So let's start with the basics. The car is built up around a carbon-fibre monocoque so stiff and strong that Bugatti's engineers say it has no need for side airbags. All the panels are carbon fibre too, except the wings and doors, whose shapes are too complex to be manufactured easily in carbon, so make do with aluminium instead.
The car naturally uses double wishbone suspension at each corner and, of course, the brakes are massive and made from carbon ceramic material. They'll stop the Veyron from 250mph in less than ten seconds. The tyres are unique Michelin PAX run-flats and, with a 365 section at the back, are by far the fattest ever to be used on a road car. The exhaust system is titanium.
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| Engine capable of over 980bhp |
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But this, I suspect, is not what you really want to know. You're more interested in the monster responsible for its 987bhp power output and, having savoured it, I cannot say I blame you.
Astonishingly, the engine that's conceptually closest to this 8.3-litre, quad turbo 16-cylinder beast can be found in the humble Volkswagen Passat. Remember the Passat W8, the astonishingly slow-selling top-of-the-range from the last generation Passat? Well, in very broad terms, the Veyron engine is two of those joined together and boosted into the stratosphere courtesy of four turbochargers provided by Mitsubishi. And while most cars are happy with just the one radiator, keeping the engine, transmission and subsystems cool on a Veyron takes 10.
More incredible even than this is that Bugatti is actually being somewhat economical with the truth over its power output. The claimed 987bhp was measured, as are all VW power outputs, at an ambient outside temperature of over 40° C, where the air is thin, starving the turbos of the oxygen they need to develop full boost. At a more normal temperature, say 20° C, its output is nearer 1035bhp.
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| The Veyron has no rivals |
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Then there's the torque. When you accelerate, it is torque, not power that you feel. The Veyron has 922lb ft of the stuff: to put that into perspective, the only other car ever made to even approach the Veyron's performance, the McLaren F1, had 479lb ft of torque. So you have to understand, before you understand anything about the Veyron that this car has no rivals: it is a new dimension.
