo 560-4. Horsepower is a staggering 563 hp which is an immense amount and 10 hp more than the Gallardo even.
Prices are looking to be around £190,000 including taxes and delivery. Will it be worth it? Well, the Phantom’s price was £265,000 and that was worth every penny you ever earned. We’re certain the Ghost will not disappoint its owners either.
Wealthy people of the world, get that deposit put down!
For more information on and photos of the Rolls-Royce Ghost click here.
